Can more experienced refillers help me with the following - I am filling a variety of carts - ones that are fresh (not fully emptied) and ones that have clogged heads, clogged nozzles, and dry chambers. I have the speedbrite machine and an ultrasonic cleaner. Here are my questions: I soak all my carts in warm water first for 15mins.
1. The first thing that I check after soaking is to see if there is still good ink flow by paper towel dab - if good I weigh and simply vacuum fill the cart to top off. Many instructions suggest evacuate then fill - what is the reason behind evacuting the old ink first?
2. I find that on most carts that are completely empty and do not show good bars when dab on paper towel a few times I need to flush the cart. How do some of you experience fillers gauge if the cart should be filled or flushed? I hate it when I fill it and need to flush afterwards also - waiting time and ink. After doing about 20 #16 and #70 I am starting to think that it is better to just remove top, flush cart, wash sponge then simply refill if initially the cart was dry and showed poor ink flow.
3. What do you use to flush and what are your steps? I rinse inside of the cart with warm water, then put it on the evacuate dock and flush it with 99% alcohol 2 times. Then I add some alcohol to the cart and soak it in alcohol overnight. Next day I put a little alcohol in the cart and put it on the ultrasonic cleaner for 10 miniutes, then back on the evacuate dock and suck out everything. Is 99% alcohol a good choice, the fumes give me headaches. Is there a better way?
4. What and how do you wash the sponge? I simply squeeze out ink first, then rinse in warm water, then final rinse in 99% alcohol then let dry. Is there a better method? Will my method harm the effectiveness of the sponge?
5. Priming - I hate seeing white streaks on nozzle check. How do you tell if the nozzle test print is clogged nozzle or air in chamber? Is it safe to say that if the same nozzle does not print that it is a clogged nozzle. I basically dab on paper towel then 3 seconds on the ultrasonic cleaner to prime. I also tried suck out a little ink if there are streaks but if the paper towel dab and a few secs in the ultrasonic did not work neither did sucking.
6. Tops - do the tops have to be glued on to fill in the vacuum chamber?
7. To fill the CLIP should provide an air tight seal with the printhead right - is it normal for ink to come out during vaccum? If there is no air tight seal with the head as the vacuum is released won't air get into the printhead chamber? Trying to understand the filling process a little more and hopfully getter rid of those white streaks.
Thank you and I appreciate your help and advice.
Brian.
1. The first thing that I check after soaking is to see if there is still good ink flow by paper towel dab - if good I weigh and simply vacuum fill the cart to top off. Many instructions suggest evacuate then fill - what is the reason behind evacuting the old ink first?
2. I find that on most carts that are completely empty and do not show good bars when dab on paper towel a few times I need to flush the cart. How do some of you experience fillers gauge if the cart should be filled or flushed? I hate it when I fill it and need to flush afterwards also - waiting time and ink. After doing about 20 #16 and #70 I am starting to think that it is better to just remove top, flush cart, wash sponge then simply refill if initially the cart was dry and showed poor ink flow.
3. What do you use to flush and what are your steps? I rinse inside of the cart with warm water, then put it on the evacuate dock and flush it with 99% alcohol 2 times. Then I add some alcohol to the cart and soak it in alcohol overnight. Next day I put a little alcohol in the cart and put it on the ultrasonic cleaner for 10 miniutes, then back on the evacuate dock and suck out everything. Is 99% alcohol a good choice, the fumes give me headaches. Is there a better way?
4. What and how do you wash the sponge? I simply squeeze out ink first, then rinse in warm water, then final rinse in 99% alcohol then let dry. Is there a better method? Will my method harm the effectiveness of the sponge?
5. Priming - I hate seeing white streaks on nozzle check. How do you tell if the nozzle test print is clogged nozzle or air in chamber? Is it safe to say that if the same nozzle does not print that it is a clogged nozzle. I basically dab on paper towel then 3 seconds on the ultrasonic cleaner to prime. I also tried suck out a little ink if there are streaks but if the paper towel dab and a few secs in the ultrasonic did not work neither did sucking.
6. Tops - do the tops have to be glued on to fill in the vacuum chamber?
7. To fill the CLIP should provide an air tight seal with the printhead right - is it normal for ink to come out during vaccum? If there is no air tight seal with the head as the vacuum is released won't air get into the printhead chamber? Trying to understand the filling process a little more and hopfully getter rid of those white streaks.
Thank you and I appreciate your help and advice.
Brian.
