How do ink refills work

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Learn why people trust wikiHow. Download Article Explore this Article Steps. Tips and Warnings. Related Articles. Article Summary. Buy an ink refill kit for your printer. Many office supply, discount, and department stores carry these kits for a fraction of the cost of an official replacement cartridge. Kits usually come with everything you need to refill an existing cartridge, including ink, a syringe, seal covers, a manual, and a screw tool. Some ink refill kits are universal, meaning they are intended to work for all inkjet printer brands.

Others are manufacturer or model-specific. Most printer companies advise against refilling your own printer ink. Instead, they recommend that you purchase new cartridges from them directly. Refilling your own cartridges may void your ability to receive tech support from the printer manufacturer, so refill at your own risk. Prepare your workspace. Ink can be messy, so lay down some newspaper or paper towels on a flat working surface. Then, grab your ink kit, more paper towels, a pair of gloves you don't mind getting dirty, and some clear tape.

Printer ink will leave permanent stains on clothing and surfaces. Put on gloves to protect your hands. Though ink stains on your skin won't be permanent, they can definitely stick around a long time. Remove the printer cartridge. The steps to do this vary by printer, but the cartridges are usually not too difficult to remove. You may need to turn the printer on so the cartridges move to an accessible location. Place the empty cartridge on a folded paper towel.

Fold the paper towel in half twice to make an effective spill guard one to work over. Read the refill kit's instruction manual. The manual will contain instructions specific to the kit, including information on how to use included tools. If the manual's instructions differ much from this wikiHow, stick to the manual's instructions. Find the ink fill hole on the cartridge.

Some cartridges, such as those made by HP, already have a fill hole that doesn't require you to puncture the cartridge. If you're working with a cartridge that has multiple inks in a single unit, each color will have its own fill hole.

If you find more than one hole, only one actually leads to the ink reservoir. Inspect each hole until you find one with a spongy material inside—this is the fill hole. You can verify by attempting to remove some existing ink with the syringe included in the kit. Some manufacturers place a twist-off cap on each cartridge that must be removed to expose the fill hole. If the fill hole is sealed, you'll just need to break the seal to fill it. Create a fill hole in the absence of one.

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Loading Facebook Like button Pros and cons of refilling cartridges Are you wondering if refilling cartridges is right for you? Pros: Better for the environment — Since cartridges are made of plastic, every time you decide to get a new cartridge, you need to throw away the old one. Cons: Printer damage — Refilling cartridges without taking professional help can increase the risk of causing permanent damage to your printer.

Join our online community and subscribe to our e-newsletter. Powered by. This can be because the cartridge wears out over time, or because of the memory chip on the cartridge.

The memory chip on your print cartridge is what tells your printer the status on your ink levels and communicates other errors, such as incompatible cartridges. On some printers, such as ones from HP and Epson, these memory chips also keep track of serial numbers from cartridge chips and refuse ones that have been repeated.

The quality of ink inside refilled cartridges is of lower quality, which contributes to the lower cost of the refilled cartridge. While this loss in quality is not as noticeable in standard text print jobs, is it noticeable if you print photos.

The ink is likely to fade faster, and will not last as long as ink from OEM cartridges. Cartridges can only be refilled so many times before the printer head fails -- about five times. As an alternative, you can get it refilled at a store. The cheapest and effective alternative though is to refill it yourself.

All it takes is a bottle of printer-ink and a syringe. You can buy it from a computer store. A 1ml disposable syringe. The smaller the needle, the better. Your printer cartridge. My printer uses a HP56 cartridge. But the refill method is same for most inkjet cartridges. There is a black spot on the white-sticker covering the top-cover of the cartridge. Underneath the black spot is a hole through which ink can be injected into the cartridge.

You can peel off the sticker to locate the hole. Or simply pierce the black spot with a needle as shown in the figure. Draw ink into the syringe slowly and inject it into the hole. That's it!

Some important tips: 1. The needle size is very small. If you draw ink into the syringe too quickly, you can create air-gaps.