Best generic ink for Canon Pixma Pro 9000 MkII?

[stratman]

I don't use all the inks that your model printer does, so I cannot be sure what the nozzle check should correctly look like. Others here will know.

From what I see in the nozzle check, the BK is not black, the R and G are at a minimum very light in intensity, and the PM not magenta at all. This does not look like what I would expect from your printer.

Your problem may be, but not limited to:
1) Wrong color refilled ink in certain cartridges
2) Ink starvation from certain cartridges - no flow out the cartridge(s). Poor flow from a clogged cartridge or an air leak. The quality of the ink you've been using could be the cause, or, an unusual interaction between the ink originally in that cartridge and the new refill ink.
3) A contamination of one or more cartridges ink mixed with another. This could happen before ink enters the print head or after the ink goes in the print head.
4) No or inadequate suction on the print head / cartridge(s) to suck out ink from the cartridge. Checking the function of the Purge Pads at some point may be helpful.
5) Some other catastrophic failure. Usually these are accompanied by an error message. You haven't spoken about that so hopefully that isn't involved. Stop printing pictures until the nozzle check appears appropriate.

The one initial weak link in your story is that you are using an unknown aftermarket inks and cartridges. These are notorious for creating problems. You can try a number of potential fixes, including purging, but you may need to purchase all original OEM Canon cartridges to resolve your problem and prevent future issues (along with using quality refill ink)

The members will help you, but you need to be prepared to obtain OEM Canon cartridges and use only quality ink if possible. If your printer is still under warranty, obtain OEM Canon cartridges, see if this fixes your issues, and if not, send the printer in for service.

 

[dinky]

Your problem may be, but not limited to:
1) Wrong color refilled ink in certain cartridges.

I was careful refilling and the ink colors look correct in each cart . But I'll recheck.

2) Ink starvation from certain cartridges - no flow out the cartridge(s). Poor flow from a clogged cartridge or an air leak. The quality of the ink you've been using could be the cause, or, an unusual interaction between the ink originally in that cartridge and the new refill ink.

Yes, possible...as are your #3 and #4. It's not easy for me to diagnose though. The purge pads?

Also, no error messages from the printer. Just poor nozzle check colors and crap photos.

As for ink I use Hobbicolors. There are 4 remanuf carts (not refilled by me) that were working before and are full, so I didn't want to replace them yet. I will replace these 4 carts with refilled Canon carts to make 8 oem refills and see.

If the issue becomes intractable, then I'm back to ordering 3rd party ink carts (which worked quite well). I was quite excited to master this... oh well.

Thanks

 

[rodbam]

Will the 8 refilled OEM cartridges you're going to use all have Hobbicolor inks in them? I'm still on a mixture of IS inks & Canon inks & still my print outs look good.

 

[dinky]

Yes Rodbam, all hobbicolors in OEM carts. I doubt this will help but hey...

I trust Stratman's range of probable causes to be spot on but it's hard to easily determine which applies to me. ...my gut says it's something simple that is just not quite apparent yet.

 

[rodbam]

Dinky, on your third photo "Image on plain paper" the nozzle check colours have what looks to be the wrong colours in two cartridges, unless I'm no good at reading upside down & I should be living in Oz. Your BK (Black) cart shows the magenta colour & your photo magenta looks to be light black or grey. Is this the problem? The red & green looks very weak too but i'm not sure what this test is supposed to look like, I will print one tomorrow & see how mine looks.
-Image on plain paper:
http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/8171/canonpro9000plainpaper.jpg
I got too curious to wait until morning so I printed my nozzle check & here it is the same way up as yours & you can see your BK & PM are swapped. Some of your other colours look strange too on the right side. My red & green inks are still 100% Canon.
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i406/rodbam/_MG_5676.jpg

 

[The Hat]

Dinky
Looking at your nozzle check it a cured to me that all of your colours
on the left side of the printed sample are completely wrong.

So you either have total ink starvation on all of these cartridges or your
purge unit on that side has a big problem, and my money is on the purge unit.

As I dont have the 9000 and can only speculate that the 9000 purge unit is laid out
just like your nozzle check is, where you have on one side the colours are wrong and the other side there right.

I would investigate into your purge unit first and leave the cartridges alone for the time being.
Drop some Windex onto both purge unit pads and do a head clean, then
check to see if all of the liquid is gone and the pads are dry or still saturated.

Follow stratman advice and dont print anything other than nozzle checks till your problem is fixed.. :|

 

[dinky]

Thanks The Hat. I am off to get some ammonia (not a drop at home: we use white vinegar to clean windows (my next project!).

Anyone can kindly send me links to pics of the purge unit, how to access and clean it and anything else I should clean in (carefully!) there? I read you soak the PU in a few drops of Windex/Ammonia and wait to dissolve any clogs? Otherwise my quick googling has not yielded much.

Thanks all urging this wounded grunt on to victory! This weekend is my final push, come what may. We shall fight in the purge unit, in the nozzle checks, in the cartridges...we shall never surrender (well, at least not until Sunday morning).

 

[rodbam]

It seems as though Mr Dinky didn't read my post just above Hats so I suppose that's the drawbacks of just being a Guru a There's two colours on the right side (if we turn the page the right way up) the red & the photo cyan look to be correct when compared to my printout of the same nozzle check. So you can either go to all the trouble of messing with the purge unit (whatever that is) or the simple task of inserting your original OEM carts in the printer & make double sure they are filled with the correct colour inks. For your black to be printing magenta & your photo magenta to be printing a sort of grey colour from my very limited knowledge I would suspect your generic cartridges may have been filled wrong otherwise how can black ink produce magenta in your nozzle check?
Here's my photo of a nozzle check from my printer as posted above & went seemingly unnoticed, I even turned it upside down to match your own......... I know I know, I'm so helpful
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i406/rodbam/_MG_5676.jpg

 

[dinky]

Oh no...Guru Rodbam...Dinky respects you! Your nozzle check print is in fact very helpful.

Let me explain. For whatever reason (poor scan/color repro) my nozzle check image that I posted is inaccurate. On paper, BK is very light grey (not magenta) and the other colors are all fine when I check against yours and Canon's NChk image. The only one that is screwy is PM which is an even lighter grey. I know the Hat believes all the colors are wrong but that may be because of the poor scan. So it looks to me like that's the only off cart color is PM as the others are very much like your image and the Canon's. I am of course speaking of the big rectangles...the small dark bars next to each color all look very similar (dark green to very dark grey) and I am not sure how to interpret those.

I don't know what purge is either. I am waiting for instructions. The printer suffers from a bit of dust so I imagine a clean up is a good idea anyway?

 

[rodbam]

Well that's better Dinky I now feel respected as it took a week of learning to get my Guru status
I think the purge unit The Hat is talking about is where the head clean happens, it's on the right hand side where the head parks itself when at rest. If you lift the lid to expose the head & cartridges the head etc comes to the middle & if you shine a torch (flashlight) into the right hand side you should see some sponges, I think they should look black with waste ink. So I think the Hat is saying to drop the cleaning stuff onto these sponges to get rid of as much ink as you can, maybe wipe them & then do a head clean through the printer preferences then no ink from the ink pads will contaminate your heads during the clean on start up.
Best check with a master first as most of what I've just said could be just a Guru's gobbledegook