Are Canon BCI-3e inks Pigmented or Dye inks

[Trigger 37]

A very long time ago I was told by Canon tech support that their BCI-6 inks were Dye inks and that the BCI-3e inks are all pigmented. We all know for sure that the BCI-3e Blk is pigmented, as that has been demonstrated and widely published. When I order ink from just about anyone for my BCI-3e Blk ink carts, the bottle is labeled "Black -Pigmented"

However, I just printed a 6 color test image on my i850 (4 color) that is designed to purge ink out of each ink cart for 6 color printers. Then I dropped some water on to all the colors, including the black. They all smeared and ran together except the black, which did nothing. Water did not touch it (wonder if that is why so many people complain about their black ink clogs and it won't seem to clear up when soaking in water). One place that sells Image Specialist inks and their site makes a point to state that their inks match the manufactuer's inks is PrecisionColors.com. Here is the link to that claim.
http://home.eol.ca/~mikling/Inks.html

When you go to that link and look at their list of inks for Canon, their ink table shows that all their BCI-3e inks, (Cyan,Magenta,Yellow, Photo Cyan, Photo Magenta, are all "Dye" inks. When I take out the ink tanks from the i850 (I got it used) it seems the yellow looks like pigmented ink. It looks totally different from all my other Canon printer yellow ink. The other colors are too dark to see anything. The yellow is opaque, or at least it is much darker than any yellow I have ever seen.

The reason I'm asking for confirmation on this is that I have an i850 that uses the BCI-3e inks (the ink carts are just labeled with a large capital "E"). I don't want to be using pigmented ink for photos or anything. I think it cost much more, and it clogs up the printhead very easy if not maintained on a regular basis. So I was planning on purging the old ink from these carts, and filling them with Dye ink. The problem being, is the Canon Print driver is expecting the color gamut of Pigmented ink and will this totally mess up any photo printing. The only two printers in the Canon i Series that use the BCI-3e inks for color are the i550 and the i850. The i560, i860, i950, i960, iP4000, iP5000, iP6000 all use the BCI-6 inks which are Dye inks. The new iP6600D CLI-8 carts for all colors including black are Dye inks.

I have been to the Canon Web site and attempted a search on their knowledge base for these printers and did not find any information about Pigmented or Dye inks. I got my original information about this from a Canon Support tech.



If anyone has any experience with either the i550 or i850 in converting them over to Dye ink I would like to hear about it.

 

[ghwellsjr]

The short answer: the only pigmented ink in the BCI-3e series is the black ink in the wider cartridge, all the inks in the narrower cartridges are dye inks. So it's simple: wide cartridge = pigment ink, narrow cartridge = dye ink.

The long answer: the rumor that Canon 3e series inks are pigmented has a long history. No one has ever been able to point out a Canon website or printed material that makes this claim.

What I have been able to gather is that when Canon first introduced the BCI individual ink tanks (as opposed to the three-color cartridges of which they have many, some with built-in heads, some without), they called them the BCI-3. These cartridges had only one sponge material in them. I also believe, but I'm not positive, that all Canon's early black inks were pigmented. These were for use on plain paper. To get black on photo paper, they combined all three colors.

Eventually, they realized their one-sponge design was inferior and they came out with the two-sponge design and called it BCI-3e. They may also have changed the formulation of the color inks at that time, I really don't know. But the point is that they had not yet introduced any printers that had both pigment and dye black ink so they never made a big deal about the fact that their black inks were pigmented and used only on plain paper.

Eventually, they came out with a dye black ink for use on photo paper and they called it BCI-3ePBK to stand for Photo Black. It was a narrow cartridge, just like all the other dye ink cartridges. Since one of the black cartridges was narrow and the other wide, there never was any confusion about where they went in the printer, but there was confusion about which one to buy.

To avoid this confusion, they changed the nomenclature on the dye cartridges from BCI-3e to BCI-6 and left the BCI-3eBK for the wider pigment black cartridge. Again, I'm not sure if they changed the formulation of the dye inks when they went from BCI-3e to BCI-6 but the cartridges are identical. The label on the black dye ink is simply BCI-6BK. There is no "p" to signify photo or to get confused with pigment.

So, if you want to refill your BCI-3e color cartridges, you do not have to purge them to get rid of any pigment residues because there are none. But if Canon made a change in the formulation of ink when they went from BCI-3e to BCI-6, then you should get dye ink designed specifically for the BCI-3e. Maybe someone else will post an answer to this question.

BTW, anyone who wants to get some empty cartridges for their BCI-6 printers can also use BCI-3e. They tend to go for cheaper prices on eBay because most people are not aware that the cartridges are identical.

 

[mikling]

I believe the E designation came about when Canon introduced their ink level detection system using the prism. I would guess they used the E since it was an Electronic system. I'm not 100% on this but getting back to the gist of the thread.

The opaque yellow is dark because of the choices that Canon uses to formulate their colors within the instructions to the printhead. Pigment yellow is actually quite light and truly yellow in color and totally opaque... looks like paint actually.. Because of the way dye ink reacts with paper, the end result of the color you see is different from that in liquid form. Just to give another example, the new Epson dye based printer line now uses a different set of colors from that of the old. The new inks are supposed to offer a wider color range and in comparing the yellow, they've gone to a much lighter shade in the liquid form. However, when printed and intermixed with the other colors, the colors can be identical. Another hint is that colored pigment ink is much more expensive than dye ink.

To date, Canon has not introduced any colored pigment ink ( excluding TEXT black) into any of their consumer line. The closest we have seen are the Canon Pro 9500 which have been in the news but not to be seen yet. Maybe we will see it later this year. The little brother to that is the Canon Pro 9000 which is the successor to the i9900 but that is also all dye based.

Check this review out and you'll get the same information.
http://www.photo-i.co.uk/Reviews/interactive/Canon Pro 9000/page-1.html

The 9500 will be Canon's first foray into the consumer/pro line utlizing pigment inks. That should dispel any ideas that you i850 used pigment yellow.

Canon does have pigment ink wide format printers ( read floor standing BIG) but those are beyond the means of the normal consumer.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I just want to make one thing clear about the pigment black ink. Even though Canon consistently says it's for text printing, it really is for any kind of printing on plain paper, at least for the printers I use. It gets blended with colors for a photo or graphic on plain paper just like the dye black gets blended with colors on photo paper. You do have the option of specifying greyscale on plain paper, where only the pigment black ink is used (as long as you don't also specify duplex or borderless). You should select the high quality for a good image.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I believe the E designation came about when Canon introduced their ink level detection system using the prism. I would guess they used the E since it was an Electronic system. I'm not 100% on this...

I took a look at my BCI-3 cartridge and it has a prism, just like the BCI-3e cartridges.

 

[Tin Ho]

BCI-3CMY and BCI-3eCMY differ in the ink in them. BCI-3eCMY contain ink suitable for photo printing. BCI-3CMY contain ink more suitable for graphic art. With e on the cartridge they charged more money. Well, they were all replaced by BCI-6CMY eventually. I believe the ink in BCI-6 is probably better than that in BCI-3e or BCI-3. Canon would not have moved to BCI-6 if it were not the case. If your printer had BCI-3 or BCI-3eCMY carts you should use BCI-6CMY to get the benefit of newer and probably better photo ink.

 

[Trigger 37]

Wow,... These are really great answers to my question. I also got a very good answer from PrecisionColors which is basically the same as all the responses above. Just for everyone's information,... the ink carts in the i850 that I have(Which I bought used and damaged) are all original Canon carts with BCI-3eX label on then, The 'X' is either BLK, C, M, or Y. In the middle of the top label there is a very large "E" in script italic font. These must be rather old Canon carts but the person that sold me the printer had it for a long time and must have purchased the "E" versions somewhere as replacement carts as they were about 80% full when I got it. Now that I have it fixed, it prints great.

Again, thanks to everyone for you response.

 

[ghwellsjr]

You can still buy Canon and compatible BCI-3e series cartridges from places like OfficeMax and Staples. They haven't been discontinued.

I checked on one bulk ink supplier's website and they use the same inks for both the BCI-3e and BCI-6 cartridges. Anyone know of a supplier that uses different inks for these cartridges?