Strange problem with MP540...

[Photofan1986]

Photofan1986

Did you fill this black cart yourself recently?

Yep, I did. Why?

 

[headphonesman]

Yep, I did. Why?

Please take this in the spirit that it is intended........can you be absolutely sure that you did not refill with or partially refill with Cyan. It seems like a mistake nobody would make , but I have almost done it on several occasions.

As a result I try and keep the refill of Black as a "seperate " operation/stage , i.e " Black is black the others are different altogether , they are Colors"

My apologies if this is wrong to suggest, but I have read and re-read all the comments in this thread , and for me it is the only scenario that would fit the current facts. If Forum members think I have missed an important fact in arriving at this deduction please let me know where I made the error.

Meanwhile I hope I`m right , the fault will be easily be recoverable via puchase of a new Black cart and a few Light Cleans in the Maintenance Section

There is one other state that can cause this fault , a failure within the printhead at the small rubber gasket where the inks travel to the jets. The gasket is allows the blue to mix over into the black channel , but it cant be this , because it would occurr after the screen , you say the black screen mesh showed plain evidence of Cyan.

 

[Photofan1986]

No problem Well, i don't think so, but one can never be 100% sure. The thing is, I cleaned the "black" cart, let it dry, and put some fresh dye black ink into it, then I cleaned the printhead thoroughly using windex, put it all back in the printer (after letting it dry, of course), and I also cleaned the two little pads in the printer and...well the problem is EXACTLY the same!

I hate this f**~#ing printer!
Maybe the print head is f***ed up, really.

edit: a couple of pics of the print head after some prints... Does it look normal to you?





Many thanks to those trying to help me out!

 

[headphonesman]

Pity , I was hoping that my suspicion was correct , now after reading your trials and tribulations with the "wrong batch" of ink in another thread , Im not so sure.

This is what i would do,
Firstly try printing your test picture at a Standard paper setting , (this will not use the Photo black , just the PG Black and see how it looks. If its good then the photo Black is probably a problem. Why ? It`s problem could be its getting contaminated within the printhead in the area I mentioned before.
To help establish this buy a new Photo Black and see if the problem remains after installing it.
or
Get hold of a set of Canon inks that have not been refilled , that is with some ink in and intact , if not from a friend , then buy a new set.
Ater installing, carry out a few cleaning cycles to work thru the old inks thru the head......and see how it looks. Print at Standard , Photo , High Res and see how it looks
if all else fails :-
The solution that should work is replacement of the head..........but I reckon you can probably replace the entire printer more cheaply. The head can be dismantled down to the rubber gasket but in my experience it is rare to re-seat it and solve the problem, hardly worth the effort.

I had a printer that was "off" when printing Photo...........but it was pretty good when set at High Res..........I kept it going quite a time that way.......not ideal but it was better than nothing.
Please let us know, ( if possible ) , how it proceeds dont let the System beat you.

 

[headphonesman]

The last picture in the sequence and the text at the side of it makes interesting reading...............................and makes you wonder.....................

http://www.infento.com/carts/


good luck
headphonesman

 

[Photofan1986]

Well, thank you very much for your help.
Actually, I did something stupid...I opened the head to see whether the problem was inside...and well, it wasn't; no contamination whatsoever, so you were probably right: I probably accidentally put some blue ink in the black tank (I'm quite floored I could have done such a stupid thing but well...). Then I went to the shop to buy a black photo, and when I put it back into the printer, I was surprised to see that not only it solved the black shortage issue (i.e. the head starving...) but also the blue/green cast in the dark areas of my pictures were gone! So that's great news!

Now the bad news: I closed the head carefully, and put everything back again, but now when I try to print, the nozzle check shows many problems, as if the head was dirty. But even after a few cleaning cycles, the results are the same. Oh geeze...to think that's it's because of my fault that my printer now doesn't work properly, and that if I hadn't been messing around with the head, it would be completely OK now...
Fortunately, my girlfriend has the same printer, and she's ok to take mine, because she only prints text.
Well, one more lesson learned!
And thanks for your help