German "Durchstich" refill method for the PGI-520/CLI-521 cartridges

[PeterBJ]

The Hat wrote

Now some of the orange clips that I have come across have little protruding groves on the inside of their rims
and that can cause your cartridge not to get a good seal, just use a small knife (Carefully)
to remove them and youll find they will make a much better seal.

I think you solved the problem with the leaky orange clips. Why didn't I think that the clip could be a wrong type? Well done, The Hat

Here is a scan showing showing 2 OEM cartridges and the proper orange clip to the left, and a NON OEM cartridge plus orange clip to the right. Note different orange clips, also note the leaking of the NON OEM Cartridge. Also note how the the prism on the empty cartridge reflect the light from the scanner, and the prism on the full cartridge does does not reflect the light from the scanner.:

See this instruction for the German refill method from Precision Colors. It contains some very interesting new ideas. Note the idea of using a refill hole places higher, probably to avoid separating the outlet filter and the lower sponge, also note the sealing of the vent to minimize the risk of ink blocking the vent: http://www.precisioncolors.com/Canon german Method.pdf

 

[joseph1949]

To: The Hat, PeterBJ,
To: newbies


The Hat, per reply #350, you said that you worked on an orange cap to help improve the seal. Would you please provide a before picture and an after picture of said cap. Would your cap (before picture) look like the cap on the right in PereBJs reply #351?

The following is my take on orange caps:

http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=7567

title: Comparison of old style orange caps with the new style orange caps

Please read the entire thread. Note: All the caps shown are OEM orange caps. If you do not recognize a cap it may be that you do not live in the states. Canon may have used different style caps in other parts of the world (i.e. Europe, U.K., etc,).

With all due respect to The Hat, if you are a newbie please do not remove any material from the seal area on the cap. It is O.K. to remove the nebs (see PeterBJs picture in his reply #351. He has arrows pointing to said nebs.).

In my opinion there are four possible reasons why you can have ink leaking around the orange cap: Note: I am eliminating the possibility of a damaged ink outlet on the cart.

Note: I use the top-fill method to fill my carts (CLI-221C,M,Y,BK and PGI-220BK).

1. The cap is damaged.

2. The cap is worn out.

Let us assume that your cap is not damaged and/or worn out. We then can go to the following reasons.

3. You have over filled the cart. Because of the cause/effect situation in working on carts one cannot know for sure if over filling was THE cause for the ink leaking around the cap seal. If you have ink leaking from the air maze you know for sure that you have over filled the cart. Good filling practice will eliminate over filling as a reason for ink leaking from the cap and the air maze.

4. The way you have attached the cap to the ink outlet on the cart. There are two types of caps: snap on (SO) caps and loose fitting (LF) caps. The SOs are the older style caps and the LFs are the newer style. If you have a SO cap which has not been used for refilling you may be able to snap on the cap and that is itno rubber bands, tape, c-clamp, third hand clamp, etc. I would not recommend this. You can assume that Canon has engineered their caps for one-time use. If you use the cap again to refill the cart you can assume that the cap will leak unless you use something to provide added pressure against the cap and the ink outlet.

There are four primary methods to hold the cap against the ink outlet:

1. Rubber bands. This is the tried and new method. This is the method that I use. If you are using a SO cap you can use two bands. If you are using LF caps I would recommend three bandscross two bands on other side of the cap and a band down the center of the cap.

Note: If you are using a LF cap you may want to use a piece of plastic film wrap and one or more pieces of aluminum foil between the cap and the ink outlet. The plastic film should go against the outlet first with the aluminum pieces to follow. Use enough aluminum pieces so the cap will stay on by itself. Without the film/aluminum pieces the cap may not provide a good enough seal no matter what method you use to hold the cap against the outlet. The SO caps may not need the film/aluminum pieces. If you see ink leaking from a SO cap you may need to add the film/aluminum pieces.

2. C-clamp. Sometimes I use a 2 inch c-clamp to hold the cap against the outlet. For me this has worked quiet well. There are two draw backs in using the clamp:

1. You can use too much pressure and then you have an ink bomb. You should use the smallest c-clamp possible (my two-inch clamp is really too big but it was what I had on hand). You can add a small piece of wood, plastic, etc. between the air maze and the clamp to help distribute the load.

2. It is awkward to manipulate the cart while filling the cart if a clamp is attached to the cart.

3. Tape. You can use sticky tape like electricians tape or you can use Velcro-like tape. At best tape is awkward to use. Where you can use tape is when you refill the carts for later use. When you store the filled the carts you can use rubber bands to hold the cap against the outlet and then wrap the bands with tapethink belt and suspenders.

4. Third hand clamp. I believe that this is the best way to hold the cap against the outlet. Your hands are free to fill the cart and there are no rubber bands, c-clamp or tape to mess with. If you use hot glue to create a plug the third hand clamp is super handy to use. I use my coin/paper disc method to create the hot glue plug. A third hand clamp would make it especially easy to use my coin/paper disc method. By using a third hand clamp you would not have to sit the cart down to add the paper disc, use the hot glue gun, etc. Why do I not use a third hand clamp? I am cheap. They are a bit expensive!!!!! Maybe Santa Clause will give me one for Christmas?!?!

Newbie, if you use one of the four above methods and you still have ink leaking from around the cap and you have not over filled the cart you can do some surgery on the cap (a la The Hat). But proceed with great caution. You do not want to nick the seal materialbig time!!!!!

Thank you.

 

[y3kcjd5]

>>345
Filling procedure is by no means the only reason printing problems may occur, which is precisely why I'm trying to eliminate possibilities. Concluding that my procedure is to blame solely because I have printing problems seems like putting the cart before the horse to me. In addition, if my procedure truly is to blame, I would be eager to learn precisely which aspects (and why) are the cause.

On that note, what exactly is so backwards about my prism test? Allow me to restate my test procedure to eliminate the possibiliy of misunderstanding:
1. Chose a cartridge that was giving me the low ink warning (reservoir empty, so prism should reflect, chip currently recording a low level)
2. Reset cartridge chip (reservoir still empty, chip should now indicate full)
3. Replaced cartridge in printer (reservoir still empty, chip and printer show full level)
4. Printed 2 nozzle checks (to give the printer a chance to read the prisms, it also decided to do a cleaning cycle at this point)
5. Let printer sit around a bit (printer still shows full level, reservoir still empty and reflecting)
Is there something specific I have to do to get the printer to read the prism? Am I misunderstanding the way the sensor is supposed to work? From how it was described, I got the impression that, upon detecting an empty reservoir, the prism sensor sets the ink level to the low (yellow '!') level regardless of how full the chip thought it was before...

>>346
For clarification, does that mean that the only problems with overfilling are ink in the air maze and leaks out the outlet port? If that's the case I think I'm OK in terms of (over)filling.

Ah, I must be more specific about my ink mixing (by the way I did not mean to imply that the OCP ink was somehow at fault, only that I used OCP inks in my mixing and that the resulting consistency might be responsible). My scheme is based on the idea that grayscale printing is cheaper than color without any contrast sacrifice. In other words, I only mix the 3 color cartridges, CMY, and use straight OCP ink for the BK and PGBK (which means no pigment issues). For mixing, I prepare a blank fluid which is 75% water, but also contains 25% propylene glycol (did some research) to adjust the viscosity, surface tension etc. For cyan and magenta I then mix 50% blank fluid and 50% OCP dye black ink for an even gray, and use blank fluid for the yellow cartridge (esssentially saving me 50% on C&M and ~100% on Y, lumped together with the remaining blacks for an arbitrary cost estimate of 50%). I've never had any major inkflow problems (my nozzle checks always come out OK), but the minor banding I mentioned earlier seems to be persistent. Though it is a bit early to conclude that this is the cause of the banding, it is certainly a possibility; I have ordered small quantities of the OCP color inks, and will do my next round of refills with those (no mixing) to test the possibility. In the mean time, we can cover any other possible causes.

Oh, in the printer and not the print head, that makes much more sense...

As I mentioned before, my banding issues are minor because they only show up in areas of black or near-black; my nozzle checks always turn out fine. Nevertheless, I will upload one (it's big, so as a link; some whitespace cleared to reduce image size):
http://img689.imageshack.us/img689/57/nozchk.jpg

>>347
Ah, a picture worth a thousand words. I went hunting in my printer and found it:

Unfortunately I have yet to verify its function.

>>351
Yes, now I see how the prism is designed to work――now I just have to actually get it to work...

Aha! Finally! a refill volume! The instructions you provided say 4-6mL for the CLI and 9-10mL for the PGI; my numbers are ~7 and ~11 so ink flow appears to be satisfactory. On a side note, I wouldn't really call those refill holes higher; this is what I meant:

 

[member 5159]

Good points The Hat and PeterBj. I. The Durstrich hole was NOT SEALED. 2. My clips are a motley selection and I just pick up the nearest. At the time of the Cyan disaster I did not have available one of Octoinks great clips.

So yes I do need to check the seal But did'nt realise the importance of tightness. Will check all clips for protrusions.

Thanks everybody

 

[The Hat]

joseph1949

Sorry Joe I dont take a picture of the before and after but it was similar to PeterBJs
clip on the far right, its been a while so I cant be that certain.

I do however have one showing how to hold the orange clip on securely using the rubber bands.

y3kcjd5 On that note, what exactly is so backwards about my prism test?
Allow me to restate my test procedure to eliminate the possibiliy of misunderstanding:

You still havent come to terms with the way the sensor works just yet.

Youre starting at the end of the procedure with a cartridge already showing the low ink warning
instead of resetting the chip before this warning appears at all.

The chip on your cartridge functions only as a visual indicator as to how much ink it estimates
that is left in the cartridge and mainly to prevent the user (You) from being able to refill it.

When the reservoir empties the printer takes total control via this prism sensor
and the chip can no longer indicates the amount of ink that is left in your cartridge.

At that point there can be as much as 10% of ink left in the cartridge
and a couple of nozzles checks or a cleaning cycle wont empty the remaining ink.

So for your satisfactory test to work youll need to reset a cartridge with to 1/3 on ink visually left in the reservoir
then reset the chip and print normally and you will eventually see the on screen ink indicator drop
from full to low (Yellow Triangle) with no increments, i.e. the little sensor does its job once again.

y3kcjd5 As I mentioned before, my banding issues are minor because they only show up in areas of black or near-black; my nozzle checks always turn out fine. Nevertheless, I will upload one (it's big, so as a link; some whitespace cleared to reduce image size):
http://img689.imageshack.us/img689/57/nozchk.jpg

Your banding problems may be solely down to your ink mixing experiments (Indicated by PeterBJ earlier)
by allowing to high an ink flow out to your print head not less which can also cause much the same issues.

The nozzle check you up loaded says it all, its absolutely terrible I think if thats the quality
of all your prints then you need a complete rethink about all of your printing habits.

The cost of third party inks are 80% cheaper (Approximately) than OEM inks so just how much more are you trying to save.

It just doesnt make any sense whatsoever to attempt to dilute (Alter) in any way these very cheap inks
and it has lead you to this point where everything is gotten out of control and you cant see what your problems are.

I suggest you take a break from your printer for a day or so and sit down to rethink this crazy strategy of yours
of saving a cent or two and destroying the quality of all your output and eventually your printer too.

Were not here to brow beat or gang up on anybody and we shouldnt have to state the obvious,
but please rethink your whole printing procedure again and you may see things actually improve considerably.

Dare I say.. Happy Printing..

 

[y3kcjd5]

>>355

You still havent come to terms with the way the sensor works just yet.

I'm fully aware, that's exactly what I'm trying to figure out right now.

Youre starting at the end of the procedure with a cartridge already showing the low ink warning
instead of resetting the chip before this warning appears at all.

Does it matter? Once the chip is reset it won't know the difference, it always shows the same full amount regardless of how full or empty it was before, right?

When the reservoir empties the printer takes total control via this prism sensor
and the chip can no longer indicates the amount of ink that is left in your cartridge.

If this is the case, why did my printer/chip continue to display full (NOT low), even though the reservoir was empty?

At that point there can be as much as 10% of ink left in the cartridge
and a couple of nozzles checks or a cleaning cycle wont empty the remaining ink.

Well of course, what's remaining in the sponge, I was counting on that to save my print head while I was testing, but that shouldn't affect the prism, would it?

So for your satisfactory test to work youll need to reset a cartridge with to 1/3 on ink visually left in the reservoir
then reset the chip and print normally and you will eventually see the on screen ink indicator drop
from full to low (Yellow Triangle) with no increments, i.e. the little sensor does its job once again.

? Does that mean that the sensor will only detect a change in prism reflectivity and not just a high level of reflectivity? Or did I just not give it enough time to detect it?

Your banding problems may be solely down to your ink mixing experiments (Indicated by PeterBJ earlier)
by allowing to high an ink flow out to your print head not less which can also cause much the same issues.

I am aware of that (and as I said earlier will test for it), but in the meantime we can eliminate other possibilities. If the problem is high inkflow my refill numbers indicate that it's not by much, and has no possibility of damaging my printer (unlike the converse). Correction would simply involve adjusting my blank fluid.

The nozzle check you up loaded says it all, its absolutely terrible I think if thats the quality
of all your prints then you need a complete rethink about all of your printing habits.

Terrible? How so? It looks to me like all the little dots are there, so I see no problem with it. If your gripe is about color, keep in mind that I said I was trying to make things cheaper by turning my printer into a grayscale printer, it just so happens that cyan gets used up fasrest, so the magenta and yellow tints (frrom OEM ink left in tthe cartridge during refills) have yet to fade completely.

The cost of third party inks are 80% cheaper (Approximately) than OEM inks so just how much more are you trying to save.

As I said before, about 50%. Regardless of the actual price, half-price always means that I can print twice as much for the same price. The only sacrifice in this case is color printing, a function I don't need in the first place (I have an MP620 I can use for that), so converting my MX860 to a half-price grayscale printer seems like a good move to me. Besides, even at those 80% off rates ink is still one of the most expensive liquids around.

It just doesnt make any sense whatsoever to attempt to dilute (Alter) in any way these very cheap inks
and it has lead you to this point where everything is gotten out of control and you cant see what your problems are.

Out of control? Problems? The only problem I see is the minor banding; if you see something else please enlighten me (and please be as specific as possible).

 

[irvweiner]

I use the following 'tools' for reloading my Canon carts: BCI-6, CLI-8. From: http://rjettek.com/

Part # 1813 Inkport Cap 25 pcs @ 0.30 $7.50
1916 Plug CLI8 100 0.09 9.00

No rubberbands, no tape, no leaks, no crap!!

My cost to refill a CLI-8 is ~30 cents, a new OEM cart is ~$16+. My resetter, from Rjettek was ~$20
Ink savings are 98%, Canon's ink only price is 2X that of Human Blood at your local ER!!!

Stop whining over the trivia, LISTEN to this community and spend your time creating fine prints.

irv weiner

 

[fotofreek]

I use the following 'tools' for reloading my Canon carts: BCI-6, CLI-8. From: http://rjettek.com/

Part # 1813 Inkport Cap 25 pcs @ 0.30 $7.50
1916 Plug CLI8 100 0.09 9.00

No rubberbands, no tape, no leaks, no crap!!

My cost to refill a CLI-8 is ~30 cents, a new OEM cart is ~$16+. My resetter, from Rjettek was ~$20
Ink savings are 98%, Canon's ink only price is 2X that of Human Blood at your local ER!!!

Stop whining over the trivia, LISTEN to this community and spend your time creating fine prints.

irv weiner

In keeping with Irv's advice to keep it simple (the KISS principle), use what has been proven to work by others and introduce no new variables. That is the way, with minimum problems and effort, to use the printer as a tool to PRINT. If you have an inquiring mind and wish to play with the printer as a hobby project, go ahead and experiment. Your experiment may prove to have equally good or better results or it may not. For me, however, the least time I have to mess with my printers, the better I like it.

In addition to finding the easiest clips and plugs that work for you, I always suggest the use of squeeze bottles with caps that hold leur-lock needles. No syringe cleaning, no opening and drawing ink into the syringes, less potential mess or spillage, etc.

 

[y3kcjd5]

>>357, 358
Experimenting is exactly what I'm trying to do in this case. I'm not questioning the validity of any of the methods here, I'm merely trying different things with them in an effort to find improvements and alternatives (I refuse to belive that any if these methods, my own included, are so perfect that improvements and alternatives do not exist). The most important part of experimentation is figuring out why things work (or don't) and not just whether or not they work. That is the reason why I'm taking the time to pick apart the trivia and the details; they all play one part or another in the process.

 

[fotofreek]

>>357, 358
Experimenting is exactly what I'm trying to do in this case. I'm not questioning the validity of any of the methods here, I'm merely trying different things with them in an effort to find improvements and alternatives (I refuse to belive that any if these methods, my own included, are so perfect that improvements and alternatives do not exist). The most important part of experimentation is figuring out why things work (or don't) and not just whether or not they work. That is the reason why I'm taking the time to pick apart the trivia and the details; they all play one part or another in the process.

No criticism intended! Some users see the printer as strictly a tool, some as a tool with which they would like to experiment, and some as a hobby that incidentely produces the prints they want. All motives are valid. For me, the process that is a straignt line to get the result I want is preferable, and when something isn't working I will then experiment.