Canon inkjet ink: any issue after freezing?

[Bob_B]

I guess it was bound to happen. I ordered several refill inks for my Pro100. The package containing them arrived last Tuesday when the day temperature was around 9-10 F, and the package sat on my shaded front porch for 3-4 hours. I assume that these inks are water-based and that the ink froze during the time the package sat in the cold. I'm a bit hesitant to use them, as I worry that freezing may cause the ink to come out of solution, form particles, or otherwise clog the print head on my Pro100, yet I need the refills and hate the thought of lost $$$.

Anyone have any experience similar to this? Any thought about what happens when inkjet ink freezes?

Thanks for the help,

Bob

[colinm]

If they're standard retail-boxed Canon inks, there should be a range of storage temperatures on the back of the package in a near-indecipherable pictogram.

While "water based", both piezo and thermal inkjet inks have a considerable amount of glycerol content which will behave (unintentionally) like antifreeze. Actually freezing therefore requires some seriously cold temperatures.

In the case of Epson inks, acceptable storage is anything above -4F and below 104F. I don't have specs for Lucia inks in front of me, but I suspect they're similar.

[Bob_B]

Thanks for your advice. I also thought to look at the package for temp information. Unfortunately, the vendor placed their stocking sticker over the entire back of the ink package on all eight inks, so I can't determine what the temp range is from these packages.

Bob

[bill t.]

I have a mail slot at the UPS store specifically to receive temperature sensitive supplies during the winter.  I also keep an eye out on the weather web sites before shipping such supplies to evaluate the condition of the route, and I try to ship on Monday so the supplies will not sit outside in the truck over the weekend.  Best strategy is stock up on water based supplies in September like a squirrel hoarding nuts for the winter.  The carts for my iPF8300 don't seem to suffer from he cold, but I wouldn't ship if I saw a real freeze on the way.  Fedex can arrange for temperature controlled shipping, don't know how much that costs.

[I.T. Supplies]

Technically, any of the OEM inks will be fine if they do freeze.  This does happen during the really low temps that have occurred.  You can let them thaw out for most of the day (especially the large printer inks) and they will be fine to use.  We've had this issue a few years ago during the really bad weather conditions in Feb 2012 and very few of them were exchanged as customers wanted replacements upfront.  The rest thawed them out and had no problems with the colors afterward.

I wouldn't be able to say on 3rd party inks since they have different formula than OEM.