I'm Filling My Cartridges With Fountain Pen Ink

[Eugbug]

I'm fed up buying inkjet cartridges for my Lexmark printer, which usually dry up and stop working, so I decided to fill the cartridge with black Parker Quink fountain pen ink. This is a photocopy. Not as black as the real thing, but it works. (If I change the settings for a darker output, photocopies and printouts from a computer are great quality. Not sure about the results on photo quality paper, but 90% of the time, for me anyway, a printer is only used for photocopying and making printouts of forms etc, so quality is good enough.
It took a while to get the flow going out through the nozzles. Wiping the head with hot water or dipping it in hot water didn't work. In the end, I put my mouth onto the top of the cartridge and blew through the vent holes. That created sufficient pressure to make it work. An air compressor might work too (I think I tried that before), but it could be a bit hazardous and burst the cartridge (like Mr Bean's painting technique using a firework)

 

[UpAndPrinting]

Have you considered upgrading to a continuous ink supply system? Or CISS. You can reset the ink levels and always have ink that's way cheaper in price. Unfortuantely, I haven't seen any systems for Lexmark printers. Putting pen ink through a printhead sounds like a great way to ruin it.

 

[Chris_N]

Fountain pen ink might work in some printers. If it works for you then that's great!

As has already been mentioned, you might be better off purchasing an ink tank printer. Epson, HP and Canon make them. (Epson EcoTank, HP Smart Tank, Canon MegaTank). I believe HP have some budget models that come with 3 years worth of ink.

You can also purchase bulk printer ink online that is better and much cheaper than fountain pen ink. eg OCP inks from Germany or Google "Bulk printer ink". Ebay also has lots of offers from China.

HP/Canon/Lexmark inks tend to be similar. Epson use a different formulation. You might also experiment buying a bulk ink bottle made for a Canon MegaTank printer and using that.

Kind regards
Chris

 

[Eugbug]

Fountain pen ink might work in some printers. If it works for you then that's great!

As has already been mentioned, you might be better off purchasing an ink tank printer. Epson, HP and Canon make them. (Epson EcoTank, HP Smart Tank, Canon MegaTank). I believe HP have some budget models that come with 3 years worth of ink.

You can also purchase bulk printer ink online that is better and much cheaper than fountain pen ink. eg OCP inks from Germany or Google "Bulk printer ink". Ebay also has lots of offers from China.

HP/Canon/Lexmark inks tend to be similar. Epson use a different formulation. You might also experiment buying a bulk ink bottle made for a Canon MegaTank printer and using that.

Kind regards
Chris

Thanks Chris.