Missing Line in Extended Nozzle check iP5200

[dparadowski]

I have refilled my CLI-8 cartridges about 6 time and decided to purge them and let them dry with a paper towel toucing the sponge. I let them dry for five days and they were bone dry. I refilled them, and installed them. I noticed banding in my photos, so I did an extended nozzle check. The cyan, particularly the 'light cyan) check was missing many lines. Does any body know if this means the cartridge is dead or is there something else gone wrong? I've been using the ink from WEINK before they closed, and this is the last 1/3 of the bottle, Maybe the ink is getting bad? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[mikling]

During the time you had the cartridges out drying, were there any cartridges installed installed in the printer? If no, then you could have dried up ink within the head. I'd just let the catridge sit in the printer for 24 hours and see if the new ink has dissolved the dried up ink and see if there is an improvement trend.
The ink that WEINK used to carry is Image Specialists ink and has a pretty long shelf life so I wouldn't think that is the problem.

 

[dparadowski]

No I had a second set (refilled) that I put in. Those had the line, so I figured, may the cartridge is bad. Si, I refilled the ones I pulled out and put them in. Still get the missing lines and bandings. It is only in the lighter shade of the cyan (ip5200 is only a 5 color printer, so I don't know where the light cyan nozzle check comes from)

 

[mikling]

If after some head cleanings and there is no improvement, I would tend to follow the removal and cleaning of the head as described elsewhere on other threads.

 

[panos]

One month ago I finished some Weink ink that I bought 4 years ago, no problems.

I wouldn't worry about some light banding, just do a standard head cleaning and it will be probably fixed. If it doesn't you you can try an original Canon cyan cartridge and if that fails too, use the windex method.

What are you using to seal your cartridges ? Did you check for dripping before installing them ?

 

[dparadowski]

I'm using rubber plugs from a set of BCI-6 cartridges I had. There is no dripping. After nozzle cleaning, the problem is still there. The only place that I notice it is in blue sky's and some shades of green. The regular nozzle check from the mantainence tab of the print driver looks good, but the extened nozzle check from the printer firmware isa where the missing nozzles show up. The full strength cyan lloks fine, it is just the half strength cyan that about 60% of the lines are missing. I'm assuming that on the ip5200 the "light cyan" is just less ink coming out of the nozzle. Am I right? Well, I guess that I'll have to break down and buy a OEM cyan Cartridge and see if that works. :-( If that works, any ideas of what it was. The refilled cartridges are about a year old. They were refilled alternatly with ink from weink and stored in a tupperware container with a damp sponge (water and some alcohol) while waiting to be swaped into the printer. The second last refill, I did the water purge and let the dry for 5 days with a paper towel touching the sponge to spped drying. I did this because the inks were not aborbing into the sponge like they used to during a refill.

 

[panos]

Such issues are usually caused by ink feeding problems. Sometimes it's less ink as you wrote, some other times it's more ink.

There was an issue with some purged cartridges where the exit port filter would retract from its place after being subjected to high pressure from water. In this case, Grandad would lightly tap the cartridge to restore the filter to its original position.

Could you post a photo of your filled cartridge? It may help a bit -- and posting photos in this forum is considered "good politics" with the administration

 

[ghwellsjr]

I'm assuming that on the ip5200 the "light cyan" is just less ink coming out of the nozzle. Am I right?

If the iP5200 is like the earlier 5-cartridge printers like the ones I have, the light cyan and light magenta have their own sets of nozzles. I'm guessing that the "light" sets of nozzles are somehow different than the standard set. Maybe they are smaller nozzles or maybe they have smaller chambers where the ink is boiled and ejected through the nozzles.

If you remove the print head and look at the number of rows of nozzles, you will probably see six which would include one each for yellow and photo black and two each for cyan and magenta. And there is one more longer row of nozzles for the pigment black

 

[ghwellsjr]

It is only in the lighter shade of the cyan (ip5200 is only a 5 color printer, so I don't know where the light cyan nozzle check comes from)

The iP5200 does not have a photo cyan ink cartridge. It does have separate sets of nozzles for the normal cyan and the light cyan but they both feed from the same cyan ink cartridge. The same goes for the magenta ink/nozzles.