Why I think a waiting period is important when working on printers.

[The Hat]

joseph1949

I have found your refill methods very interesting and well taught out however, I also found them far too long winded
for most to take on board and therefore your good messages tend to get lost in all of your details.

Now this waiting period you speak of after you have filled a cartridge is just far too long also,
if everybody was to start using this method I reckon most would say to hell with refilling
and just switch over to using a CISS system or buy an Epson.

The science is inside the cartridge itself and not in the refilling, if one refills a cartridge by which ever method they choose
and it doesnt leak straight afterwards then its good to use in my eyes.

The only way a cartridge can truly leak is if the refill hole on the top of the reservoir is not air tight and waiting
will not resolve this problem, an hour, a day, a month, nothing will, except resealing.

By just removing the orange clip from the outlet hole after refilling is the best way to judge
whether the cartridge is safe to use or not, time is not a useful factor in this equasion.

I myself have had instances where my hot wax seal was rushed (not done correctly) and when I went to use the cartridge,
it dripped continuously which was a clear indicator to me that the seal was defective and needed redoing,
if I had waited for a longer Time.. Exactly the same outcome.

The point I am trying to make here is that if the cartridge is filled correctly using your method or anybody elses method for that matter
then it wont leak and all the precaution you talk about become redundant and are a total unnecessary waste of good printing time..

 

[stratman]

never leave a print head with ink in it exposed to the air for more than a couple minutes.

If you mean 2 minutes then I disagree. However, I do agree the less time the better but it is overstating the topic to doom things to a two minute drill or else.

I've had a print head without cartridges for ~15-20 minutes, maybe longer, and there was no issue. My usual refilling time for all six cartridge refills at one time is ~10-12 minutes depending on how fast I feel like moving. My refilling is done at the basement sink one floor below the printer, so the print head may already be parked by the time I return to insert the cartridges.

Of course, now that I've written this I'll probably get a clog so I'll send the bill for a new print head to ghwellsjr for causing the jinx.

 

[pearlhouse]

I dough know ghwellsjr. Sounds a little like you are talking in circles there. First you get a good seal on the outlet port than you dont get a good seal on it. I think you leave us wondering what a good seal is?? I have over 8 sets of refilled carts (40+) sitting on my shelf right now and none of the vents are sealed. But now Im wondering if the vent should be sealed for storage. These carts. have been sitting there for over a month now. I have three friends that I refill for but they havnt been printing much these days so they havnt asked for refills. Tomorrow if I have time I will open up the outlet ports on some of them to see if they are still wet or dry. I guess I could weigh a few also to see if they are maintaining their weight. I use 31-32 grams for the large black and 19grams for the small colors and small black. I use the german refill method but still seal the fill hole with alum tape to protect against evaporation. But never thought twice about sealing the vent.
Im pretty confident I have a good seal on the outlet port because I take the time to trim off the nibs left when the orange cap is first broken away both from the cart. and also the orange cover. Then I clean both the port and seal on the cover. I then use a pretty heavy rubber band (1/4" wide) to hold the cover in place. I would think this is as good a seal as comes from Canon. I then use another rubber band to hold the set of 5 carts. together as a unit.
So now sealing the vent should be easy using the same alum tape I use for hole covers. I suppose I could then wrap the hole set with saran plastic wrap and then store them in a zip lock bag.
I used to store my HP carts in their clip wrapped in plastic wrap in a zip lock bag with a wet paper towel in the bag to keep things moist.
But I gotta say this seems like a lot of extra work that may not be necessary.
So I will check these carts on my shelf tomorrow and see what they look like.
I will let you guys no of my findings.
"That my theory and Im stickin to it."
Bob pearlhouse Pearl

 

[fotofreek]

I've kept my refilled carts in plastic food containers with lids on them to seal the container. No tape ever on the air vent. When I change carts I remove the cap from the ink outlet of the full cart, hold the cart over some waste paper, and blow gently on the air vent to get a drip or two. This is a test for good ink flow, and it also assures that the outlet filter is wet. When I was doing a great deal of printing i usually had four backup carts or more per color. As my printing decreased I found that some of the carts had been refilled several times over more than two years and had been refilled from more than one batch of ink from separate purchases. To be on the safe side I decided to keep less backups per color to minimize the number of carts that would be continually refilled for two years or more. I have enough purged empty carts to set up new refilled backups without lost time, and I can then accumulate the used ones to purge all at once.

I've never waited with any cart, whether immediately refilled or refilled and stored, before continuing on with printing. If any one of the carts had to be replaced due to the low ink or out of ink message the printer automatically does a cleaning after installing the newly refilled cart. Doing a nozzxle check isn't a bad idea if your feel at all uncertain about any replacement cart, but blowing into the cart's air vent before installation and getting it to drip without much air pressure being applied pretty much assures you that the ink flow will be just fine.

 

[ghwellsjr]

never leave a print head with ink in it exposed to the air for more than a couple minutes.

If you mean 2 minutes then I disagree. However, I do agree the less time the better but it is overstating the topic to doom things to a two minute drill or else.

I've had a print head without cartridges for ~15-20 minutes, maybe longer, and there was no issue. My usual refilling time for all six cartridge refills at one time is ~10-12 minutes depending on how fast I feel like moving. My refilling is done at the basement sink one floor below the printer, so the print head may already be parked by the time I return to insert the cartridges.

Of course, now that I've written this I'll probably get a clog so I'll send the bill for a new print head to ghwellsjr for causing the jinx.

I was really targeting my comment to people who might have read joseph's recommendations and been lead to believe that you can take a cartridge out of the print head, refill it, set it on the table upside down overnight and then put it back in the print head the next day. I know he's not proposing that but if you don't read everything he wrote very carefully, you can pick comments here and there out of context and think that might be what he's saying.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I dough know ghwellsjr. Sounds a little like you are talking in circles there. First you get a good seal on the outlet port than you dont get a good seal on it. I think you leave us wondering what a good seal is?? I have over 8 sets of refilled carts (40+) sitting on my shelf right now and none of the vents are sealed. But now Im wondering if the vent should be sealed for storage. These carts. have been sitting there for over a month now. I have three friends that I refill for but they havnt been printing much these days so they havnt asked for refills. Tomorrow if I have time I will open up the outlet ports on some of them to see if they are still wet or dry. I guess I could weigh a few also to see if they are maintaining their weight. I use 31-32 grams for the large black and 19grams for the small colors and small black. I use the german refill method but still seal the fill hole with alum tape to protect against evaporation. But never thought twice about sealing the vent.
Im pretty confident I have a good seal on the outlet port because I take the time to trim off the nibs left when the orange cap is first broken away both from the cart. and also the orange cover. Then I clean both the port and seal on the cover. I then use a pretty heavy rubber band (1/4" wide) to hold the cover in place. I would think this is as good a seal as comes from Canon. I then use another rubber band to hold the set of 5 carts. together as a unit.
So now sealing the vent should be easy using the same alum tape I use for hole covers. I suppose I could then wrap the hole set with saran plastic wrap and then store them in a zip lock bag.
I used to store my HP carts in their clip wrapped in plastic wrap in a zip lock bag with a wet paper towel in the bag to keep things moist.
But I gotta say this seems like a lot of extra work that may not be necessary.
So I will check these carts on my shelf tomorrow and see what they look like.
I will let you guys no of my findings.
"That my theory and Im stickin to it."
Bob pearlhouse Pearl

Where did you get the idea that I was suggesting that you should seal the vent for storage? That's exactly the opposite of what I said. You should not change what you are doing.

 

[pearlhouse]

Sorry didnt mean to confuse you, I dont think it is necessary either. But after you pointed out that they come sealed top and bottom and shrinkwrapped I just threw that out there. Its been quite a while since I bought a new cart so I forgot the vent is sealed. If I can see any evaporation on the ones on my shelf than I will consider doing something like tapeing the vent. According to fotofreek they will not show any evap. I also agee Joseph1949 puts to much detail out there and sorry to say hes got me doing it also. From now on I will re-read my comments before posting and edit the extra our, I hope!

 

[stratman]

I was really targeting my comment to people who might have read joseph's recommendations and been lead to believe that you can take a cartridge out of the print head, refill it, set it on the table upside down overnight and then put it back in the print head the next day. I know he's not proposing that but if you don't read everything he wrote very carefully, you can pick comments here and there out of context and think that might be what he's saying.

OK, good point. This thread has gone sideways at times.

 

[fotofreek]

If I can see any evaporation on the ones on my shelf than I will consider doing something like tapeing the vent. According to fotofreek they will not show any evap.

Very little evaporation can occur with my refilled carts in a sealed food container. I've have carts stored this way for many months at a time. No problem, no tape on the air vent. the ink outlet port is sealed with an original orange cap/rubber band and the top fill hole is sealed with a screw/O-ring

 

[mikling]

I've stored carts for months as well with no drying issues in sealed containers BUT one did develop mould inside! so be careful of long term storage. I think grandad35 once warned of this as well and there was a recommendation to put some alcohol or something inside the container as well. Can't recall exactly.