HP LJ4000 prints very lightly near left margin.

[David Farber]

This problem had been happening intermittently. Now it's becoming more
frequent and annoying. A sample is here:
http://webpages.charter.net/mrfixiter/Repair/HP-LJ4000-print-sample.jpg

Along with the vertical streak of light type that runs the entire length of
the page near the left margin, that same streak has a rough texture to it
when your run your finger over it. The rest of the paper feels normal. Any
ideas what could be causing this? Would cleaning the laser scanner unit be
the next logical step as explained
here?http://www.fortwayneprinterrepair.com/wordpress/2011/11/28/light-print-hp-laserjet-4000-4050/

Thanks for your reply.
--
David Farber
Los Osos, CA

[N_Cook]

The roughness is probably iron filings, the so-called developer.
Maybe dampness, maybe contamination, its not flowing correctly, plus
loss of the material leading to gaps and consequent non moving of the
toner in one section.
Try removing the cartridge and shaking about , to redistribute the filings

[David Farber]

Just now, I gave the toner cartridge a good shaking. I'll let you know if
things improve.

[Jeff Liebermann]

The fuser roller or film has a layer of caked on and possibly burned
in toner imbedded in it. It should be visible if you remove the fuser
assembly. The printer looks like it's printing normally, but the
toner is not sticking to the paper and is getting sprinkled all over
the affected area. It also appears that you have the same problem on
the other edge of the page. My guess is that you dumped some toner on
the page from the toner cartridge.

What to do about it:
1. Remove everything you can from the printer. Paper tray, toner
cart, fuser roller, etc. Find an air compressor that doesn't spray
water and blow out the printer. My guess(tm) is that it's quite dirty
in there. Try not to get the nozzle too close to anything fragile or
you'll break things.

2. Inspect the fuser roller. It should be a consistent color across
its length and not have any caked on toner at the ends. If it does,
find a PLASTIC scraper and carefully scrape off the melted plastic
toner. It will not stock to the drum and should fall off easily.
Also, remove any melted toner stuck to the rubber rollers. You may
need to turn the rollers by hand. Blow out any remaining debris.

3. If cleaning the fuser doesn't fix the problem, or the fuser roller
looks burned at the ends, you can either replace just the fuser film
(or sleeve), or get a replacement or exchange fuser assembly.
<https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=hp+4000+fuser+assembly>
<https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=hp+4000+fuser+sleeve>

4. If the amount of dumped toner is substantial, it's probably also
imbedded in the rubber feed rollers. They can be cleaned, but with
such an old printer, methinks a maintenance kit with separation pads
would be best:
<http://www.printerworks.com/Printers/MaintenanceKits/MK_4000MKA.html>
<https://www.ebay.com/itm/151250586702>
<https://www.ebay.com/itm/282891878887>

I some HP 4000/4050 parts in stock if you don't mind ancient
inventory. Email for details.



--
Jeff Liebermann je...@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Mon, 09 Apr 2018 11:20:35 -0700, Jeff Liebermann <je...@cruzio.com>
wrote:

How to remove and replace the fuser assembly and install new rollers
in an HP 4000/4050:
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ug4Mvydot_A> (6:25)
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENy7zbJnnbA> (3:56)
Plenty other videos on the topic.

[tabb...@gmail.com]

HP manuals will tell you what item is faulty based on the spacing of the repeated image. Each roller that can affect the image is a different size for this reason. Clean the relevant roller.


NT

[bruce2...@gmail.com]

Maybe it must have improved, but its still probably an indication that the cartridge is low and needs refilling/replacing.

[David Farber]

"Jeff Liebermann" <je...@cruzio.com> wrote in message
news:0fancdpdif7lhf00c...@4ax.com...

[David Farber]

Hi Jeff,

You said:
My guess is that you dumped some toner on
> the page from the toner cartridge.

I don't know how to interpret your guess. :-)

Here are pictures of the left side of the rollers in the fuser assembly:
http://webpages.charter.net/mrfixiter/Repair/HP-fuser-roller-1.jpg
http://webpages.charter.net/mrfixiter/Repair/HP-fuser-roller-2.jpg

I didn't see anything that was caked on but you can definitely see that the
there are some inconsistencies in the color.of roller-1. Roller-2 looked
rather normal except there seemed to be some waviness in the way it
reflected light as I was looking at with a magnifying glass.

I decided to swap out the fuser with another LJ4000. I also created a
"printer cleaning page" via the control panel and so far it's printing
better.

[David Farber]

There were times that parts of the image were reprinted (think old TV with
rabbit ears receiving a secondary bounced signal) at a specific interval.

I used the repetitive defects ruler in the manual which is also shown here:
http://www.printertechs.com/printer-troubleshooting/repetitive-defects-rulers/138-repetitive-defects-ruler-laserjet-4000-4050

The spacing of the defect was 76mm which put the fuser roller as one of the
primary suspects. I decided to swap out the fuser assembly with another
machine that I had which wasn't in service and the problem seems to have
been corrected for now.

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Tue, 10 Apr 2018 08:54:44 -0700, "David Farber"
<farberbe...@aol.com> wrote:
>> You said:
>> My guess is that you dumped some toner on
>> the page from the toner cartridge.

>I don't know how to interpret your guess. :-)

The companies the refill toner cartridges tend to overfill the
cartridges and forget to empty the overflow bins. The result is that
a replacement cartridge will dump some toner onto the page or
mechanism. This eventually gets to the fuser roller, which melts the
toner onto the paper, rollers, gears, etc.

>Here are pictures of the left side of the rollers in the fuser assembly:
>http://webpages.charter.net/mrfixiter/Repair/HP-fuser-roller-1.jpg

The fuser sleeve is definitely burned and in need of replacement. You
can replace the sleeve yourself but make sure you smear some of the
included silicon grease under the sleeve.

>http://webpages.charter.net/mrfixiter/Repair/HP-fuser-roller-2.jpg

The red rubber pressure roller looks just fine. There's a little
black spec of melted toner imbedded into the red roller, which is
easily removed. I can't be sure, but it looks like you have some
scratch marks on the red roller surface. These are caused by melted
toner accumulating in places that are stationary relative to the
roller, and scrape the surface. At this point, it probably won't
cause any problems, except that the grooves tend to attract and retain
loose toner that eventually melts and sticks to the surface. Spin the
red roller to be sure it's clean.

>I didn't see anything that was caked on but you can definitely see that the
>there are some inconsistencies in the color.of roller-1. Roller-2 looked
>rather normal except there seemed to be some waviness in the way it
>reflected light as I was looking at with a magnifying glass.

No clue on the waviness. I've seen that happen along with a wrinkled
roller surface. They usually go together. However, there's no
evidence of wrinkling in your photo. When it does wrinkle, it can't
be easily fixed and needs to be replaced. Note that the 4000 series
fuser rebuild kits usually include just the fuser sleeve, the red
rubber pressure roller, and some silicon grease.

>I decided to swap out the fuser with another LJ4000. I also created a
>"printer cleaning page" via the control panel and so far it's printing
>better.

Better as in there is still toner crud on the edges? Not good enough.
Did you tear it apart and blow the loose toner out of the guts? Black
toner on black plastic is difficult to see.

My guess(tm) is your replacement fuser assembly is only a little
better condition that the one you replaced. They're not very
difficult to take apart and clean, but it does take some care and
there are a few parts that are easy to break. Learn by Destroying
perhaps?

>Thanks for your reply.

Good luck.