Stupid Mistake --- But Not Fatal

[fotofreek]

My wife uses a Canon i960 (six carts) and one of my printers is an ip5000 (four dye based carts, one pigment black). I installed newly refilled dye based carts in my ip5000 several weeks ago and hadn't used it until today. The colors were terrible! Cleaning routines didn't help at all. The nozzle check was a bit off. I assumed that the print head was clogged, particularly the cyan nozzles.

The printer is 10 years old and the print head has been used about four years. Although I started to mentally write off this printer, I did the simple printhead cleaning, pumping it up and down on Windex soaked paper towels, followed by water and a good drying. As I was reinstalling the ink carts I discovered that I had installed a PHOTO CYAN (PC) CART instead of the correct CYAN CART.

Moral of the story: Even with 12 years of refilling and managing inkjet printers one can make a simple, stupid error! Second stupid error was not checking the obvious cause before wasting more than an hour doing an unnecessary out-of-printer printhead cleaning.

Lesson: Don't give up on a printer that suddenly doesn't produce the desired result.

 

[mikling]

There's a good reason for having electronic chips. With electronics that won't happen. You really need to get up to date printers that have chips and all those problems will be banished forever and you will be in a state of printer bliss thereafter. You really should think about taking those unchipped printers and disposing of them ASAP....

I'm sure many would offer to dispose of them for you and pick them up to make life easier.

 

[stratman]

If it ain't broke, don't fix.

Yes, chipped cartridges would have caused a red light flashing on the offending cartridge and an error message would have popped up on your monitor which would have alerted you sooner to the "fix". BUT, and to paraphrase, if you like your printers you can keep your printers. Don't change if you are satisfied with the printers!

However, picking up a Pro-100 on the cheap along with a resetter and new inks might, to paraphrase again, give you a thrill up your leg.

PS -- great avatar photo of you and the Mrs.!

 

[fotofreek]

However, picking up a Pro-100 on the cheap along with a resetter and new inks might, to paraphrase again, give you a thrill up your leg.
PS -- great avatar photo of you and the Mrs.!

Thanks for the thumbs-up on the photo. That was us about 40 years ago. One of my favorite family shots. Taking a "selfie" in those days required a tripod and a self-timer on the camera. Also a quick dash into position to be in the picture! My chin is now naked, the hair on the head much diminished, and not a single dark brown hair in the bunch.

I use a 9000 Mk II (bought new on Craig's list for $100) and have in reserve a slightly used ip4500, a spare newip5000 printhead, and a new ip5000 in the sealed factory box. The ip5000 is such a good printer that I hope it lasts for ever. It can handle certain custom size prints that the 9000 Mk II won't. For some print jobs I've had to do part of the printing on the 9000 and part on the ip5000.

 

[Lucas28]

Cartridges without chips! Yes, the good old days. But Canon still allows the user to switch off the chip, an advantage over Epson.

I can only hope my Canon will last for that long, my Epson gave up the battle after 4 years of non intensive use.

 

[The Hat]

I have in the past put the photo cyan ink into a cyan cartridge so I know how it feels to have a problem that defies all logic and can’t be resolved, that is till you screw you head back on properly so you can see the real problem “ME.”

I have said it at least a dozen times on this forum that when you have poor quality output on your printer don’t touch your print head but LOOK first at your cartridges for the problem because as sure as night follows day 99% of the time that’s where it is..

Happy Printing fotofreek, O’ and nice Avatar, it gave me a laugh dough, (Greyscale)

 

[fotofreek]

I have in the past put the photo cyan ink into a cyan cartridge so I know how it feels to have a problem that defies all logic and can’t be resolved, that is till you screw you head back on properly so you can see the real problem “ME.”

I have said it at least a dozen times on this forum that when you have poor quality output on your printer don’t touch your print head but LOOK first at your cartridges for the problem because as sure as night follows day 99% of the time that’s where it is..

Happy Printing fotofreek, O’ and nice Avatar, it gave me a laugh dough, (Greyscale)

Luckily I had put the correct ink in the PC cartridge, but I put the wrong cartridge in the printer. Much easier mystery to solve than wrong ink in the cartridge. This potential problem exists because I still refill my wife's i960 printer.

B/W was my favorite medium for many years. Just gave away my darkroom equipment a few years ago. I may move back to some B/W pix, an easy setting on my digital cameras. Even tempted to bring out my Rollieflex and buy some film. How retro is that!