Refill Your Printer Cartridge

Printer Cartridges are surprisingly costly. 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.

Step 1: What You Need

1. Printer-ink. You can buy it from a computer store. In Bangalore, you can buy it from an ink-refill shop at the entrance of SP Road, near City market.
2. A 1ml disposable syringe. The smaller the needle, the better.
3. Your printer cartridge. My printer uses a HP56 cartridge. But the refill method is same for most inkjet cartridges.

Step 2: The Cartridge

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 ).

Step 3: Refill Your Printer Cartridge

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. Air gaps can block your ink cartridge. So make sure that there are no air bubbles, before you inject ink through the hole.
2. Refilling is a messy job. Make sure you have a piece of paper/waste cloth. The image has a clean background only to make it look good!
3. I was advised to fill the cartridge to near-capacity and not full. i.e., my cartridge's capacity is 19ml. So I filled it to about 13ml. Probably this is to prevent leakage.
4. Once, the cartridge is filled, it should be allowed to set for a few hours. This lets the ink to settle at the bottom of the sponge. The sponge is located inside the cartridge & cannot be seen.

P.S. Sorry for the poor image quality in this instructable. I ruined it by putting the camera too close to the objects.

Acknowledgement: I was "taught" to fill ink by my neighbor Sridhar. Thanks very much!

Comments

[Digitalnock]

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[pradipnandy79]

Where do I find the cartridge inside the printer

[JeanJacquesRou9]

If you have a recent model, they are not inside the printer. Latest models use wifi ink, sho you need to go yupp the store where you bought it, to purchase more ink network.

[franceschicaleb]

Awesome thanks

[taylorrogue5]

How do I remove old cartridges and install new ? ( HP7760)

[MichaelM1465]

Could ink used in the Offset printing industry be used in domestic inkjet printers.

[LisaB410]

Do you think you could use homemade ink for this? I'm wanting to use eco-friendly ink for my business labels.

[gen-os]

Did you ever find out if this was possible?

[LauraS380]

Does this article apply only to HP ink cartridges? My Brother cartridges appear to be a whole different trip.

[DeepakM71]

For hp 678 cartridge see video total information

[DeepakM71]

https://youtu.be/ZPm0RDTKhSI

[DeepakM71]

For hp 678 cartridge see video total information. https://youtu.be/ZPm0RDTKhSI

[amirk17]

i have canon pixma 2470 inkjet printer. i refill black cartreidge 746 . after installing cartreidge black light did not stop. and computer open diogbox again ink empty low. i am very bothring i got stuck. canon catriedge price is very high. what i do please help me give the solution how can stop light and dilog box msg..

[BenjaminB10]

get a chip resetter for your cartridgers

your cardridge has a chip built into it that tells the pc that the cardridge is full so its not that easy for people to refill their cardridges, that resetter will erase the memory and reset it on that chip

[SallyM29]

Can you be more specific about the size of the syringe? what size ml and needle?

[SamikJ]

just ask a chemist to give insulin syringe. I know it very well as my grandmother uses the same thing

[xchcui]

Should i need to push the syringe needle into the sponge or the needle should be above the sponge,while refilling it with ink?

[rockystone]

You can fill 15 ml ink into this cartridge. Always use pigment ink for this cartridge. I used inkclub brand ink bought from snapdeal & it worked fine. After refilling use a suction tool to make the ink flow from sponge to the printer head. Check it on tissue paper & install it in the printer. Happy printing!!!!

[UltriconConvoy]

I got some oil-based printing press ink the other day.
Would this ink work???

BTW, where do you buy syringes?

[orrosta]

syringes can be found in medical supply stores or farm supply stores.