I am using genuine Canon cartridges. And leaking/cross-contamination is an entirely new (and previously unknown to me) possibility. I had thought my yellow ink turning dark was definitely mould. Is there a way to be sure?
Well hell. The mould is back, and the new carts are set to be ruined. Again. And I cannot help but wonder, if the mold had been in the print head, why shouldn't it come back, since I did nothing with the head itself and it probably became a safe refuge for it?
Oh! Very insightful, thank you! Now I will lose my sleep thinking whether I inserted the square 'sponge' proper side up (or, indeed, the cut corner facing top-left)...
Okay, I belatedly followed out your recommendation (and replaced the carts;. the old ones were probably - can't tell for the darker colours - beyond hope anyway). Will monitor the results.
However, the purge unit was a bit too deep down there to easily reach, so I used a syringe to flood it...
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...