Can My Cartridge Be Refilled?

Written by Barry Shultz


New styles of inkjet cartridges are enteringrepparttar market allrepparttar 107194 time, faster than anybody can keep up with. It takes time forrepparttar 107195 remanufacturers to collect empties and tool up to refill them. Sometimes it could take many months for remanufactured or generic cartridges to hitrepparttar 107196 market. Bulk inks need to be developed or reverse engineered. For this reason we don't always have refill kits or bulk ink or cartridges right away for new printers.

What's a person to do? You ask, "Can my new cartridge be refilled while I'm waiting forrepparttar 107197 after market to catch up?". Thankfullyrepparttar 107198 answer is a resounding YES! Ifrepparttar 107199 manufacturer got ink inside that bugger you can bet you can too. "What aboutrepparttar 107200 inks?", you ask.

Many new cartridges are just re-hashes ofrepparttar 107201 old ones with minor variations. While you're waiting you can experiment with your old cartridges and try to refill them withrepparttar 107202 ink you already have. There are some guidelines to follow here though because I don't condone a one ink fits all solution.

Generally Lexmark and HP inks are interchangeable. Likewise, Canon and Epson can be interchanged. There might be some color variations but you should be able to compensate inrepparttar 107203 driver set up. Pigmented ink should not be used in a dye based cartridge, however, dye based ink can be used in a pigmented cartridge. An Example isrepparttar 107204 Canon BCI-3e black cartridge which uses pigmented ink and BCI-6 which uses dye based ink. You can userepparttar 107205 BCI-6 black inrepparttar 107206 BCI-3 but not visa-versa.

Using Print Head Sealing Tape

Written by Barry Shultz


There is a lot of confusion when it comes to using print head sealing tape. When you refill a cartridge that contains a print head, Lexmark and HP in particular, you need to sealrepparttar print head to #1 protect it and #2 keep it from drying out. The combination of sealing tape and a cartridge clip can't be beat for sealing cartridges for storage or transport.

Print head sealing tape comes in two varieties, adhesive and static. Both serve a different purpose which I will get into very shortly. There are two colors available, blue and orange. The orange tape is used on Canon cartridges mostly and is ofrepparttar 107193 adhesive variety. The blue tape is used on HP and Lexmark cartridges and is available in static or adhesive.

The reasonrepparttar 107194 orange tape is only available in adhesive form is because Canon cartridges don't have print heads on them which can be damaged with an adhesive type of tape. The orange tape can be used to sealrepparttar 107195 ink ports and refilling and breather holes onrepparttar 107196 BCI-3e and BCI-6 Canon cartridges.

The blue tape deserves more discussion because usingrepparttar 107197 wrong tape can permanently ruin your cartridge. Do not userepparttar 107198 adhesive tape on color print heads, ever. It is used to sealrepparttar 107199 breather holes for storage. The adhesive tape can actually causerepparttar 107200 copper foil to disconnect fromrepparttar 107201 cartridge when you remove it, which is of course a bad thing.

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