Okay, one more question: shouldn't I do something about the print head itself? After all, the mold is spreading inside my carts. You're suggesting I clean the purge unit. The head is in between them and is, presumably, infected, too.
But where will all this liquid go? What amount is safe to use (it will have to go somewhere, won't it)? And what liquid should I use? (Suppose you mean it should be an ammonia-based one, and I unwittingly use an ammonia-free window washing liquid)
Oh. I'm afraid I've never done that. Is 'purge unit' the thing that soaks up the ink from all the maintenance cleaning operations? So there's some disassembly required to clean it?
Hi there! I had the misfortune of switching out my trusty refillable carts for the equally trusty iP4200 back to Canon originals, and now two colours (yellow and, possibly, blue) repeatedly turn dark. Repeatedly because I replaced like three CLI-8Ys. In-printer clearing the colours works, that...
But what happens if an incompletely flushed head gets dried? Shouldn't that lead to even more clogging (after all, having dried traces of ink inside is not a head's natural state)? Or, inversely, might it make sense to keep the nozzles wet while drying the head's electronic parts? Just a thought.
Well, no miracle happened so far. My original head still can't print PGBK, and the 'new' one's PGBK nozzles are half-clogged despite extensive soaking.
I have now acquired a second 'new' head from a similar source and am soaking it as we speak (the definition of insanity, they say). Speaking of...
I'm still soaking my 'new' head. Getting a bit of OCD here as it still bleeds PGBK a bit (what looks like a couple of drops per day). I suppose I do need to clean in *thoroughly*, don't I?
Here you go.
You may find it strange, but that seems to be rather common here. People buy a relatively cheap 'photo printer', play with it for some time, then, I suppose, find that the price of 1st party ink is high, and their interest in printing is low (plus the digital age with its 24h...
Almost. No. 5 should read 'Print head soaked. PGBK now no longer printing at all.', and no. 6 'New PGBK cartridge used without PGBK appearing on nozzle check or Plain Paper printing'.
Well, the first time (a year+ ago) I did it I wasn't following your instructions. I seem to remember flushing...
OK, I will try to repeat the procedure. It just didn't occur to me that it could possibly make the issue worse.
I don't know. It successfully ran out of ink, so I guess it was okayish. I am admittedly just hoping to find a random intact head and join in the fabled luck of the Irish.
Yes, it's just like B.
Do you believe soaking might not have cleaned my original head (and somehow even made it worse)?
Also, this Regular/Deep Cleaning business gets me nervous. I almost thought I burnt the nozzles the last time because, as I was talk later, doing too many of them...
The real question is: I have just acquired another second-hand iP4200, and its head is currently soaking away. Perhaps I may be able to restore it to life. PeterBJ's stamp test seems to suggest it's not the logic board that's at fault. Should I try inserting the 'new' head into my original...
And sorry guys if I seem to have confused you. The previous nozzle check image referred to what it looked like prior to soaking (when the funnel-shaped loss of ink occurred - stratman said he found it surprising that the could be loss of ink followed by a normal-looking nozzle check).
After...
Well, mine is looking exactly like the first one: no PGBK stripe at all.
The thing is, I soaked the bloody head this Tuesday (as per stratman's instruction). Following which it stopped printing PGBK altogether (instead of producing the funnel-shaped missing patches described above).
And I did...
I am printing on Plain Paper setting, so it definitely is PGBK that's acting up. (I had been printing on Photo Paper setting the last time I thought my PGBK nozzles died completely (as documented earlier in this thread), and still so do from time to time now that they're once again not...