How can I clean printer catridges?

You can get cartridges full of cleaner instead of ink or you could put cleaner in your old cartridges and run them through. I would recommend that you remove the cartridges and place them in a air tight plastic bag between uses.

An example of the cleaning cartridges can be found at the bottom of this page:

I had success with HP carts by standing them in a saucer with enough warm water (with a few drops of cloudy ammonia and detergent) to cover the head and leaving over night or at least an hour. Dry off the head with soft tissue and run a few prints off.

Get one of the laser printers. They do not use ink that can dry out. They use a dry transfer type of material to do the printing.

Try IPA isopropyl alcohol works for us

steve balstone stephen balstone

"Edu" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@p79g2000cwp.googlegroups.com...

If u don't need photo quality printout, a laser printer might be your best bet, as one poster suggested. They will never dry out on ya, because well.. the ink is dry powder to begin with! Manufacturers are reported to be working on dry type inks for inkjet technology, but I'm not sure how close this is to being market-ready. Unfortunately, present-day affordable color laser printers aren't much use for photos, so if u need pretty pics or wide color gamut graphics, you're stuck with inkjets or specialty sublimation printers.

Printer manufacturers don't make money on printers, they make money on INK. It's that way everywhere. Indeed, many computer systems, even low-end ones, sold in the USA include FREE printers -- u won't find any free replacement ink carts. As for the thermal inkjets, Canon is about the least expensive ink u can buy.

I got sick and tired of my thermal carts clogging when I didn't remember to print something every 2-3 days, so I switched to an Epson, which uses a piezo-electric "mechanical" head rather than a thermal one -- u don't replace the head every time u replace a cart. This _should_ but doesn't result in vastly cheaper ink, as Epson price gouges with their ink just like the other manu's. I no longer buy original inks. I bought a refill kit with clear carts as soon as my Epson carts ran out -- they don't really run out completely, because the chip on the cart tells the printer it's "empty" when there's actually about 20-25% ink left (gee thanks, Epson!). I've had no more trouble with the third-party ink than I had with the original Epson ink, and it saved me gobs of money ($45 for 6 clear carts with autoreset chips and enough ink for 9 refills per color).

From my many years experience with thermal inkjets, I feel comfortable saying that you are fighting a losing battle trying to keep these carts free flowing, most especially if u are a refiller. Oh sure, u will get maybe all nozzles open, once.. for a while. But if u forget to print or perform a cleaning routine every few days, you'll find at least one nozzle is clogged yet again. I've tried all the tricks. Soaking on a moist paper towel (sometimes for a whole day) usually opens most, but not all nozzles after wasting plenty ink in the attempt. Letting the head sit in a petri dish of warm water will make u think this is working wonders as you'll witness streams of ink pouring out the nozzles, but ultimately your cleaning utility will show some nozzles still aren't printing. It also wastes a ton of ink in the attempt. Siphoning with a syringe and rubber seal wastes a ton of ink, too, and doesn't always open all the nozzles. Sometimes, after wasting quite a bit of ink, you may conclude the head itself has burned out, especially if you've refilled it several times -- thermal heads don't last that long. A major problem with thermal carts is not actually the head but rather the sponge. If the sponge begins to clog, ink will not flow properly to the head well and therefore what you THINK is clogged nozzles is actually a clogged sponge. The only certain remedy for this is to pop the top off the cart, remove the sponge, flush all the old ink out, let it dry (or help it with a hair dryer), flush the head itself, replace the sponge and refill. I hate the damn things. They require far more effort than they're worth.

My Epson may spend more ink on startup purging, but the amount of work and frustration it saves me in trying to keep the ink flowing is WELL worth the difference. And with the third-party Epson inks being so inexpensive, the cost isn't much greater.

Thanks to everyone for all the replies, very useful!

Someone suggested using a laser printer. I have a b&w laser printer, but for my job I need colour photo quality. Colour laser printer would be too expensive to me for now...

I am not using refilled catridges. Should I?

Actually, I have an Epson C42UX, and an HP 3325. Which one should I use for refilling for better use? I think HP has counter chip in the cartridge... so I should somehow reset it, right? I have read on some pages methods for resetting the cartridges. Do they work???

Or is it better to use a refillable catridge? Anyhow, which is better to refill, HP 3325 or Epson C42UX?

And should I also buy a cleaning cartridge? Can I use Isopropyl instead (although I don't know where to buy it yet...).

Thanks!!!

Eduardo Ray L. Volts ha escrito: