Why You cannot hear ink when you shake an ink cartridge.

Posted by Adrian Rigby on February 26, 2020

A customer told me the other day he knew his ink cartridges were empty because he had shaken them and could not hear the ink sloshing around inside. Even though his printer told him there was ink in the cartridges (I will go into this in another post).

The reason you cannot hear ink sloshing around in an ink cartridge is because it has sponges inside to hold the ink.

The sponge (1 for each colour) is saturated with ink to a specific density/dampness. The ink then flows through gravity into the print head at the bottom of the cartridge. The print head is the copper /electrical bit on the bottom of the cartridge. If there was no sponge and just a tank of ink the ink would flow through the print head to quickly and soak the paper being printed on. The sponge gives a controlled rate of ink into the print head.

This is why self-filling ink cartridges can be somewhat hit and miss, or give patchy print. You do not know exactly how much ink you are squirting into the cartridge with a syringe. It works for some people but most we found it did not. Ink cartridge refill kits were one of these good ideas that did not quite work in practise.

If you have any printer or cartridge issues/questions please contact us and we will do our best to help you out. Call 01522 683460  e-mail sales@abcartridges.co.uk or message our face book page.