Won't print black, ink jets not clogged

[dswift743]

Hi everyone,

I have a Canon MP830, and it has just started to not print out in black. If a document has various colors, it prints the colors but not the black. I did research, learned all about clogged jets, and I was just about to start some procedures. But then I saw some folks printed out a test sheet, so I did that, and it came out perfect (file attached). Are there other reasons I could be having this problem?

I'd be grateful for any help.

Doug

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

half of the upper black PGBK pattern is missing, that's an electrical fault of the printhead. You may try, as an emergency, set your paper selection to glossy paper, or try to set the quality to high , and then print a test text, it'll print pretty slowly but at least readable. And it appears that the lower cyan and magenta fields are as well very dim, that's the smaller nozzles. There is no chance to clean that electrical fault away.

 

[dswift743]

Thank you. I appreciate the diagnosis. I'm really not that handy. Sounds like I should get a new printer and try to sell this one for parts on ebay.

 

[stratman]

Just being curious... why is there a perfectly squared notch in the upper left hand corner of your scanned image? It looks like there are two pieces of paper that were scanned together.

If your scan is 100 % accurate in showing the entire nozzle check then there are several issues potentially. A "normal" nozzle scan for a Canon MP830 from the jimbo123, the king of MP830's, can be seen at http://www.printerknowledge.com/threads/nozzle-check-pattern-q-canon-mp830.4095/

The first, as @Ink stained Fingers pointed out, is that one-half of the lattice work print out of the PGBK (pigment Black) ink cartridge is missing. That you cannot see all the letters of "PGBK" as you can for C, Y, M and B is a tip-off there is missing ink. From experience, the PGBK portion of the nozzle check should be approximately twice as tall in the vertical axis than it is, demonstrating a potential electrical error of the print head that cannot be fixed concerning the PGBK (pigment Black) nozzles of the print head.

The second issue is that the central core of the PGBK vertical solid black stripe is void of black ink, meaning it is white (absent ink). Typically a lack of ink in these vertical bars are horizontal and run the entire horizontal length of the bar. Why the central vertical core of the bar is white, and that this absence of ink is not duplicated (at least in some aspect) on the companion vertical black bar (the other side of the letters "PGBK") is unusual and not a good sign as far being a simple clog that can be fixed.

The third issue is the lack of Cyan and Magenta in their respective second nozzle check patterns. These horizontal colors should be uniform in color throughout (like the other colors). The vertical bars that bookend the C and M are appropriately grey-green unlike the solid deep black of the other vertical bars of the nozzle check (except for the odd absence of ink noted in issue #2 above) Maybe this is an artifact from a low scan resolution setting or using too much compression in saving the image to your hard drive.

As Ink Stained Fingers suggested, you can bypass using Pigment Black ink (the problem PGBK) and have the printer use CYMB dye based inks to make black by setting the printer paper type from Plain Paber (uses PGBK by default for text) to ANY Photo Paper setting (which do not use PGBK ink). You might want set Print Quality to High or Custom if Standard does not look deep enough black.

While it is possible that there could be an issue with the logic board assay of the printer, experience has demonstrated that a new print head would most likely fix the issue. However, Canon no longer manufactures or sells them. It may be possible to find a new, unopened OEM print head. The print heads out of China are refurbished for the most part, maybe all of them with copycat packaging, and there are reports of malfunctions, so it is a gamble.

One simple thing to try is to make sure the electrical contacts on the print head and the printer are clean. Use either a lint free cloth and rubbing alcohol like isopropyl, or, a #2 pencil soft erasure.

 

[dswift743]

That is an excellent analysis. The scan is accurate, so I have no doubt your diagnosis is also. This is more printer than we need in the first place--hand me down from brother in law--so we've already ordered a simple printer/scanner by Brother. Next question: what is this current unit worth on ebay in this shape? I saw someone was trying to get a hundred bucks from the same model, sans printer head. Many thanks for the response. Very helpful.

 

[stratman]

what is this current unit worth on ebay in this shape?

No idea. Search ads on eBay, Craigslist, wherever else for pricing/bidding amounts.