My Refilling Experiences - HP Lexmark Canon -

[Nifty]

My first refilling experience was with the HP 500... what a mess that turned out to be! Let's just say that I didn't have a very good success rate and made an awful mess of the bathroom (if you are going to make a mess, this is the place to do it!) The whole bladder / vacuum system HP used in their black cartridges really bothered me... enough that I thought I'd never refill again.

Thankfully I got a new printer, the BJC-1000. This printer was SUPER easy to refill and very durable (I probably refilled each cartridge about 30 times and they keep on going!). Sometimes the print heads would plug up... I'd just blow air through them really hard and it would force all the junk out. I'd put them in the microwave which would revive the sponge to hold more ink. I'd even use thinned out ink (using alcohol) and run it through without problems. Maybe I was just lucky, but I beat these cartridges up and they still worked GREAT.

I'd still be using this little work horse if it had higher resolution and I didn't have to swap black / color cartridges (what a pain)! Also, the color cartridge had all the colors in one cart and each little reservoir didn't hold much ink.

I decided to get a new printer. I ended up with a Lexmark z-22 and then a z-32 which initially produced excellent results. I actually ended up getting about 60 opened cartridges for this printer from QVC returns for about $.50 each. I'd refill them, test them, and sell them on eBay for $18! Well, that was the honeymoon because I started having problems:

After only a few refills the printer would blink lights like crazy. I discovered that the contacts on these carts was wearing out (giving me those annoying blinking lights). The copper contacts looked fine, but no matter what I did the printer wouldn't accept the cartridges.

I've been leery about getting a printer with a built in printhead because all my experience has been with cartridge based heads and I'm worried about having a head fixed into the printer... if it plugs, the printer is dead. After a bunch of research, calling local refill shops / stores, more research, more calls, I discovered that the Canon i series printers and cartridges (specifically the BCI-6 and BCI-3 carts) had the best success rate and were easiest to refill.

I'm now the proud owner of a Canon i860 and couldn't be happier! These cartridges are all separate and SUPER easy to refill. I think Canon loves the refiller... this is why they even made the cartridges translucent so you could visually inspect them.

If you want a great printer that is super easy to refill.... get an i series Canon!

 

[raagus]

I have tried refilling the HP-7350 cartridges. The re-filling itself if pretty easy, once you get the hang of it. But I am unable to repeatedly get photo quality prints from my re-filled cartridges. I think hte problem is that HP has a fairly complex cartridge design for the 7350. They have only one cartridge with the sponge for different colors demarcated by position. For example, you have holes that you can pierce with the syringe for different colors. I think that might make it difficult to get a precise re-filled cartridge with the ability to print photo quality printing.

Also, the HP-7350 seems to guzzle ink like there is no tomorrow. Having owned the HP-7350 for a year and a half, I have decided to get rid of it and buy a canon pixma ip series.

WOuld love to hear from anyone who has good success with photo printing from refilling their HP 57 and 58 cartridges

 

[Guest]

Anyone have instructions on how to refill the Lexmark 82 black cartridge? I have ink/instructions for an older Lexmark model. Do I have to pry off the top of the cartridge or drill a hole in it?