just wanted to leave an updated comment - it worked for me! i've been away at college so my old canon pixma pro 100 dried up. made the solution and let it soak overnight, and then used the water flosser as well (that gets pretty messy if you don't have one with adjustable settings lol). i let it dry for a few hours with a fan blowing on it, then put the cartridges back in the printer and let it sit for a while so the sponges could soak back up. it took a couple restarts but it works great!

For people that own the Canon Pixma Pro-10, this works, too! I had problems with mine where it would not print a single color and I was at a point where I was going to throw the printer in the trash. Luckily, I saw this video and resurrected my printer! I cant thank you enough for sharing this video, man! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

A few years later and this video saved my PIXMA Pro 100! Thank you for the tutorial and for sharing your cleaner solution. Mixed up my own. Soaked for a few hours and had to clean out the clog. I don’t have a water pick so I used an oral syringe to force the liquid through the clog (water pick definitely seems worth it if your print head clog was as bad as mine). I was able to print a few photos after cleaning. Thank you so much for your time and effort for this helpful video!

Did I see Refillable Cartridges and NOT OEM Modified for refilling ones???? Yes CYAN IS going to fail if anyone is going to fail. So I am glad you now know and have figured out what the problem was. Mike is a genius!!!!

I used a Airbrush in the final step & it works perfectly fine. Thank you for your help Andrew!

Thanks! I came to this after looking at a print head cleaner that costs $89 for an 8 oz bottle. Great video, clear, concise, no BS.

I appreciate the insights. I printed 4500 sheets (many large format prints) before I had my first print head clog. First, the Cyan acted up then the Yellow. I opened the lid and unplugged the printer. I removed all my cartridges and then the print head. In a glass beaker, I added 300 ml of distilled water and 30 ml of isopropyl alcohol (no ammonia laying around). Rather than soak the board, I slowly poured the liquid over my ink screens a few times until all the solution was used. I then rinsed with distilled water. Getting the water out of the print head was a bit of a challenge. I basically tried to use a much centrifugal force as possible by holding on the cartridge in a plastic bag and then making arching/circular motions. Once the water seemed to be out, a used a paper towel to dry up any external spots of water. The reason I did this is that I do not want my electronics to be wet for very long. Using this basic process, the print head cleaned up nicely. I simply replaced the print head and cartridges and did a print test. I was back in business printing in less than 15 minutes. Note: My Pro-100s are always powered on with battery UPS power sources and my print heads have never dried out. Hope this helps someone.

Thank you for this informative video. I tried one time to use generic cartridges from Amazon and the end result was they clogged the printhead. I thought I'd ruined my printer because nothing printed. I found your video, watched it and then used your cleaning method on the printhead. Then, I replaced all cartridges with genuine CANON cartridges. My Pro-100 prints again and much better quality now!!!! Thank you! Thank you!

Andrew! Thanks for this EXCELLENT tutorial - saved me a ton of money. Your awesome cleaning recipe and a cheap WaterPik clone are now a permanent part of my Canon tool kit.

My Canon Pro-100 have been revived thanks to your excellent tips ... your video was right on. About a year ago I abandoned the printer due to a sudden need to move. Leaving it behind, I made a critical error and left the printer unplugged. Last month I retrieved the printer, but the black port was fully clogged ... not even a hint of black ink on the cleaning printout. I ordered a Waterpik on Ebay for about $30 and got down to business. The printhead cleaning went smoothly and 3 days later I trialed it. Accept for a bit of streaking on on the PC ink printout, everything looked good. I printed a photo today and the colors look great. Thanks again! [Btw, leave some detailed instructions on how to use your tip jar.]

Thank you SO much for this video. I was having issues with a clog (yes, in the cyan port) - and I had an extra print head. I subbed out the new print head, and am soaking the old one to use as a backup. I REALLY appreciate you taking the time to explain things so well.

I've had my Canon 100 for 5 years, and it's been a fantastic printer. Earlier this year, I tried using refillable cartridges with success. But after letting it sit for a few weeks, I came back and prints were banded all over. So I'm trying this method to clean the print head. I don't have a waterpik, so I might see how a simple soak and rinse will go, come tomorrow. Thank you for the great tutorial.

Hello 👋 I wanted to thank you for this video. Because of it and you I was able to save my Canon Pro-10 which was turned off for over a year. When I finally got it to do anything I had 3 color channels not working Red, Black & clear. I tried cleaning and deep cleaning and revived the clear & black but not the red. I made your mixture and soaked the head (2) x for 45 minutes plus spraying the blocked nozzles with a syringe 💉. But the red remained blocked. I even tried dropping ammonia directly on the red nozzle, but still no love. Finally I took it to WaterPic level. Despite aç the ll of my attempts to avoid it, I got spray all over my sink, but this cleared the red nozzle finally. Just to help others, when I put it all back together, the red channel still didn’t work. This turned out to be a bad Red Cartridge. The cartridge has liquid ink in it, but was not feeding the nozzle. I traded another red cartridge and it finally came to life. I got a good nozzle check and was able to print a calibration print. Unfortunately I’m very low on Red ink and Mike at Precision Color Ink in Canada 🇨🇦 is closed until May 17th. So I’ll just be printing nozzle checks to keep from clogging until I get a set of carts filled with fresh inks. BTW I used 99% Alcohol because that’s what we had on hand. Thank you again. Dave in PA

Yessss... you saved my Pro 100, i tryed all, finaly i made your recepy of cleaning solution, took the print head out and soked it over night, after the cleaning cycle, it now print perfect... Thanks for sharing the info how to do......

I recently picked up a Pro-100 at my local thirst shop for cheap cheap! I had some issues with some of the nozzles being clogged. I followed this and now the printer works like new! Thanks so much for sharing.

Your method is perfect! I've had a pro-100 for almost ten years and the blue stopped printing two days ago. I mixed your "potion" exactly as you said, let it sit overnight, sprayed it with water this morning and then used my blow dryer to dry it. I'm a scrapbooker and 12 X 12's are what I print on my 100 It worked beautifully! You saved me a lot of money. Thank you for taking the time to make this video :)

Thank You so much for a detailed tutorial. I hadn't printed since the pandemic and had given up on the printer when I saw horrible pictures being printed about a month back. Your tutorial saved the day. I was able to print a couple of pictures today after using your video.

Thank you for taking the time to record this. I was having trouble with the printhead and did the cleaning as you suggested and it brought my printhead back to life.

Very thorough process!!!!! Got me to try and remove print head. Way easier than i thought with Canon Ts9020!!!!!!!!! Simple lever to pull up and it came right out. Before we do your full flush out, i would try just squirting 10/1 distilled water and IPA and dabbing cotton ball on head and soaking up and cleaning the resting plug cap inside printer with wet cotton ball so it can seal again!!! Worked got me printing again!

THANK YOU! This worked like a CHARM. Well, it did take a couple of times for my printer to stop giving me the error of death but, I unplugged the printer for a while and it started up again and has been so far so good! Thank you for sharing this video! (I do not have a water pick but I was able to use the spray feature on my sink to rinse out the print head (without the mixture) and it still worked for me. I'm not quite ready for a new printer soooooo HAPPY this WORKED!

This was awesome! Completely unclogged the PC, which was not printing on the test page at all. I used generic Windex and made sure it had amonia (Jose Rodriguez recommended Windex for a different method of cleaning the nozzles because of the ammonia). Soaked the printedhead for an hour and it rinsed clean. Test print came out perfect.

Worked for me! I didn’t have ammonia and used 90% isopropyl alcohol and distilled water (50:50) for 30 minutes and used the spray setting on my sink let air dry and it worked wonders! For stubborn clogs I imagine the ammonia is a must

Not sure if you will see this or not however thank you!!!!! I had one channel that completely clogged. I followed this and it worked!

You totally Saved me from buying a New Head!!! Thank You so Much!!! My moms happy because I can give her prints now!!! I was fooling with new inks for months!

Really impressed demonstration! This is a good guiding cleaning way for all Canon PIMAX serious print heads. I have both Pro-100 & IP7270, I will definitely follow you way to clean the IP7270 print head as it is clogged now. Blessing from Hong Kong!

yes ! it works, I had to do it multiple time, I tried to cut corners and leave the printhead with the solution for few hours only and it didn t do much. I left it for 3 days and night adding solution twice a day then did a water toothpick thingy, let it dry for a day and it s perfect. I tried everything, even calling canon repair center, whom already changed my printhead once (80€) when I sent them the whole printer. They can t sell me a new printhead if I don t send them the whole printer again ..... Now I have to find a third party ink that doesn t clogg and that can resist UV light better than octoinkjet' and that is sold in europe.. Than you for the video and thank you for the solution recipe !

Hey thank you so very much. I was ready to throw my printer out yesterday before I found your video. It works! My printer is working again and I don't need to buy a new one even though it will be 9 years old in a few months. Ironically for Christmas I got new ink and paper to start printing for fun again and was totally devastated when I realized it wasn't working. The story has a happy ending. Thanks again.

WOW!!! So I didn't have amonia but I had water and alcohol. I mixed it swirled print head in it. Let it sit few minutes. Put a few drops right on yellow mesh screen since it was the only one not printing. Dried it off. Put in printer and WOW Yellow is back and more beautiful than ever!!!Thank you!!!

YOU SAVED ME!!! Thank you so much for this thorough process

Just wanted you to know that I followed your instructions and after two soaks and a flush with my old waterpik my printer is working again!! Thank you thank you!! I only use canon ink and have had the printer for years now without ever having any issues. I had just ordered a box of new ink cartridges and was freaking out that I would lose money if the printer didn't work again. Thanks for sharing the info!

I just cleaned mine and am waiting for it to dry, so excited to see the results! I was having a hard time with my Yellow, every print I made came out purple-toned. Luckily, I saw a lot of yellow on the paper towel, so it should be fixed!

One of the better demonstration videos on KZfaq. Thanks for taking the time to make it. Just a couple of comments: First off, Original Windex with some Isopropyl Alcohol will do the job. Secondly When you used the WaterPik on the bottom of the printhead, you are actually reverse flushing the nozzles, effectively forcing debris and/or old ink back in. Probably a better solution would be to gently run distilled water from the top and let it leach out by gravity. Your finished product looked great though!

Very good video - other youtubers look and learn! Some questions: 1. How do you prevent the cartridges you remove to dry up? 2. How long must the cartridge-holder dry before you can put it back in the printer?

Absolutely brutal disregard for not inking up your hands. Spartan.

Amazingly, this method worked for me! My black ink is back and no more faint bars. So grateful!

just wanna say thank you for this. I too have been using the same aftermarket inks as you almost since the day i got my printer over 5 years ago. Took a lot of research but they have been the highest rated inks for this printer and its been worth every penny. I think i lucked out bc when i bought the original ink refill kit the carts that came with mine were legit canon carts that just had to have the chips changed. haven't had any issues with the carts at all. this is the first time in 5 years ive had an issue and was never able to figure out WTH to do. Did this last night let it soak over night after changing out the cleaner a couple times to remove the old ink and now this morning printing great!! You literally saved my sanity after the last 3 months of shitty prints. super stressful.

Will keep this in mind, but so far my PRO 100 seems invincible! It is about 3 years old. First 6 months used about 50% of the ink that came with the printer. Then it sat for OVER A YEAR without use. Fired it up, ran the nozzle check, perfect. Used up some of the ink colors and replaced them with OEM carts (at this point there is a mixture of older and newer ink carts). Sat for another 3-4 months without use, fired it up, ran the nozzle check, perfect. Printed a few 8.5 x 11 photos, perfect. I can only guess that because of the very low volume of ink that has passed through the printer I have avoided the clogging issues. The plan at this point is to print a full color gamut page and nozzle check once a week (if not used for real photo work).

I actually found out last night I had a clogged print head for cyan and was gonna give up on it, and I’m glad I came back today with a fresh head. I’m gonna try this out. Thank you!

This worked like a charm for me with no errors.

Thank you so much for this. So helpful, well organized. I’m thankful for this whole Canon 100 community, Jose is great too. Ready to bust out my waterpik and try not to inhale too many chemicals while I clean up this Cyan that has been plaguing me!

Thank you so much for taking so much time and effort to put this video together and share it with us all. Extremely helpful information!

Finally my printer is back in action! Thanks for sharing this info.

Thank you. Everything worked. I didn't want to spend money on the waterpik and so i just used a squirt bottle.

Worked beautifully. Thank you!! Didn't even need to do the water pick.

Thank you for sharing. It's very generous of you to share the recipe also. I have the same printer and it's been sitting. I'm about to find out if I have same issue, but first I've been working on a brother laser printer that prints faded on left and an epson 1430 with ciss that got clogged and now, one colour is printing very faded after doing a manual clean of the nozzles. I think I'm going to have to take the printhead out, but it's scary because of all the plastic clips that can break. Ugh. Either that or maybe it's my capping station. It's been a week of headaches and I can't let it go until I fix it. I even made an external waste tank with aquarium tubing and a bottle because I've been doing so many head cleanings. Lol, this has become such a priority to me for my small business, that fixing it has even started to infiltrate my dreams. One thing I heard recently is that newer printers might be using copper in the printhead so ammonia might actually make things worse, but I feel good about using it on the machines I have. Thanks again. 😊

Very, very brave man ! Cleaning ink cartridges with a white dress shirt in the bathroom sink. Must not be married !

Thank you, I followed your instructions and the problem was solved immediately!

I'm doing this process right now on my Pro 10 but using an ultrasonic cleaner instead of the Waterpik. I do have a Waterpik, but I have a feeling the ultrasonic will work better. If not, I may do the Waterpik as well. Thanks for the excellent, detailed video!

This video has saved me twice! Thank you Andrew. Clearly done. 👋

Thank you!! I only soaked mine for 15 mins in water and isopropyl alcohol. I took it out when I noticed no more ink going into the mixture. Now my black and Cyan work again.

Well done. Clear instruction, clear video - up close with great detail. I have a MG6320 with a B200 error and the construction of the print head is very similar. I will be making the 10/2/1 head clean solution and trying to clean the head as you have shown.

Another printer saved, cyan blocked, I used precision ink as well... thank you!!

Perfect answer to my issue!! Totally clogged Cyan!! Will get the recipe and tr it out this weekend Thank you!!

Thank You So Much For This Information! Helped Me Start Troubleshooting My Canon Pro 200

Is it safe to rinse out the printhead even when it touches the gold piece in the back? I've seen videos where they let it sit in distilled water/iso Alcohol but recommend that you don't get water on the golden plate in the back

Thank you, this worked perfectly with my Canon Pixma 100 Pro. Thank you!

This is awesome info! I’ve had my canon for about seven years now(best and longest lasting printer I’ve ever bought!) I purchased an ink reseter and dye ink kit at the same time. Well ink finally ran out and bought new ink, turns out seller sent me pigment ink bottles for black and gray. :( now I’m waiting to see what they’ll do. Guess I’ll be cleaning out the cartridges and print head now.

👍🏿👍🏿👍🏿👍🏿👍🏿Good to know some methods does work and able to avoid them.

thank you hbt, my printer had no cyan, soaked it, now it prints great again. i did have a print head code(1405) come up at first after reinstalling, but i read on another forum to clean/lube the parking station, as i guess it became dried/gunked up. Also the wife had a heart attack when she walked in and saw the sink! HAHA-- THANKS AGAIN!!!

Just started the process of soaking... Hopefully will save another printer! Thanks for the vid.

EXCELLENT presentation, AND I have an old Waterpik!!! Great idea. Thanks...

I just use similar technique but only warm running tap water. No equipment or special solution. Been doing it for years, no print head failure. But I'm thorough in using an absorbing paper to dry it up after...

whoa great idea using water pik, now I know what else to do with mine thanks!

Thanks for this very helpful. One thing you don't mention is how you evacuate all the cleaning solution out of the cartridges. I assume you just shake it out.

OMG this is wery helpful. Im gonna try this. I was fully in stress, my Magenta and Yellow stopped printing, I almost decided myself to buy a new printhead! :D

After the printheads were cleaned, how many hours the get dry? the same of flushing the cartridges, how many hours to be ready and be filled with new ink? Thank you for the info you shared!

Thank you so much!! I now print black again!!!

excellent video.

Hi andrew, how should you dry the printhead after the cleaning?

Thanks for tuition. Very helpful in future.

water pick was the greatest idea. !!

Hi! Thank you for the tips! I managed to clean the print head as well as all the cartridges, but after refilling, I noticed that the original filled cartridges are leaking... the ink is flowing... and as a result, my yellow cartridge, for example, is stained. I will redo the entire cleaning process, but do you have any idea why the cartridges are leaking?

Thank you so much for making this video, you just saved me some money. Thank you!

Cheers dude,project for the easter bank holiday!

After cleaning the print head, the OEM cartridges that have been sitting unused in the printer for the past 2 years are probably also clogged; can I use them or do I need to clean them out and refill? Thanks,joe

Thoroughly informative and excellent. Some key information makes all the difference. Would have loved a link to the cartridge flushing tool. Or maybe you could just list the parts. I don't know what the head part is or where I'd get it. I guess tubing is not so hard, but many will just want to make this thing or purchase it from you! Thanks.

Hi there. I have a pre-owned pro-100 that consistently leaves streak marks and smudges on my prints. I've done bottom plate cleanings dozens (probably hundreds) of times and there is still ink smudge on the paper after doing said cleaning. I'm at an absolute loss--is there anything you know that could help?

How do you know when you need to preform this cleaning? i've only had and used my pixma pro 100 for 2 weeks and its clogged and wont seem to unclog with countless cleaning and deep cleaning cycles.

For your printhead solution,,, is the alcohol 70% alcohol or 90% alcohol?

Good observations and share. I wonder if this head cleanng will get rid of the slight banding I get with light ink coverage. I had head strike from a curled corner on the paper and had issues since. Tried a number of cleaning methods, and may have tyried this, but I will give it another shot. Jose's channel is good so is Northlight , Keith.

@HBT - Did you create a video on how to make a cleaning cartridge clip as mentioned in the video @11:07. thanks

Great video. Very helpful. You mentioned that you would sell the water pic attachment you made to learn the printer cartridge. How might I do that? tcs

For the alcohol portion, are you using 91%+ or anything less or more?

Thank you so much for this video, just considering wether to buy a lightly used pro 100s that hasn’t been used for a couple of months. People are asking a lot of money here in the UK for this printer, impossible to find a brand new one.

Love the special waterpik connector that goes right into the cartridge holder. You teased a video on how to make that - can you provide me your recipe? Thanks!

Hi there, please. i am newbie in these things. i tried to clean my printer heads - my tubes are still not sending ink through. Please help i am using g4411 canon printer.

This helped us out so much thank you very much for the info

Many thanks for your clear and instructive video. My initial problem is that I simply cannot see how to do a nozzle check or clean on my printer. I have done it in the past, but now don't seem to have access to where to make the printer do this. I have looked through other KZfaq videos, but they all talk about cleaning the printer head. This will be good to know, but I also need to know how to do a nozzle check and clean. I feel really stupid, having done it before. I would really appreciate your help.

My printer has been exhibiting a fainter band the same size as GY in the gray channel. There don't appear to be any fully missing nozzles, just a whole section ever so slightly lighter in the nozzle check. When printing I do see banding in the photos associated with the darker areas of photographs. One night, when trying to print a nozzle check, I received a B200 error. While I unplugged the printer, let it sit, then plugged/powered it back on and got it to print a check, I'm concerned about damage to the print head with that error. From what I can tell, your cyan, at the top and bottom edges of your nozzle check, were faded rather than completely gone. If I'm right, I'm hoping this may be the solution. I love my Pro 100 with PC42SE inks and really don't want to get another printer. Are there any gotchas to be aware of when doing this besides the obvious ones like being gentle with the ribbon, contacts, and so forth? Addendum question: Any reason a person couldn't use the cordless water flosser if it can be gotten cheap? Does the corded waterpik work better?

I followed these instructions and now my test print is coming out stripy within the color blocks whereas before all the blocks were solid and the cyan wasn’t coming out at all. Any advice?

I have a pro 100 where yellow is not flowing. I'll have to try this.

Hi, my printer is printing everything thing in cyan, I did the cleaning for the head but again same thing and everything in cyan! What should be the problem ?

Hi HBT. Great tutorial on cleaning clogged printhead on the Pro-100. After a vertical fade-out on nozzle check, the Cyan color is not printing at all now (apart from a very faint line) on my Pro-100. All other colors test perfectly on nozzle diagnostic and I have not printed more than a page or 2 since I noticed the Cyan problem. But even after 2 regular + 2 deep cleanings on group 2 colors only (Cyan, BLK, LGY, GY), still no Cyan apart from a single very faint line. Cartridges seem okay--were not leaky or drained to empty, but I swapped out the one in the printer with freshly refilled one just for good measure. Should confess that I have not been printing very regularly the past couple months, and a 10-day power outage back in August might have been a factor. But all the other colors are printing perfectly...argh!!! Plan to try your cleaning recipe and do a soak tonight, but have one main concern re: the final flush and rinse step: I saw that you weren't too fussy about avoiding getting those copper contacts wet as you flushed and rinsed. I worry that the exposure to liquid will risk frying out the electronics on the printhead. Or is that not really a concern? In prior experience, I had a Canon Pixma-MX922 with a neglected/clogged printhead that I fixed by soaking w/ distilled water. At the rinsing stage, I put a piece of clear packing tape over the contacts to prevent exposure to water. (Maybe all it did was give me peace of mind :) Do you think that such taping would risk any more/less damage to those contacts than liquid rinsing? Thanks for sharing your wisdom. Pro-100s and printheads are much more costly than they were a couple years ago when I got the printer on sale with rebate & paper bonus, so hope to fix this issue. FYI: Per Jose's instructions, I've been using Precision Ink refills on OEM Canon carts---two pristine sets I bought from Mike with ink set, and one that I drilled out and rolled over from my original Canon set of inks.

Do you have any suggestions on how often to hit the maintenance cleaning of the heads?

Andrew, I wish I could’ve seen this video two years ago it would’ve save me a lot of money and time. I am also very interested in your device to clean out my ink cartridges. You said you were going to show us how to do it is there another video ?

I have repeated this process 3 times before trying to print, replaced all ink with Canon ink, and I STILL have lines. Is there something else that can be causing this issue? Thank you.

Andrew, can I use your cleaner recipe to get my cli42 cart 100% white clean if I inject your cleaner into it for 24 hrs. I have already tried 2 cycles of windex with ammonia D for 2 hours each and still cannot get the cyan stain out completely. thanks.

Awesome. I'm checking out secondhand pro 10 and 100s. This would be perfect.

Hi followed complete instructions and now printer does 5 flashes 'printhead is not installed/is damaged' any thoughts?

Thank you sooooo much. Due to circumstances beyond my control I've had a Pro-10 and Pro-100 sitting unused for over a year. Today I got to the point on the Pro-10 where only 2 nozzles the Red and Black are blocked. I will be using this method. does the % of Alcohol matters meaning 70-90-99% Iso Alcohol? Also any advice on a type of ammonia to use? Could I try Windex? Finally, do you flush out your Waterpick and use it for your teeth after using your mixture? Thanks much. I'll let you know how it goes.