Stupid Refill Problem

[alexandereci]

I have 2 PG-40 carts that I tried refilling with a new set of black inks that my supplier had in stock. Both clogged up soon after refilling; I figure that as soon as the new ink made its way into the printhead, things got nasty. Now, no amount of cleaning/deep cleaning/soaking head on wet tissue would get the printhead to work again. Dammit!

I was wondering if there is any way to de-clog these carts once this problem has occurred.

 

[pharmacist]

Alexandereci,

maybe a chemical reaction is causing the clogs (precipitation between the two inks). I used KMP pigment black to refill and my friends using these cartridges are very happy with the deep black and razor sharp text output.

 

[alexandereci]

If so, how do I fix it?

 

[pharmacist]

I figure you did buy very bad ink causing clogging. Did you use this ink into a PGI-5 or BCI-3eBK cartridge ? If the clogging is tenacious I would suggest you to seek for other (empty) PG-40 cartridges to refill.

 

[alexandereci]

No, just used it on a PG-40 cart. Is there any way to unclog the cart? Or should I just throw it away?

 

[pharmacist]

you might use a bottom puller and push the ink back through the nozzles to try to unclog the cartridge. But watch out: the bottom puller must be very good or you will end up oozing ink into your hands or worse.

 

[alexandereci]

Hmmm... that bottom puller again. What happens if I suck all the ink out of the printhead? Won't that damage it in any way? I know you can suck ink back into it via the bottom puller, but I'm thinking more along the lines of ink not flowing into a few nozzles, thereby "ruining" the printhead.