sublimation ink shelf life

[bigj2552]

what is the shelf life of sub inks ?
if stored in a cool, dry place, out of sunlight ect ?

and does it make a differance once they are opened as well ? - wouldnt think so, but asking anyway !


thanks

johnny

[bms]

Sawgrass are now putting dates on their inks and in the event of issues arising this date is requested. I think dates are a little confusing and similar to the food industry use by/ best before & sell by dates. I can understand the logic of milk having a use by date (don't fancy 6 month old milk in my cuppa!), but equally what happens to baking powder 6 years after the 'best before' date (err rhetorical ). As for ink, a bottle left standing for 3 years might start to show signs of settling but what does happen to ink over time? Any chemists on here?

[bigj2552]

Sawgrass are now putting dates on their inks and in the event of issues arising this date is requested. I think dates are a little confusing and similar to the food industry use by/ best before & sell by dates. I can understand the logic of milk having a use by date (don't fancy 6 month old milk in my cuppa!), but equally what happens to baking powder 6 years after the 'best before' date (err rhetorical ). As for ink, a bottle left standing for 3 years might start to show signs of settling but what does happen to ink over time? Any chemists on here?

na martin - thats just sawgrass rippin the p**s like they have always done m8. - Just to make you think your ink is out of date & not performing properly - ....oh i better buy some more "new in date" inks.....gimme a break :rolleyes:

nice marketing ploy tho !.
wasnt talking years here martin - more like 12mth tops...at the most bud !
I presume the chemicals in the inks would start to break down after a period of time - but whats that time frame i wonder ???

I rememember JSR on here saying once that he had to get another profile done on his inks after a period of time, as the colours changed slightly over time....then when he got NEW INK, he used the profile he got at the start of the last batch of FRESH INKS !

Would be intresting to see how sub ink fares after a period of stagnation.
ANYONE had there sub inks ( not ebay crap ) for longer than 6mth ? - probably not - as most of the guys on here are usually busy

[Paul]

I had a supply of ink fr over 2 years. All peeformed as good as in day one

And no. Is not tuat i was npt printing enough. I bougt 4 liters of ink so lasted me ages. Btw. I still got it now lol. Perfect results.

[JSR]

I'm not one to be cynical (what, me?) but the dates on Sawgrass inks seems to be coinciding with them being called upon to provide more support - something that our friendly neighborhood BMS has been helpful enough to emphasise from time to time. Is the dating issue actually Sawgrass setting up a loophole to absolve themselves from support when it's asked for? No, of course not. I'm not that cynical.

There was a story last year in which HP were putting expiration dates on their cartridges to prevent the printer from using them if you'd had the ink around for too long. How soon before that happens with Sawgrass's Ricoh cartridges?

Old ink left idle does settle and "separate". I've seen this with ink on my shelf, although I should qualify this in that it seems only to happen with bottles that have previously been opened and CISS/cartridges with plenty of air in them. So it's not a settling over time, but a reaction with the air from what I can tell. And, yes, this happens with Sawgrass ink as well. I had some small amount in an old CISS on the side not doing anything for quite a few months and it was noticeable to see the ink had separated. Just last week, I removed inks from my 1290S that's been turned off for months and the same thing happened with Artanium inks there. It's most noticeable in the yellow, but it does happen with the darker inks too.

Does this settling/separation cause more nozzle clogging? It would be difficult to tell. If you're the kind of person who experiences a lot of "clogging issues" anyway, then it seems fair to presume that it's not going to get any better. If you don't normally experience "clogging issues", then it remains to be seen what would happen with 12+ month old ink. Even then, would the "clogging issue" be a matter of ink age, or merely that the ink isn't really suited to small-power desktop inkjet printers in the first place? After all, dye-sublimation ink is thicker than regular dye ink anyway. It's going to have difficulty with third-party printers at some point or another. Pointing fingers at the age of the ink implies that the problem won't occur with new ink, and may encourage the naive to junk their old ink and buy a new (expensive) batch, when it may have nothing to do with the age of the ink at all.

Does ink age affect the colour? I think it does. I had some old dye-sublimation ink that I used for my original Brother printer test review. I didn't use that printer/ink combination much (because I had another Brother printer). When I dug it out to use it again, there was a noticeable difficulty in the yellows/greens - something that was solved by getting a new profile made up. Given that Sawgrass only provides one profile per printer, it's unlikely to be suitable for all situations, all printers, and all ages of ink - so it would only be right that Sawgrass would try and get you to minimise the chances of their single profile being unsuitable. If, however, you want to get your own profile done there should be no reason why you can't continue using the ink unless you experience an increased "clogging" issue. After all, £20 spent on a new ICC profile is a whole lot cheaper than giving Sawgrass £240-£360 for a brand new set of inks. Unfortunately, the freedom to update your profile isn't open to you if you rely on the PowerDriver software.

Really, though, if Sawgrass are going to start date-stamping their inks and deny support if your ink is too old, then they need to start offering their inks for sale in smaller quantities. £60 for 125ml of each colour of ink is really not on if you're a low-user or hobbyist and you need to use it up in one year. I've had 4x100ml of regular dye ink in my office printer for about 18 months and I still have about half of it left, despite printing anything and everything whenever I feel like it. Sawgrass needs to start offering their ink in 30ml, 60ml and 100ml bottles - in a way that helps the end-user (and not just in a way that let's them hoik up their prices). That way people might actually use what they buy before the expiration date.

[bigj2552]

I had a supply of ink fr over 2 years. All peeformed as good as in day one

And no. Is not tuat i was npt printing enough. I bougt 4 liters of ink so lasted me ages. Btw. I still got it now lol. Perfect results.

lol...thats why i was asking bud - going to purchase 4 ltrs of the stuff - the savings are unbelievable - not from a retail shop tho...obviously !

Good to hear - thanks paul

[Paul]

Make sure you.store it.properly

[bigj2552]

Make sure you.store it.properly

i,m listening......all ears.....whats properly bud ?

i thought in a cool, dry place out of direct sunlight would do ?

[Paul]

yep. thats what i mean. dont expose it to direct lights.

[swimwivsquid]

I had some Rotech ink that had separated and had like stringy globules in the cartridge and figured maybe the ink was old. Checked a new bottle and it had the same so I'm not so sure about the quality control of the manufacturer. I have since been using a non Sawgrass brand and have (touch wood) had no problems with clogging in my epson workforce 1100 printer (US version of the B1100) even when leaving it for a week or two. Personally from what I have read on the subject and experienced I wouldn't go back to Sawgrass inks.