June 14, 2013

HP CM6030 and CM6040 Light Print in an Individual Color

Posted by Market Point under Uncategorized, HP, Printer Tech Support Articles | Tags: , , , , , , |
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Last week I was called out to work on a HP CM6040 with a light print issue. When I arrived onsite I printed a few test pages and it became obvious that they were having problems with the black toner or image drum.

Today we’ll tackle this light print situation. It is not covered in the service manual and I believe, with the design of the machine, this could easily be a common issue.

Troubleshooting

The first thing to do when troubleshooting light print issues is to isolate the problem. Is it happening in all colors or just one? To find out, print some test pages; the diagnostic page and print quality (PC) troubleshooting pages are the best for looking at individual colors and comparing them to one another. However, you should also print the configuration, demo, supply usage, and Error Log pages to get a better understanding of what is going on with the machine’s history and usage.

Below is where to find the Print-Quality troubleshooting pages, for example.

Print-quality-troubleshooting pages

Use the built-in print-quality-troubleshooting pages to help diagnose and solve print-quality problems.

1. Scroll to and touch Administration.

2. Scroll to and touch Troubleshooting.

3. Touch PQ Troubleshooting.

4. Touch Print.

In the case of the machine I was working on the test pages showed me that the customer was experiencing light print in the black toner or image unit. All the supplies were at least half full or more and the black toner and drum unit had just been replaced. Also, the error log showed that it was getting 54.14 Errors. This error is not in the service manual but through deduction of similar errors it means the printer is experiencing problems with the black toner sensor output.

I pulled the black drum out and checked the toner sensor window. I noticed that the image unit had no toner in it, which would explain why the machine believed it had a toner sensor issue. The toner cartridge read full but the drum unit was showing that there was no toner in it. So I knew there was a problem with the toner supply getting into the drum unit.

Solution

On top of the drum unit, behind the hole where the toner falls into the unit is a white plastic piece with four arms. On the bottom of the toner is another white plastic piece with four arms. When the toner is inserted in the machine the toner cartridge depresses a black piece of plastic around the white plastic arm on the drum unit, unlocking it. The arms on the toner and drum mesh together and it rotates the white arm on the drum unit clockwise, opening the hole on the drum unit so toner can fall in from the toner cartridge.

The white plastic piece on the drum has four arms. Each time the arm is turned it either opens or closes the hole. Somehow, the arm on the drum had been rotated so it was in the open position when the toner was not installed. Therefore, every time the customer installed the toner they were actually closing the hole on the drum, not opening it.

To solve this problem remove the drum unit and check whether the hole opening is open when you remove it from the machine. If so, it is in the wrong position. Press down the black plastic surrounding the white plastic arms and rotate them so the hole is closed. If you need a reference point remove one of the other drum units in the machine to see how they are positioned. Once you have the pieces situated correctly re-install the drum unit into the machine.

This procedure will not fix the light print problem immediately. After re-starting the machine the sides of the image were improving but after a few copies the print quality started to decline again, so I knew I had to get more toner into the drum unit.

While this machine does have motor test that runs the toner motors, unfortunately it doesn’t run for a long period of time like on some other machines. What I ended up doing was running about 4 or 5 full calibrations. In this state the machine is running for a long period of time and running the toner motors. After, the fourth or fifth time the black toner was restored so I ran the calibration one more time to be sure, then put it under some large runs to make sure the quality stayed the same.

After running a few hundred test prints everything seemed to be working the way it should be and the machine was printing consistently with no quality issues. I see this as a potential issue with these machines and I can’t believe I’m the only one that will run it this problem. It’s not included in the service manual as a possible solution to a light print problem.  I hope this helps others resolve light print issues.

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Kevin Gumpp is a certified printer technician and freelance writer for Market Point. If you have a question regarding this topic or have any other printer repair related questions or topics for which you would like more information, please send an email to maryp@marketpoint.com.

 

June 14, 2013

Slow Printing or No Printing with an HP Printer on the Network

Posted by Market Point under Uncategorized, HP, Printer Tech Support Articles | Tags: , , , , , , , |
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In the past few months I’ve run into several HP machines that have been having issues on networks. In each case it hasn’t had anything to do with the functionality of the machine.

Network Setup Issues
Network setup is not normally any problem for network administrators, printer techs or employees with a little background experience in networks.  But, for others, network setup can be the cause of printer problems if the network setup instructions aren’t followed precisely.

Just about any machine you buy comes out of the box setup for DHCP or BOOTP installation. When the printer or multifunction device is first plugged into the network these two configurations allows your machine’s network adapter and your server to gather information from each other and the

However, if you don’t change the DHCP or BOOTP setting to manual after initial setup then the printer or multifunction device can change its IP address if turned off then back on or after a period of time. Most of the time if a customer calls me and says they periodically have to reinstall their printer for it to work then this is the first thing I look at. This tells me the printer is functioning fine but it keeps changing the IP address. On laser machines, printing the configuration page usually shows the setup setting for your IP address on the jet direct page. On inkjet machines this page is usually on the network report page in the reports menu.

Slow Printing or No Printing
In this example I’m talking about a customer calling in to say it takes 5 to 10 minutes to print a document. Sometimes it prints fine, other times it takes several minutes to print, and often times the machine doesn’t print at all or says processing for a minute or two but then returns to a ready state.

Frequently this situation is the result of bad packets.

Whenever troubleshooting network print issues the first thing to do is to print the network configuration information. The two main things to look for are the IP address information and the packet information.

The IP address information is noted above.  The packet information will have a list of sent, received, uni-cast and bad packets. What I’ve seen in several calls these last few months are lots of bad packets. Having one or two bad packets is nothing unusual. Under normal circumstances I never see the number of bad packets get over 10.  If your showing anything over 10 you probably are experiencing network communication issues. This problem can be a result of the network adapter in your device, the cabling, router, hub, or server.

To troubleshoot, first try another cable or if nearby, another network wall outlet. The most common problem point is the hub. Get your network administration to switch the machine to another port or hub to further troubleshoot.

Usually a new cable or switching hubs corrects the problem. However, if the problem continues, it could indicate an issue with the formatter and/or jetdirect. Obviously, replacing the jetdirect or adding one to an open EIO slot is cheaper than replacing the formatter so that should be the first setp if you get to this point.

Multiple devices having the same IP address on the network can result in this problem.

Testing For Duplicate IP addresses
1. Print the Network Config Page to get the machine’s IP address
2. Click on the Windows Logo located on the bottom left corner on your computer screen
3. In the run or search box type in cmd or command and press enter which will bring up a black text box (memories of DOS flood back!).
4. At the command prompt type C:\ ping (then the IP address). Example:  ping 192.168.2.102

The IP address will be pinged 4 times. After it has completed it will give a report. The report should say 4 sent / 4 received. If it timed out you have a network communication issue.

To test if you have multiple devices using the same IP, remove the network cable from your printer then ping the address again. This time it should show 4 sent 4 lost and time out after each ping. If it still shows pings back then something else is using the same IP address. Call the network administrator for further troubleshooting.

Jet Direct Issues
Typically, if the EIO jetdirects fail, the network settings page doesn’t print when a config page is printed because the card is not communicating with the formatter. Often the machine will work for a day or two but then it’ll stop working. At that point, turning the machine off — then back on — sometimes keeps it running for a while but eventually it will quit working totally.

Then you’ll need to replace the network card. By now everybody knows the 615 series is junk so that should always be replaced.  Lately, I’ve seen more of the 600 and 610′s going out. The 620′s have come down in price quite a bit so that’s your best bet when replacing EIO cards.

A few months ago I ran into an issue where an HP 5500 kept turning off then back on when print jobs were sent to it. The original jet direct, a 615, had gone bad years ago so they were using an external jet direct 170.  I happened to have an old 5500 laying around so I swapped formatters, firmware, and memory but the problem kept happening. Eventually I installed a 620 in the machine and got rid of the 170 and the problem went away. So even external jet directs can cause issues.

I’m sure there are more network issues I haven’t talked about, such as firmware issues and what not. If you find this article interesting and feel like sharing an experience you have had with network problems please leave a comment below. If you have questions you can also leave those below too.

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Kevin Gumpp is a certified printer technician and freelance writer for Market Point. If you have a question regarding this topic or have any other printer repair related questions or topics for which you would like more information, please send an email to maryp@marketpoint.com.

 

March 18, 2013

What to do when your HP Color LaserJet 4700 has a Blank Control Panel

Posted by Market Point under Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , |
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A few weeks ago I went on a service call for a HP 4700 that had a blank control panel. Once I arrived onsite I observed that the machine was turning on and going through its normal start up procedure. However, the control panel, while lit, had nothing in the display. The three attention lights on the bottom of the control panel were also lit. After reseating the formatter, compact flash, and 256 MB memory DIMM nothing changed. I could not print to the machine but it did print the Engine Test Page.

In this particular case I ordered the Compact Flash and Memory DIMM and it happened to be the memory DIMM that resolved the issue. The best advice I can give if you run into this issue is to remove any accessories plugged into the machine, including EIO devices, memory, and compact flash. Insert each device one at a time and see if anything changes. Start with the Compact Flash, then memory, then EIO devices. I found that the memory and compact flash were relatively cheap so obviously the best place to start.

Note: On researching this problem I did find a few topics where the machine locked up after doing the memory count where the battery on the formatter had gone bad.

Service Manual Troubleshooting Tips
1. Reseat Formatter
2. Reseat Compact Flash
3. Reseat Memory DIMM or DIMM’s
4. Replace Compact Flashes and Firmware Card
5. Replace Memory DIMM
6. Replace Formatter
7. Check Flat Ribbon Cable Connector From DC Controller to Formatter
8. Check Formatter power connectors for LVPS
9. Check Control Panel display connectors to DC controller
10. Replace Control Panel display

Parts List

Q7722-67951 256 MB Memory DIMM, 4700

Q7725-68003 Compact Flash, 4700

C7038-67018 Compact Flash, 4730

Q7495-69002 FORMATTER board,  4700 base model

Q7492-69003 FORMATTER board , 4700N/DN/DTN/PH+

RM1-1617 CONTROL PANEL,4005, 4700 – Control panel assembly

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Kevin Gumpp is a certified printer technician and freelance writer for Market Point. If you have a question regarding this topic or have any other printer repair related questions or topics for which you would like more information, please send an email to maryp@marketpoint.com.

 

March 5, 2013

HP LaserJet 5si, 8000, 8100, and 8150 Gear Noise

Posted by Market Point under HP, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , |
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This last year I’ve been experiencing more calls due to noise coming from the left side of these machines and, in extreme cases, the noise is followed by jamming in the face-down delivery assembly. When you close the back door on these machines a swing plate gear drops down and meshes with the top gear on the fusing assembly. Over time this gear gets worn down and a noise develops.

What I’ve noticed is that the swing plate gear noise is gradual and because these machines typically are noisy anyway, customers tend not to notice a problem until the printer starts jamming or the noise gets extremely bad.

To check this out, turn the machine off, remove the fusing assembly and check the gear. If you’re looking at the inside of the machine from the left side the gear is located on the bottom left part of the delivery assembly.  It’s spring loaded so you can pull it down and get a good look at it. If the teeth are worn down it’s pretty obvious. If it’s really bad and jamming all the time you can further test it by running a paper path test from the information menu and send it to the face up exit assembly. The paper will exit out the left side of the machine and drop on the floor if the tray is not there but this test will verify if the fusing assembly is causing the problem or not.

Another way to check is to see if the rollers on top of the machine are rotating. If the teeth on the swing plate gear are stripped out, the exit rollers on the top of the face down delivery system will not be functioning correctly. Sometimes they don’t turn at all and other times they will turn only intermittently. The gear is not sold separately so if you find this to be the case then you will have to replace the face down delivery system. It’s not a tough job and because of the age of these machines the parts seem to be getting cheaper by the day. Right now these are some of the cheapest HP machines to own and operate because of the cost of parts and toner.

HP LaserJet 5si, 8000, 8100, 8150 Face Down Delivery Assembly RG5-1874

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Kevin Gumpp is a certified printer technician and freelance writer for Market Point. If you have a question regarding this topic or have any other printer repair related questions or topics for which you would like more information, please send an email to maryp@marketpoint.com.

 

February 27, 2013

Lexmark T630 Series – Gray Background on Side or Across Whole Page

Posted by Market Point under Lexmark, Printer Tech Support Articles, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , |
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Brian has talked about this briefly in an earlier post on this blog (see it here) but since I ran into this problem on a few machines recently I thought I would elaborate on this problem. On most machines the primary charge roller is located in the print cartridge so when you replace the cartridge you replace the charge roller. In Lexmark and Kyocera printers the charge roller is separate from the print cartridge; therefore, it doesn’t get replaced as often and has more opportunity to cause print related problems.

The charge roller puts a charge on the drum before the image is written to it. If the charge roller has too much build up or debris, like label glue, gets on the surface then the part of the drum unit that area touches doesn’t get properly charged and spots or gray background will result.

On Lexmark machines the charge roller is easily seen by removing the print cartridge and looking up in the cavity of the machine. It will be a light tan roller about a foot in length. The one I saw on the T630 I was working on looked OK but  (more…)

 

February 27, 2013

HP P3005 – Light Print – Formatter Issue.

Posted by Market Point under HP, Printer Tech Support Articles, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , |
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A few months ago I serviced a HP LaserJet P3005 for a third party company. While servicing the machine for a paper jam issue I noticed that it was printing extremely light and every time I turned it off and back on, upon reboot  it gave me an 11.XX internal clock error. The internal clock error was pretty simple. That’s the formatter board.

The light print, though, threw me for a loop. The machine had an OEM cartridge, toner density all the way up, and not in toner save mode. The customer said it was always like that so they had no issue with it. I told them that to fix the clock error they would have to replace the formatter and possible either the ECU or formatter to fix the light print.

Fast forward a few months (more…)

 

February 18, 2013

Troubleshooting Tips for HP LaserJet P4014 and P4015

Posted by Market Point under HP, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , |
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49.XXX Service Error on the Display

These 49 errors are usually related to software and communication issues. On a recent machine I serviced the error was the result of a broken pressure roller gear that locked up the fuser drive system. After replacing the part the machine started working again but it was more noisy than usual. I then printed off the config page to see the machine had 500,000 prints on it. Since the noise was in the back I pulled the fusing assembly back out and noticed that the swing plate gear inside the machine that meshes with the pressure roller gear was worn down. I had often wondered if this was going to be an issue with these models because of how hard the fusers turn as they age. So this situation answered my question. From now on I’ll be keeping an eye on these swing plate gears.

HP LaserJet P4014 and P4015 Fuser CB506-67901
HP LaserJet P4014 and P4015 Maintenance Kit CB388A

Tray Issues

I’ve been seeing a lot of jam issues coming from the paper tray, specifically the paper not even making it out of the tray.  While troubleshooting I’ve been seeing lots of broken paper stops. The plastic that locks the stop in place breaks or cracks and the stop will move back an inch or more. People see the problem and move the stop back up but once they close the tray the weight of the paper pushes the stop back again. Unfortunately the stops are not available as separate items to purchase and replace. However, you can get refurbished trays relatively inexpensively.

HP LaserJet P4014 and P4015  500 sheet Cassette Tray RM1-4559

Perform User Maintenance Message Reset

I’ve talked about this before but didn’t give the instructions. In older models there was a firmware glitch and the maintenance reset is not in the start up service mode. Below are the instructions to reset the maintenance count through the control panel service menu.

1. Press the Menu Button

2. Press the down arrow to highlight SERVICE and then press OK

3. Enter the PIN using the alphanumeric keypad

PIN for the HP LaserJet P4014 models is 05401408

PIN for the HP LaserJet P4015 models is 05401508

PIN for the HP LaserJet P4515 models is 05451508

4. Press OK to enter the PIN and open the SERVICE menu.

5. Scroll down the MAINTENANCE COUNT and reset the count to Zero.

HP LaserJet P4014 and P4015 Maintenance Kit CB388A

 4. 13.20.00 Jam Inside

You’ll see this error message when the paper jams in the front of the machine, the customer pulls the paper out, and a piece tears and gets stuck on the sensor flag in the front feed assembly. On the new P4014 and 4015 series HP has made the paper jam removal guide even smaller. To find the guide:

  • open the bypass  tray and remove the envelope accessory plate right above the bypass pick up rollers
  • open the front door and remove the cartridge
  • the paper jam removal guide is in the very front of the print cavity. It has a green labeled handle on the right side to rotate it up.

Check in that area for jammed paper that may have been missed. If you see paper in there that you can’t quite reach use a piece of heavy cardstock paper and push it up through the bottom of the machine up to the top (a good thin pair of hemostats have saved me time on several occasions). This should push any paper scraps through the feed assembly or sensor flag and up to where you can grab it and pull it out. The main thing here is to only feed paper from the bottom to the top. Doing this procedure from top to bottom could break the sensor flag. Worse case scenario you will have to remove the bypass tray pick up assembly to remove the jam.

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Kevin Gumpp is a certified printer technician and freelance writer for Market Point. If you have a question regarding this topic or have any other printer repair related questions or topics for which you would like more information, please send an email to maryp@marketpoint.com.

 

January 29, 2013

HP LaserJet 5000 or 5100 Jamming at Fusing Assembly

Posted by Market Point under HP, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , |
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This jam happens when the paper gets out of the paper tray and through the toner area and then jams right at the front of the fusing assembly. The user opens the front door, removes the toner and finds the paper wrinkled up in front of the fuser; they pull the paper out, try again and get the same result.

I’ve seen two things cause Jamming at the Fusing Assembly:

(1)     The fixing film on the fusing assembly fails to rotate.

For some reason, on these models more than others, the fixing film may not move properly. Without the film moving, once the paper hits the fusing assembly, there is not enough drive and the paper stops. Other signs that indicate the fixing film may not be moving properly are distorted print or intermittent jamming.

To troubleshoot: (more…)

 

January 14, 2013

National Service Providers: From a Service Technician’s Perspective

Posted by Market Point under HP, Lexmark, Misc, Uncategorized | Tags: , , |
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A few years ago, after several changes in the company I work for, we were struggling to get new service leads. So I created a region-specific website designed to attract new business from the surrounding area. One of the things I didn’t count on was getting lots of calls from national service providers looking for technicians to provide service for their customers in our area. After dealing with several, I thought I’d share my experiences and insights on what to look for and what to watch out for.

For those of you unfamiliar with National Service Providers

The majority of the national service providers advertise on their websites that they have thousands of technicians, around the country who can provide service on any machine in any zip code.  When a customer calls and agrees to their services, the customer then waits for a call back with notification of when the tech will be out.  Typically, the national company checks their database for providers in the area or they get online and call around to local service providers to find a technician qualified to work on the machine. The local provider they find must be willing to do the work for a specific fee and within a designated period of time. Once the national service provider finds a local service provider to accept the call, the tech goes out and fixes the customer’s machine as a representative of the national service provider.

However, the above scenario is not always the case. Read More

 

October 28, 2012

HP Fusing Assemblies and Envelope Printing

Posted by Market Point under HP, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , |
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Recently, I’ve seen a rise in calls related to envelope and fusing problems. I see issues with fusers from all makes and models of printers but for the point of this article I’m going to focus on HP fusing assemblies.  In this post we’ll review different types of fusers, toners, and envelopes. Given the wide variety of options many different print quality issues can arise and will vary with your printer model.

HP Fusing Assembly History

When I first started working on HP machines back in the late 90′s, the majority of the HP fusers I saw used old technology. The fusers consisted of thermistors, thermal fuses, hot roller, pressure roller, and halogen lamps. They were very reliable, durable, and typically lasted long past their intended life. Getting a label stuck in the fuser simply required the user to remove it. Running a paper clip or staple through it might cause a nick but no serious damage. Envelopes would wrinkle up in the back if not fed properly. Actually, the envelopes would always wrinkle, but a lot less when the envelope tabs in the fuser were set to release some of the pressure. This is the case on models like the HP 5si, 8000, and 8100 series.

The new fuser technology, found first in models like the HP 4L and 4000 series, use a heating element, pressure roller and fixing film. The benefits were that these fusers would use less energy,  heat up more quickly, feed envelopes better, and for HP, they are easier to damage so users would have to replace them more often.

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