Refilling HP 56 cartridges

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Is refilling HP 56 cartridges as easy as it looks? From the instructions,
the 56 seems to be just a tank with some overridable level-read electronics?

But I just refilled a 56 in the normal way and cant get it to work at all: I
cant get the printer to prime the cartridge or push any ink through to the
underside of the cartridge.

Does anyone know about these please? I notice that one site says you need
to draw a mil of ink out of the underside somehow (do you absolutely need
their speical tool which lets you suck ink out of the bottom of the cart for
doing this?) while another site suggests that leaving it for an hour or so
in a pool of water will do the same thing: Are either of these true (I
coulndt get the ink to 'drain' into the pool at all: Is there a trick
involved?) Or is there a utility which draws ink out of these any more than
the priming utility in the HP toolbox does?
 
Fill it up again via the usual top injection method, remove 0.5ml using the
same syringe, then stick the head in 1/4" of hot water (refreshing if it
cools down) for 10 minutes, remove it from the water, quickly dab it dry,
then blow into the top fill hole until ink builds up under the head. Then
just repeatedly dab the head with dry tissue until it flows onto the tissue
evenly but not excessively, i.e you get a rectangle shape. Return the
cartridge to the printer, print out one test page using the 4-3 Tap method
which is good for testing all the jets without using hardly any ink. As
long as most of the jets now work just leave the cartridge and printer
unused for several hours. Now run one cleaning cycle and try a 4-3 Tap test
again. All the jets should work now.

4-3 Tap is ......hold Power button, press Cancel 4 times, press Page feed 3
times, release power button, at least it is on my 5550 printer.
 
Many thnaks, I will do it tomorrow: I seem to need to empty the cart and
fill it again??

(I never thought of blowing through the top hole to get the ink flowing)
 
Well the 4-3 tap doesn't SEEM to work but your blowing through it did the
trick immediately (although with the incorrect ink level reading which I
kinda expected) with the proper pigmented ink which I bought for the HP
printer some time ago.

The unit then gave me an immediate error with the 57 cart, which seems to be
the one you can re-fill easily with any high quality ink (if I can figure
out how to identify the re-filling holes in the top) and then use the same
blow-through technique to get the ink to flow
 
I refill the 57 successfully, the same blow through method can be used if
necessary but I wouldn't over-do it, just do it if you get a problem. The
correct fill holes are the outside 3 and you should be able to see the
sponge colour with the label off. Dabbing the head with tissue will show
you the correct order of ink colours as well.
 
Thank you for indicating where the holes are: I will try to look and see
that you have to get the label off somehow:

The only problem I have had as yet is that as soon as I tried to reset the
ink counter (does it read the cart LEVELS or does it just count the number
of times it has been used?) the cart stopped working with a "56 black
cartridge error" message. I put a piece of adhesive tape over the left hand
four metal contacts on the head, started the unit and then repeated the
sequence with tape over the right four contacts. The problem arose on
re-starting the unit after the supposed reset procedure was finished and now
I can't get the printer to start at all.

Do you have any idea what causes this? (I am pretty sure there is no
adhesive on the contacts)
 
With my two 56 cartridges, the following worked. First tape the top single
contact of the 2nd column, shut the lid for 5 seconds, lift it and wait till
you can remove the cartridge. Take that tape off and fit it to the top
single contact of the 5th column (i.e. 2nd from the right), shut the lid for
5 seconds etc and remove. Take the tape off & reinsert. Now the ink status
should be 100%.

Your problem sounds like you've confused the poor printer's brain.
Somewhere on HP's site is the procedure for a hardware reset.
 
I dont think it approved of taking the ink cart out after 5 seconds (I did
wait until after it had stabilised) then it didn't like my taking it out
again to take the second but of tape off. Then it did some auto cart checks
and printed out a test page, all the while with the HP toolbox telling me
that it couldn't establish contact between the computer and the printer.
This sorta indicates that you have to let it run through some sort of cycle?

I tried the instructions again and it got stuck on 'printing calibration
page' (which it didn't do). So I turned it off and waited a minute or so and
turned it on again: This time it said it was checking the cartridges and
printed the calibration page

The point is that your instructions seem OK with one minor reservation: It
doesn't seem clear that the wait 5 seconds bit is OK depending what the
printer is doing during those 5 seconds??? It SEEMS as if you have to wait
until the printer runs through some sort of cycle before taking the tapes
off and putting them on again. In any event it works for the black and the
tricolour one as well: I wonder if it is possible to leave the cart in with
the tape on either contact for too long?

(Now I have to figure out where to get those three pastel coloured inks for
the photo cart)
 
I find the 5 seconds works with the 56 for me but doesn't work at all
reliably for the 57 and 58 where it's best to wait for the calibration page
to print. It's all a bit flaky though. I'm guessing, but I think that some
pins are used for more than one purpose, so taping over a contact to change
the serial number temporarily may also introduce a printing error which
could vary from non-firing jets to the printer getting confused because it
thinks the cartridge is faulty. As cartridges mostly have different serial
numbers, it may be that some would give problems when contacts are taped and
others wouldn't.
 
doesn't work at all
reliably for the 57 and 58 where it's best to wait for the calibration
page to print. It's all a bit flaky though.
Click to expand...

That is very interesting: I wonder what the difference is between your
method of taping over one pin then the other and the other listed on-line
method of taping over four completely different contacts then four other
completely different contacts?? (see below: I couldn't get it to work but
that may just be me)


Leading the printer to believer the cartridges are new: Status: refilled
cartridges in the printer. - Turn on the printer. - Open up the cover,
remove both cartridges. -
Place both cartridges infront of you so that you can see the contact foil,
with the nozzles facing downwards. - With adhesive tape, cover the four
upper contact
points on the far left contact column of both cartridges - something like
this: X . . . X . . . X . . . X . . . . . . . . . . . - Reinsert the two
cartridges. - Close the cover. -
Open the cover again after 2 or 3 seconds. - Wait until the printer gives
you the cartridge carriage (If there seems to be a problem with either of
the cartridges,
ignore it) - Open the cover, remove the two cartridges. - Place both
cartridges infront of you so that you can see the contact foil, with the
nozzles facing downwards.
- Remove the adhesive tape. - With adhesive tape, cover the four upper
contact points on the far right contact column of both cartridges -
something l
ike this: X . . . X . . . X . . . X . . . . . . . . . . . - Reinsert the two
cartridges. - Close the cover. - Open the cover again after 2 or 3
seconds. - Wait until the printer
gives you the cartridge carriage (If there seems to be a problem with either
of the cartridges, ignore it) - Open the cover, remove the two cartridges. -
Remove the adhesive tape. - Clean the contacts well. - Reinsert the two
cartridges. - Close the cover. - That's it !!!
 
news.rcn.com said:
doesn't work at all

GOOD


That is very interesting: I wonder what the difference is between your
method of taping over one pin then the other and the other listed on-line
method of taping over four completely different contacts then four other
completely different contacts?? (see below: I couldn't get it to work but
that may just be me)


Leading the printer to believer the cartridges are new: Status: refilled
cartridges in the printer. - Turn on the printer. - Open up the cover,
remove both cartridges. -
Place both cartridges infront of you so that you can see the contact foil,
with the nozzles facing downwards. - With adhesive tape, cover the four
upper contact
points on the far left contact column of both cartridges - something like
this: X . . . X . . . X . . . X . . . . . . . . . . . - Reinsert the two
cartridges. - Close the cover. -
Open the cover again after 2 or 3 seconds. - Wait until the printer gives
you the cartridge carriage (If there seems to be a problem with either of
the cartridges,
ignore it) - Open the cover, remove the two cartridges. - Place both
cartridges infront of you so that you can see the contact foil, with the
nozzles facing downwards.
- Remove the adhesive tape. - With adhesive tape, cover the four upper
contact points on the far right contact column of both cartridges -
something l
ike this: X . . . X . . . X . . . X . . . . . . . . . . . - Reinsert the two
cartridges. - Close the cover. - Open the cover again after 2 or 3
seconds. - Wait until the printer
gives you the cartridge carriage (If there seems to be a problem with either
of the cartridges, ignore it) - Open the cover, remove the two cartridges. -
Remove the adhesive tape. - Clean the contacts well. - Reinsert the two
cartridges. - Close the cover. - That's it !!!
Click to expand...
 
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