Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!SFAUSTIN.BITNET!Z4648252
From: Z4648252@SFAUSTIN.BITNET (Z4648252)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: REFILLING DESKJET CARTRIDGES
Message-ID: <890424.12123486.060039@SFA.CP6>
Date: 24 Apr 89 21:08:31 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 54

Dave "Mr. DeskJet" Neff writes:

"When refilling DeskJet ink cartridges be aware of the fact that the cartridge
was designed to be disposable and our thermal resistors and orafices are
not designed to last "forever"."

    The main reason that I posted the 'recharging of the cartridges'
message was merely for providing an extension to a disposable product. In
many cases, I'd suppose that one could get three lives out of the cartridge,
maybe more.  My cartridge has seen, I think, six refills.  I can't recall,
but it seems that a new cartridge weighs about two ounces.  I've been injecting
no more than two CC's of fountain pen ink.  When I first undertook this, I
injected to the point of bringing the cartridge back up to two ounces.  I
don't do that anymore, choosing to inject by CC measurement instead.  The
siphon effect will occur if one brings it up to two ounces.
    Again, though, this is just a method to try to save money (rough drafts
are fine but redundant, in spite of the speed).  If the cartridge was selling
for $5.00 I doubt if I would have sought to 'recharge' the thing.  At any
rate, I've saved a lot of money.

"With refilled DeskJet cartridges the worst that
can happen is damaging a disposable cartridge or getting ink all over
the place :-)."

    Boy, that is true!  I used to have black, red, and blue hands when I
was experimenting with this.  It can be a real mess if you don't use a
syringe.  Good luck to the folks at HP who are experimenting with different
inks.  Don't even want to know what they look like when they finish at the
end of the day.

"As for waterfast ink, if there was a cheap "over the counter" ink that
you could squirt into a DeskJet cartridge and get good print quality
on plain paper with waterfast results, don't you think HP would be using
it :-)?"

    I'd agree with that.  I found that the cartridge is very picky about
the inks.  Although Skipt's Jet Black works great, their Red Ink works
very poorly.  I can imagine the problem on trying to find the right
combination without changing the physical properties of the current
cartridge in order to use permanent ink.
    I think the main reason for the recharging, again, is to save bucks. I
find the cartridge's price very pricey.  I go through one very quickly since
I do a lot of writing, that is, it is not unusual for me to consume a ream
of paper within two weeks.  The HP printer, being incredibly cheap for the
quality of output, is a bit pricey, in my 'expert' (grin) opinion on its
cartridge. What hurts us as HOME USERS is that businesses will buy up
a dozen (dozens) of the cartridges, something that the HOME USER cannot
afford.  The business purchases keep the prices up.
    At any rate, the HP DeskJet is a champ of a printer.  It is the dream
printer that I have always wanted and am very happy with what the HP folks
are doing.
    Congrats and thanks for responding to the subject, Mr. Neff.

Larry Rymal <Z4648252@SFAUSTIN.BITNET>