What is the comparison of Formulab ink with Old Ink Grabber ink

[JV]

Grandad and others,

From your experience please compare Formulab ink with Old Ink Grabber ink.

The reason I am asking is because frank trotti and RStrain from dpreview.com/forums are recommending
www.private.abacus24-7.com BCI-6 compatible carts ($1.85 each). Abacus (sj) e-mail reply was:

"The ink is made in USA by Formulab, however the carts are manufactured in China. Our Canon Compatible Cartridges are remanufactured to OEM specs including ink volume."

BulkInkJetCarts use the Old Ink Grabber ink because grandad's printer profile for this ink completely corrected the green cast I was getting in black and brown colors.

JV

 

[Grandad35]

JV,

I used the attached image (scaled down from the original) because it has a lot of grays and will show color casts. I made 3 copies and converted them to 3 different profiles (converting them to a profile changes the color values to the values that will be output to the printer):
1. Convert to the Old InkGrabber profile.
2. Convert to the Formulabs profile.
3. Convert to the Canon "PR1" profile (Photo Paper Pro, Quality 1)
These images now showed very different colors, indicating that the profiles for the InkGrabber and Formulabs inks are different, and therefore that the inks are different. I tried to upload these images, but they were too large to upload since a profile was imbedded into each image. You can use this image and do the same test yourself.

For those without access to PhotoShop, I spread 4 sample points around the deer (the same locations on all images), blurred the images by 5 pixels to get a better average and recorded the RGB values for the 4 points:
Original
57/54/50 60/63/61 67/63/57 52/52/47
Old InkGrabber profile
72/26/42 79/34/56 85/33/51 67/25/38
Formulabs profile
56/46/31 62/54/40 68/54/36 50/45/29
Canon "PR1" profile
51/50/46 59/65/60 64/62/57 47/49/42

It is obvious that the Canon profile is the closest to the original data, which is understandable since Canon would have calibrated their internal printer driver to closely match the formulation of their inks.

By comparing the RGB values to the Canon values, you can get an idea of the correction that the profile makes to the color values to make the ink perform like Canon ink. The Formulabs ink is close on the reds and greens but far away on the blues, while the Old InkGrabber ink is close on the blues but far away on the reds and greens. Clearly, these two ink sets are very different.

There has been a lot of discussion in various threads about about the performance of Formulabs inks, both in bulk and in prefilled carts. I use Formulabs bulk ink and (obviously) refill. From what I have read, most of those who use the bulk ink are relatively satisfied, while those who use prefilled carts with "Formulabs ink" are generally not satisfied. I have to wonder whether the prefilled cart manufacturers are using some generic ink (even if it is from Formulabs), not Formulabs ink formulated for the BCI-6 carts. If you test a set of prefilled carts, don't assume that you will get the same ink as the bulk ink (even if you buy the prefilled carts from the same source as the bulk ink).

 

[Inky]

Thanks for the good info.

My experience with Alotofthings.com "Arrow/Sky Horse" arts is pretty dissapointing. Bad shifts to magenta in shadows, but ok mids, meaning it's about impossible to correct both. Also, very annoying that there are so many questions about whether Alotofthings.com is accuratly representing the product they're selling at Formulabs BCI-6 filled carts.

I was curious to buy Formulabs in bulk and refill, but I'll have to make sure it's on return guarentee now and worth the trouble before trying it now.

 

[Inky]

Just noticed something odd about alotofthings.com

Their bulk Formulabs ink only comes in 4oz or larger size, and thier warranty page stipulates returns are only accepted for 2oz or smaller sizes.

So, how is one supposed to actually test their products?

I ordered prefilled carts to test quality, but have had nothing but problems with them, and according to many posters here it's difficult to even be certain that I received Formulabs ink in the Arrow carts.

geeze.

 

[fotofreek]

Now that they are backing off their ebay store site and selling almost entirely on their own website their products have increased in price. RE the 2 oz vs 4 oz discrepancy in the warranty, call or email them and ask. still cheap as compared to OEM.

 

[JV]

My testing indicated that the Abacus OA100 carts described in Post #1 did not use Formulabs ink. Using Grandad's custom printer profile for Formulabs ink produced a yellow cast. See BulkInkjetCarts Post #23 for more details.

I was interested in Formulabs ink because there are published ink numbers for each ink and because it is used by members of this forum.

I looked at Formulabs as a company and read their annual report.

Formulabs was acquired late in 2001 by Sensient Technologies traded in New York Stock Exchange under the symbol SXT.

Looking at Sensient's stock chart with www.bigcharts.com shows that Sensient considerably underperformed the market during the past year.

Reading Sensient's annual report in www.sensient-tech.com/pdf/annual2004.pdf shows that company earnings have been declining. Total revenues were $1 Billion of which inkjet ink revenues were $69 Million. Sensient develops high-performance pigment dispersions for inkjet printing. The Company continues to face price competition in technical colors (inkjet inks). A major OEM customer ($47 Million revenu source in 2004) shifted from supply agreement to spot purchasing to consoledate inkjet ink purchases with other suppliers.

JV

 

[Grandad35]

JV,

Was the $47MM major OEM revenue source for 2004 part of the $69MM total inkjet revenue, and was it for "high-performance pigment dispersions for inkjet printing"? If it was, the OEM isn't too hard to identify. I guess that the profit on OEM inks isn't high enough and the OEM has to pursue lower cost suppliers. I wonder if the savings are worth the risk of a new supplier's product adversely affecting their ink's printing characteristics? How does this OEM justify their statements that their inks/papers are worth the (substantial) extra cost because of their higher costs to purchase only the highest quality raw materials and maintain the tightest quality controls?

Sensient's stock has been paying a dividend of about $0.60 for the last several years (3% on a $20 stock). Their stock price certainly took a beating about 8 weeks ago - was that when the possible loss of the $47MM account was made public? This reminds me about a tale of too many eggs in one basket - talk about a management "oversight".

Was their debt reduction of $40MM last year responsible for the lower operating income and earnings, or was the emphasis on debt reduction just a ploy to deflect attention from a real problem? Did Sensient buy Formulabs to enter the inkjet market, or were they already players before the purchase? With a sales revenue of about $280,000 per employee, they either have a lot of very highly paid people on their payroll or they use some very expensive components for flavors/colors/etc. Their average stockholder has over $200,000 invested with them - they aren't small time investors.