No need for such drastic measures! Printers are pretty cheap these days. Printer ink is a different story!
When I started printing digital B&W in 2003 I used third party black & gray inks in cheap Epson 4-color printers (C82, then C84 and finally C88+). If I had printed in color, the cheapest way to buy ink was to buy a new printer - Epson sold the printers direct for less than a set of replacement ink carts.