Were you aware that Epson ink cartridges are deliberately designed not to be refilled. They contain a chip which measures the amount of ink remaining. When the ink cartridge is empty, the chip is set to empty. Simply putting more ink in the cartridge won't work. The chip also must be reprogrammed to a full state.

More recent chips are purposefully designed not to allow reprogramming, so this process frequently fails. I've seen many grumbles on the net of folks that bought refilled ink cartridges only to have the printer report that they were empty upon insertion.

How To Refill Ink Cartridge Epson

How does the chip know when the ink cartridge is empty? It counts the pages made public and guesstimates ink use. Ultimately it reports the ink cartridge to be empty, frequently when there is still 10-20% left. Once the chip is about to empty, it won't be reset. The chip still has to be reprogrammed. Some chips cannot be reprogrammed at all, so after they report empty they are going to stay that way permanently. This includes Epson T069, T078, T079, T098, T125, T126 and T127 ink cartridges.

But there are greater perils than simply having a cartridge report empty. Inkjet printers squirt ink through miniscule holes. If these holes get clogged, it can cause issues from poor print quality to finish printer failure. All ink has a tendency to coagulate when exposed to air. Otherwise it would never dry.

Now think about an empty ink cartridge which sat around for a bit before somebody injected more ink. The original remaining 10% of the ink in that cartridge has coagulated. Now it's been refilled. You are already losing 10% thanks to the coagulated ink which was there at the time of refill. But the issue is rather more heavy.

If that old ink clot can get free, it can clog and permanently damage your printer. Regardless of if you refill the cartridge straight away, if you are using an ink bottle, there will be clots along the opening of the bottle. If a single clot makes it to your printer head, you might lose you full printer in a futile effort to save a few bucks.

Some printers utilize a vacuum process to suck ink to the heads. If air enters the tiny tubes, the vacuum is broken. When refilling cartridges using hypodermic-type needles, it isn't uncommon for air to enter the tanks.

Then there are other problems. You have to keep 4 or 6 ink bottles around with a bunch of different hypodermic needles. It is very unlikely to refill without dripping ink. And it is just about inevitable that at some particular point an ink bottle will be dropped and spilled or break. What a mess!

So why refill? It is a sloppy process. If you do it yourself, you can’t avoid getting ink all over the place. If someone else does it for you, refilled ink cartridges still tend to leak, clot or bleed air into the printer. You don't economize. Places which refill typically charge about $10 a cartridge. You can buy a brand new compatible for $3. And you are taking a chance on your printer. Refilling is dumb on so many levels.

Note that refilling a single-use ink cartridge is not the same as doing so with an ink cartridge specifically designed for re-filling and using special ink dispensers built to eliminate air, leaks and spills.

Ruel Run is a researcher and writer on different kinds of subject matters including Epson inks. When you are interested finding far more material click here: Printer Cartridge Epson and Refillable Epson Cartridge.

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