Experiments with homebrew CIS

Photography & Video Technology
Experiments with homebrew CIS
Eddie_Matejowsky_DIY_CIS.jpg

So-called Continuous Ink Systems (CIS) are after-market goodies that attach to your inkjet printer, replacing the pricey consumable ink cartridges with permanent cartridge-heads that are continuously refilled from external ink bottles connected by silicone tubing. So to replace the ink in the printer, you just pour more ink in the bottles. Here’s a good review of an aftermarket CIS system priced at $250 (which still seems like a lot to me since it’s basically just a couple hundred grams of injection molded plastics.)

The idea of a CIS is simple enough, and beautifully subversive of the military-industrial-inkjet complex, but it’s received surprisingly little attention from the DIY community. Eddie Matejowsky of Brisbane, Australia, has one of the very few pages I could find on DIY CIS, and its records of his experiments–both successful and otherwise–make very interesting reading for those interested in the idea.

Know of other cool pages about this? Drop me a link in the comments!

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I am descended from 5,000 generations of tool-using primates. Also, I went to college and stuff. I am a long-time contributor to MAKE magazine and makezine.com. My work has also appeared in ReadyMade, c't – Magazin für Computertechnik, and The Wall Street Journal.

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