CANON PIXMA printer problem: prints stripes HELP

[kato92]

Hi, great forum. Learned a lot here.

Now my problem: I have a Canon Pixma IP5000 printer. Never had any problems with photo printing up till now. When I print a photo, there are stripes/lines in the photo. I did several cleanings and deep cleanings of all colours but the problem remains. Also used cleaning cartriges but problem remains.

This is a scan of a photo printed on normal paper with printquality on HIGH.



And this is a scan of a photo printed on normal paper with printquality on NORMAL.



You can see that the stripes with quality on high are much closer to each other.

Any idea what this could be? Funny this is, if I look at the different photo's, I don't think the problem is with the carthriges or printhead, but I could be wrong.

Let me know what you think before I bring my printer to the Canon service station here in the Netherlands.

Thanks Kato

 

[panos]

Please post a nozzle check and specify the brand of cartridges and ink you are using.

 

[kato92]

Hi, thanks for answering so quick.

This is a scan of my nozzle check.



I use all kinds of cartridge brands suitable for a canon IP5000.

Never original Canon cartridges.

Thanks Kato

 

[alexandereci]

Well, that last line (6BK) seems to be your problem... You'll notice on your pics the lines only appear in the black areas, the sky, the roof, and the blue parts of the car aren't affected. Possibly a clot? Do some deep cleans or perhaps flush the printhead with ammonia or some other solution as suggested on other threads on this site.

How long since you last used that printer?

 

[kato92]

Hi thanks for the quick replies. You may be right. I used to print many photo's like 6 monhts ago, maybe longer.

Then I stopped printing. Shall I do some deep cleanings? I did that several times. but it didn't help very much.

Thanks Kato

 

[fotofreek]

Kato - If you already ran some deep cleanings don't bother to do any more. Click on the FAQ link at the top of the forum page and go through both answers to the first question. Start with the least complicated head cleaning approach and with the least potentially damaging solutions (i.e. hot water or a weak solution of original windex with ammonia). Sounds like you just have to disolve the ink that dried in the bci-6 black intake area or nozzles. Just be patient and let the solutions do their work. Could also be the black cart that isn't feeding well, so try a new one as well.

 

[websnail]

hot water

by which fotofreek means distilled water.. If you use standard tap water you'll likely cause more problems with the minerals that tap water contains.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I have found that some apparent nozzle clogs are really caused by dried ink "painted" on the bottom of the print head. This sometimes happens when the printer has been idle for a long period of time and the head has been in contact with the cleaning pad. Try removing the print head and wiping the nozzle plate with a dampened cloth.

 

[ghwellsjr]

Another thought: since you are using off-brand cartridges, is it possible that you got a BCI-6BK with pigment ink instead of dye? That could cause a lot of clogged nozzles like you see in your scan.

Another test you can perform to make sure it is just your photo black nozzles that are clogged is to print the same photos you previously had problems with on plain paper. Make sure you tell your printer that you are printing on plain paper and it will use your BCI-3eBK cartridge instead of your BCI-6BK cartridge.

If the other remedies don't work, I would make a cleaning cartridge by filling one of my empty black cartridges with Windex and letting it drain out and then filling it again. It will still have enough black dye ink in it to let you see if the clog has been cleaned. You should also put a few drops of Windex on the cleaning pad on the inside right hand side of the printer where the head normally parks and make sure the Windex gets sucked down by the purge unit when you do a cleaning. To be on the safe side, you should make a whole set of cleaning cartridges so that you don't get contamination of your other ink cartridges when doing these procedures. Also, if you make a full set of cleaning cartridges and do several deep head cleanings, you won't waste ink and, more importantly, you won't be filling the waste container with pigment and dye which won't evaporate but the cleaning solution will.

 

[kato92]

Well thanks for all the replies. I'm going to clean the prinhead the way described above. But in case it goes terribly wrong is this a good buy? This is original stuff, right? Not immitation I hope.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Canon-iP5000-Pr...ryZ51328QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD1VQQcmdZViewItem

In the Netherlands (where I live) they are much more expensive. (about 80 Euro, which is about 100 Dollar)

Thanks Kato