b/w printer?

Is there such a product, does anybody know? I was on here a couple of weeks
ago and I said about my elderly Parish Priest who has been a keen
photographer all his life. He is now trying to print from his huge
collection of old negatives but the ink is costing him a fortune.
Apparently, his Epson printer uses colour ink to print out in black and
white and it uses eight different cartridges which to me is just over the
top! Ideally, he would like a printer that only prints black. Anybody able
to offer suggestions? Thanks

On May 7, 6:10 am, "eugene" <eug....TakeThisOut@home.com.invalid> wrote:
> Is there such a product, does anybody know? I was on here a couple of weeks
> ago and I said about my elderly Parish Priest who has been a keen
> photographer all his life. He is now trying to print from his huge
> collection of old negatives but the ink is costing him a fortune.
> Apparently, his Epson printer uses colour ink to print out in black and
> white and it uses eight different cartridges which to me is just over the
> top! Ideally, he would like a printer that only prints black. Anybody able
> to offer suggestions? Thanks


To get good b&W the printer designer have found they need more than
just a single B&W cartidge. I have been printing inkjet 6 years 4 of
that commercially, with a 6 ink printer getting good B&W was a chore,
a lot of work. Set the printer to B&W, with just the black cart and
your couldn't get midtones, use the color inks and there was always a
tonal shift but good range, I did a lot of sepia photos. There is also
a similar problems with printing B&W with color photo paper. So the
inkjet printer manufacturers put in 8 inks including midtone blacks
which greatly enhance B&W inkjet printing.
The best way to lower ink costs is to buy a printer that has larger
ink reservoirs. Right now the HP B9180 has the largest ink reservoird
of any under $1000 printer, in the US you can get this printer in the
mid $500 range. You are not paying any less for carts you just get
more ink. Many letter (A4) sized printers have under 10ml in tanks
that last for just a few prints. Looking for a small printer a few
months ago was appalled that some have as little as 3ml ink
reservoirs. I end up with the B9180, not small by any streatch of
imagination, but its 27ml ink tanks cast about the same as the 6ml
carts from another smaller HP printer. B&W is great from the B9180,
that I have at work, as it is from the Canon iPF5000 I have at home.
As for B&W printers MIS www.inksupply.com makes ink sets for printers
to convert them to B&W only, there are other sales groups that have
that conversion too. The interesting set is for the Epson C series
(C82-C88) which are 4 ink printers, which is all you need for B&W. So
you have a cheap printer, and a not so cheap ink set, but it only does
B&W.

Tom