Will a 'dry' 526 outlet fix itself?

[InkQuisitive]

Hi all

I just did my 2nd ever refill: a set of 525 / 526 cartridges via top fill. All seemed to go well: shaved an hour off of last week's attempt and not a drop of ink was spilled . Just a bit of minor bubbling out of the fill hole on a couple of them where I didn't keep a close enough eye on the scales .

After filling last time and this I balanced the cartridges over a bit of paper for ~20 mins to help check for leaks. While they rest there I dab off the drop of ink that slowly appears on some of them, so that once this stops building (presumably the sponge and everything have settled down) I can clip them for storage and they will hopefully be drip free when the clip is removed for installation in the printer.

But on the 526 black I found that after initial filling the outlet port was 'dry'. Touching it with kitchen paper resulted in still-clean paper . Eventually (maybe due to pressing a pad of kitchen paper against it to try and draw the ink) it started to work 'as normal' - touching it rapidly wicked ink onto the paper.

My question is whether it is likely to work OK when finally installed, or should I expect some issues from specks of dried out ink that might be in the port? I tried finding others previous experiences on this, but suspect I'm missing the magic search phrase .

BTW, no idea why it dried out when others hadn't. It was actually the fullest of the ones I was refilling so I'd have expected that to keep it wetted. I guess that when a couple of the colours had run out from the set of tanks that were supplied with the printer I must have replaced the full set (or at least any showing a low-ish level) and the black came out even though it may not have needed to. The removed ones then had Canon twist-off caps taped back in place, which seemed to have kept the others damp :/.

 

[ThrillaMozilla]

It's hard to know what will happen. If it were mine, I would either suck out about 1 mL with a Freedom Fill adapter, or I would blow out a little by blowing on the vent. For dye ink this would probably be good as new. With pigment ink it all depends on how sensitive the HP heads are to clogging and overheating. I'm fairly confident my HP head would be fine with that treatment, although I've never tried it.

It's usually a good idea to seal stored cartridges in a package as close as you can get to OEM packaging. I seal the vent with tape, and put the cap on with a tight ribber band. Then I seal it in a zip-lock bag with a piece of paper towel with some distilled water, or preferably some cleaning solution.

 

[fotofreek]

I'll display my ignorance as I don't know about some of the redesigned carts past the BCI-6 and CLI-8's. If the 525/526 carts are essentially the same functionally here's my thought. When I refill carts and replace the top fill seal I expect a bit of dripping. If there is no dripping immediately after refilling I blow gently on the air vent to make the cart drip. When the dripping appears to stop I set the cart on a sheet of newspaper that is on a flat surface. I don't want the outlet filter to touch the paper as it will wick ink away. I'm only interested in catching any remaining drips. I then either rubberband the original orange outlet cover on or put the cart into a storage clip. I haven't found it necessary to tape the air vent, although it probably doesn't do any harm. I store the refilled carts in a small refrigerator carton with an air tight lid. When I need to use a refilled cart I take the orange cap off, hold the cart over a waste basket that has some paper in it, blow gently into the air vent to cause a drip or two, and then install the cart into the printer. That way, I know that the outlet filter will be wet and ready to print.