costco refill ink cartridge service

[aaronep]

When I was in the Burbank, CA COSTCO this a.m. I noticed a new
service that was posted in the photo dept. For $7. to $9., they will
refill your ink printer cartridge with the appropriate ink.
They say they will do it for you in one hour.

I haven't tried the service yet, but I intend to.

If anyone reading this has used the service, please let us know if you
were satisfied or not!

best, Aaron

 

[Al]

When I was in the Burbank, CA COSTCO this a.m. I noticed a new
service that was posted in the photo dept. For $7. to $9., they will
refill your ink printer cartridge with the appropriate ink.
They say they will do it for you in one hour.

I haven't tried the service yet, but I intend to.

If anyone reading this has used the service, please let us know if you
were satisfied or not!

best, Aaron

Never tried it as I refill my own, but you can't get hurt much for
that price. What I would do as a test is weigh the carts on a digital
scale before and after the filling to see how much ink they install. I
assume they would fill the carts completely, but ink can be lost in
final purging and testing. So I would like to know what I'm receiving.
I wonder if they would fill a 42ml HP #45 cart for that price.

 

[Jeffery Small]

Never tried it as I refill my own, but you can't get hurt much for
that price. What I would do as a test is weigh the carts on a digital
scale before and after the filling to see how much ink they install. I
assume they would fill the carts completely, but ink can be lost in
final purging and testing. So I would like to know what I'm receiving.
I wonder if they would fill a 42ml HP #45 cart for that price.

What about the chips in the current class of HP, Canon, Epson cartridges?
Will the refilled cartridges continue to work in your printers without
causing any problems? Will the printers reject the cartridges after a
certain number of pages printed?

Thanks.

 

[Al]

What about the chips in the current class of HP, Canon, Epson cartridges?
Will the refilled cartridges continue to work in your printers without
causing any problems? Will the printers reject the cartridges after a
certain number of pages printed?

Thanks.

That's a printer by printer question and somebody here can answer if
you are specific.
I use old printers without chips so I'm OK for now.
Some printer chips can be reset and the professional refillers do that
service with the job.
Other printer chips only give you nags or don't allow the ink
monitoring to work so you could live with a home refill if you did not
purchase your own chip resetter.

 

[Bob AZ]

assume they would fill the carts completely, but ink can be lost in
final purging and testing. So I would like to know what I'm receiving.
I wonder if they would fill a 42ml HP #45 cart for that price.

Al

Or a 220ml Epson cartridge.

Bob AZ

 

[tomcas]

Never tried it as I refill my own, but you can't get hurt much for
that price. What I would do as a test is weigh the carts on a digital
scale before and after the filling to see how much ink they install. I
assume they would fill the carts completely, but ink can be lost in
final purging and testing. So I would like to know what I'm receiving.
I wonder if they would fill a 42ml HP #45 cart for that price.

$9 to refill a #45 is no deal. It takes about $2 in ink and is very easy
to do yourself with the snap and fill adapter from Inksupply.com
http://www.inksupply.com/snapfill45.cfm
http://www.inksupply.com/partnumber.cfm?action=search&search_part_number=HP800PT-K
It's a lot quicker and cleaner then popping out the ball, and squeezing
the cartridge with a clamp. The adapter covers the print head and the
attached syringe is used to first collapse the foil bag inside and
removes the remaining ink. Then a full charge of ink (42ml) is injected
back in. This way the foil bag will always have a slight vacuum, which
keeps the ink from dripping out. If you are refilling a small capacity
black 21ml (45G) you can still inject a full 42 ml but remember to just
reset the level indicator the first time it shows empty with out
actually refilling it. I like to just write on the side of the cartridge
with a fine permanent marker to make it easier to keep track of refills
and resets.

 

[Al]

$9 to refill a #45 is no deal. It takes about $2 in ink and is very easy
to do yourself with the snap and fill adapter from Inksupply.comhttp://www.inksupply.com/snapfill45.cfmhtt.../partnumber.cfm?action=search&search_part_num...
It's a lot quicker and cleaner then popping out the ball, and squeezing
the cartridge with a clamp. The adapter covers the print head and the
attached syringe is used to first collapse the foil bag inside and
removes the remaining ink. Then a full charge of ink (42ml) is injected
back in. This way the foil bag will always have a slight vacuum, which
keeps the ink from dripping out. If you are refilling a small capacity
black 21ml (45G) you can still inject a full 42 ml but remember to just
reset the level indicator the first time it shows empty with out
actually refilling it. I like to just write on the side of the cartridge
with a fine permanent marker to make it easier to keep track of refills
and resets.

The price of $7-9 for the 1.5 oz. of ink in the #45 is not too bad
when somebody else is doing the refill. Ink can cost up to $4/oz. I
buy cheaper bulk ink myself. I wish I had one of those ink fill
adapters. I have my own system. When I remove the fill ball at the
bottom, I tap the hole and taper the edge. Then I close it up with a
tapered machine screw. I have used hot melt glue, but this screw is
the surest leak free method for me. My method takes a little time, but
I use those carts for so many repeat fills that it still pays.
PS. 21ml is nowhere close to 45g.

 

[tomcas]

The price of $7-9 for the 1.5 oz. of ink in the #45 is not too bad
when somebody else is doing the refill. Ink can cost up to $4/oz. I
buy cheaper bulk ink myself. I wish I had one of those ink fill
adapters. I have my own system. When I remove the fill ball at the
bottom, I tap the hole and taper the edge. Then I close it up with a
tapered machine screw. I have used hot melt glue, but this screw is
the surest leak free method for me. My method takes a little time, but
I use those carts for so many repeat fills that it still pays.
PS. 21ml is nowhere close to 45g.

High quality OEM ink from MIS costs $0.67 per fl oz. HP CARTRIDGE number
45G (not 45 grams) is 21 ml (volume). If you are saying 21ml is no where
close to 45 grams you are correct. In fact liquids having a specific
gravity of 1.0 weigh 1 gram (g) for every 1 milliliter (ml) of volume.

 

[Joel]

The price of $7-9 for the 1.5 oz. of ink in the #45 is not too bad
when somebody else is doing the refill. Ink can cost up to $4/oz. I
buy cheaper bulk ink myself. I wish I had one of those ink fill
adapters. I have my own system. When I remove the fill ball at the
bottom, I tap the hole and taper the edge. Then I close it up with a
tapered machine screw. I have used hot melt glue, but this screw is
the surest leak free method for me. My method takes a little time, but
I use those carts for so many repeat fills that it still pays.
PS. 21ml is nowhere close to 45g.

Are you sure it would cost around $4 to refill ourselves. I don't count
but I paid around $20-25 (don't remember) for 6 bottles of ink for my Epson
RX680, and I have refilled somewhere around more/less 10 times and most of
them still have around 1/2 left, and the Yellow has around 1/3 left, the
Light M has around 2/5 left.

And I am using the clear refillable ink catridges without foam inside.

Ohhh.. I think you mean $4 per OZ of ink *not* $4 per refill. I think you
are right.

And *if* you use the refillable ink cartridge then it's much easier to
refill, and you don't need to take your time as the old needle method. Cuz.

- The refillable ink catridge is a special clear ink cartridge with no foam
inside. Or you can see think ink level inside.

- The catridge has 2 holes and comes with PLUG

- All you need to do is

a. getting ink in the syringe (no needle)

b. Push the end of syringe into one hole firmly

c. Instead of pumping ink into the cartridge you PULL the flunger to
create VACUMM, lets go of the flunger and the vacumm inside the
catridge will suck the ink in equal the air being sucked out. And you
can use the catridge right away without having to wait, and there should
be no bubble issue. Or no cleaning needed

 

[tomcas]

Are you sure it would cost around $4 to refill ourselves. I don't count
but I paid around $20-25 (don't remember) for 6 bottles of ink for my Epson
RX680, and I have refilled somewhere around more/less 10 times and most of
them still have around 1/2 left, and the Yellow has around 1/3 left, the
Light M has around 2/5 left.

And I am using the clear refillable ink catridges without foam inside.

Ohhh.. I think you mean $4 per OZ of ink *not* $4 per refill. I think you
are right.

And *if* you use the refillable ink cartridge then it's much easier to
refill, and you don't need to take your time as the old needle method. Cuz.

- The refillable ink catridge is a special clear ink cartridge with no foam
inside. Or you can see think ink level inside.

- The catridge has 2 holes and comes with PLUG

- All you need to do is

a. getting ink in the syringe (no needle)

b. Push the end of syringe into one hole firmly

c. Instead of pumping ink into the cartridge you PULL the flunger to
create VACUMM, lets go of the flunger and the vacumm inside the
catridge will suck the ink in equal the air being sucked out. And you
can use the catridge right away without having to wait, and there should
be no bubble issue. Or no cleaning needed

The subject cartridge is the standard HP#45. It uses a foil bag and
there isn't any foam. When refilled with a snap and fill refilling
adapter no holes or needles are required. A syringe is attached to the
adapter which fits over the print head nozzles and is used to suck out
all of the air from the foil bag. Then the syringe is filled with ink
and then re-connected to the adapter to inject the ink thru the print
head nozzles. An extraction of a small amount of ink at the end of the
refill process is what creates the vacuum. It cost $0.67 per fluid ounce
which is $2.13 for a 42cc HP #45 cartridge.

 

[Joel]

The subject cartridge is the standard HP#45. It uses a foil bag and
there isn't any foam. When refilled with a snap and fill refilling
adapter no holes or needles are required. A syringe is attached to the
adapter which fits over the print head nozzles and is used to suck out
all of the air from the foil bag. Then the syringe is filled with ink
and then re-connected to the adapter to inject the ink thru the print
head nozzles. An extraction of a small amount of ink at the end of the
refill process is what creates the vacuum. It cost $0.67 per fluid ounce
which is $2.13 for a 42cc HP #45 cartridge.

It sounds like HP has different design than Epson which has foam inside,
and after 3-4 fills the ink probably dry out inside the cartridge so you
will get much fewer print. And most people replace the catridge with a
newer one after 2-3 refills.

 

[tomcas]

It sounds like HP has different design than Epson which has foam inside,
and after 3-4 fills the ink probably dry out inside the cartridge so you
will get much fewer print. And most people replace the catridge with a
newer one after 2-3 refills.

Most HP printers that are using the #45 black use a color cartridge that
does use foam. I wouldn't say the foam dries out but you are correct
that you only get about 3 refill with the color as opposed to 6 or more
on the black cartridge that uses the thin foil bag. The thing that
eventually kills either color or black is the burning out of the
resistors which is more likely caused by plugging of the nozzles.

 

[Arthur Entlich]

Another clarification.

Almost all Epson printers currently on the market use separate ink
cartridges. None of these (at least OEM units) have "foam" inside. A
few of the ganged cartridges which have a series of color chambers in
one cartridge still have foam or batting in them, and many older Epson
models going back about 3 or 4 generations had foam or batting within
the cartridge.


Art

If you are interested in issues surrounding e-waste,
I invite you to enter the discussion at my blog:

http://e-trashtalk.spaces.live.com/

 

[Joel]

Most HP printers that are using the #45 black use a color cartridge that
does use foam. I wouldn't say the foam dries out but you are correct
that you only get about 3 refill with the color as opposed to 6 or more
on the black cartridge that uses the thin foil bag. The thing that
eventually kills either color or black is the burning out of the
resistors which is more likely caused by plugging of the nozzles.

I meant the INK inside gets dried out, or *thickening* to have lesser room
for thinner liquid (ink) to get to the printer head.

I used to refill my old Epson ink catridges with foam the old fashion way,
then I got the remanufactured for around $2.30-$2.50 per catridge so I
stopped refilling. After so many thousands of prints which I had to clean
the Wasted Ink Pads 3 times, the roller got wore out pretty bad. The
printer was still printing fine except the roller issue so I tossed it away
to replace with the newer RX680

Then I found out that Epson has newer chip protection that has 2 chips
instead of one, and newer casing making thing hard for people to drill (it's
still possible *if* you drill at the specific spot). So I was using the
Chip Resetter to reset the original ink catridges for awhile while waiting
for refillable ink catridge with newer working ACR (Auto Chip Resetter).

Before that I once using the CISS (Continuous Ink Supply System) but I had
bubble problem so this time I tried the refillable ink catridge and it works
great.