LaserJet 4000 - Noises, Multifeeding

[napprox]

Greetings,

I'm new to this whole not calling a repair guy for your printer thing, so I apologize if these are questions with obvious answers.

The LJ 4000 in the office I recently took a position in is about 9 years old. It has a little over 205,000 pages printed in that period of time, and maintenance has never been performed on it.

When you turn it on, and whenever it prints, it squeeks. This seems to be comming from the fuser assembly. I say this because I took the fuser assembly out, turned on the printer and the noise stopped. Would replacing the fuser pretty much swap out all of the moving parts on this and therefor stop the squeeking? Also, the printer still prints well so the fuser, squeeking aside, is still kicking. Would it be possible to oil the gears or something to stop the noise? If so, can somebody recommend some oil for this?

The printer is also multifeeding through tray 1, every so often tray 2. From what i've read, this always points to worn down pickup rollers and seperation arms/rollers. Is this always the case, or are there other possible causes?

Also, it sometimes "moans" when feeding out of tray 2 ... anythoughts on this?

Once again, I'd like to apologize if these are questions with obvious answers or if I've broken some sort of forum rule of etiquette. I'm working for a non-profit clinic and am new to printer repair. As such, I'm hesitant to spend a couple hundred bucks on a maintenance kit if it is not going to get this printer functioning correctly again.

Thank you for your time

[Cwest]

It sounds like you need a full maintanence kit for the printer. The fuser has a life of 200,000 pages. The manual tray sounds like its rollers are very worn. I do not know about the squeaking sound coming from tray 2 though.

[Brian]

In my experience if a fuser in the 4000 is still working fine at 200,000 prints it has already been replaced at some time, if not you are lucky.
If you remove the fuser the printer doesn't do the full power up cycle so the squeek might have another cause, could be the cartridge.
Multi feeds in tray 1 are caused by a worn separation pad, not the roller, easy to swap if it has the newer click-in pad in the arm, if not, the arm has to be replaced, that can be a tricky one.
Multi feeds and groans from tray 2 are caused by a worn roller in the tray and an over active clutch, opening the clutch and removing some of the filings usually stops the groaning.
Hope this helps.

[redcow]

Brian, I can't find anything labeled 'clutch' in the parts manual. Do you have a part number for this item?

Napprox, you are going to have to change the MFT separation pad. From your description of the non work done on your printer , you probably have the old style pad. If you've never changed it before you're in for problems. Make sure it gets replaced with the new style one.

[napprox]

I suppose its possible that the fuser has been replaced already. One of the biggest problems / challenges with this office is that next to *nothing* is documented. I say it has not been serviced based upon what my superviser says.

The clutch part number is RB1-8974-000CN , and from what i've read its also known as the torque limiter.

What I'm probably going to end up doing is getting a maintenance kit. The one I'm looking at is http://www.printertechs.com/maintkits/lj4000kit.php .

I'm positive that I've got one of the old style seperation pads ... so that should be fun to swap out.

How do you guys feel about refurbished fusers? I don't have any experience in this area, so once again I'm not sure about them. Do they last as long as the new fusers?

Thanks again

[Brian]

The clutch is indeed the RB1-8974-000CN, situated next to the roller in the tray.
The old style separation arm can be a bugger to swap but you only have to take of the front cover and tray one assembly, watch out for the springs under the arm.
I have had good and bad experiences with refurbished fusers, we have now found a supplier that does a good job and they seem to last as long as a new one, if they not only replace the film but all the gears too it should last.

[woodss]

I just replace the heater assembly and clean the gears when I did my fuser when I first purchased my 4050N in August 2005 which is a 4000 engine, when I purchased the machine the flim on the fuser was worn, in August of this year it will be 2 years since the fuser was serviced, in August of this year I will service the fuser again not to replace the heater assembly but just to clean the gears and overall cleaning, at that time I hope to be well settled into my new property.

So I decided to replace just the heater assembly because the other parts were fine, added a duplexer, 500 sheet bin and 610N jetdirect since then its been awesome, I use OEM toners, at the moment I am using a remanfactured toner because the OEM toner has been packed because I am moving house, but usually I use OEM because of the quality, when the printer is reinstalled and setup at the new house I will be using the OEM cartridge again which is full.

And I have done nearly 30,000 pages on it.

[napprox]

I have decided that I'm going to just replace the rollers / seperation pads for now. The part no. i've got for the separation pad I need from hp is: RG5-5281-020CN . Can anyone verify that this is the piece that is being swapped out in http://www.printertechs.com/tech/mkinst/mk-4000-6mp-sep2.php ? I checked with a local place and their price was $17, where as hp's price is $2. I'm just worried that what hp has is the grey pad itself, and not the grey pad and the black piece that its attatched to.

Thanks for all the help

[woodss]

Sounds indeed like a harden torque limiter.

It would be cheaper if you simply replace the heater assembly in the fuser and clean the gears with a toothbrush, replacement of the lower roller of the fuser is not required.

Next you clean the pickup rollers they hardly never wear out, you clean them with hot water and this softens them.

After that you then check the torque limiter its located on the tray its the black barrel next to the separation / feed roller, the printer has two separation and feed rollers check this site for details in the maintaince kit section for 4000 / 4050.

If it still sqeaks, you need to oil the gear train or remove it, and this is a big job.

I have a 6 year old 4050N, at the time it was purchased it was 4 years old. In about 6 years it has done: 243,380 this one has been used more too.

[Brian]

you will never find the word clutch in the service manual, its the technician's terminology.



From the HP 4000 service manual, page 8-40: RB1-8974-000CN, Clutch, Separation Roller

[napprox]

What issues does replacing the heater resolve?

Also, I've looked at the gears and a lot of them have what I assume is toner on them and what looks like some kind of grease / lube. Is cleaning these and leaving them without the grease safe? Or is it one of those deals where only certain gears need the grease?

Thanks for all the help

[redcow]

You've got 200,000+ pages, put a new fuser in it along with the rest of the maintenance kit.

And reset the maintenance count when you are done.

[Tim Harris]

You are on the right track regarding the replacement of the Feed/Separation rollers in tray 2 and making the adjustment to the clutch. As for try 1 sep pad replacement it is a bit tricky but a small Magnegtic flat blade screwdrifer will be very helpful.

You will need to remove the front door and the paper guide first, then the tray 1 pick up roller. Next scoot the plastic side rollers to one side on the shaft. Locate the 3 springs under the sep pad. Using the screwdriver, insert the blade in between the coils as close to the top of one of the side springs as possible and push the spring down to remove it from the plastic nipple that holds it in place. A magnegtic screwdriver is a great help since it makes it easy to retrive the spring once it is loosened. Push the two plastic rollers to the other side and do the same. You do not have to do this on the middle one. Next, on the arm that os opposite of the side the two rollers are pused to...use your flat blade screwdriver and insert it between the body of the printer and the arm of the sep pad and gently pry it up and over the nub that if hinges on. Once freed you can angle it up and our of its home. Most likely the rubber pad and the arm are all one unit. The new design is a black arm with a removable gray pad. I would reinsert the new unit back in and not put the springs on until the last. Make sure each arn is on the hinge and then insert one of the springs making sure to get it on the lower nipple that holds it in place. Use your screwdriver and catch the very top of the last coil and compress the spring so you can slip it over the nipple on the under side of the sep pad. The center spring should be on it's own nipple. repeat this for the other side as well. Clean and replace the roller and put the tray 1 guide and door and and you should be in business. Send me and Email and I can talk you through it if you have any concerns before your start or how to adjust the clutch.

Hope this helps

Have a Blessed Day!

Tim

[woodss]

What issues does replacing the heater resolve?

Also, I've looked at the gears and a lot of them have what I assume is toner on them and what looks like some kind of grease / lube. Is cleaning these and leaving them without the grease safe? Or is it one of those deals where only certain gears need the grease?

Thanks for all the help

Replace the heater assembly, clean the lower pressure roller with a lint free cloth and clean the gears with a tooth brush, and reassemble the fuser unit this is all the fuser needs, replacement of the heater assembly resolves the flim and the heater element itself, when I purchased my 4050N it was over 200,000 in page count, the lower pressure roller and gears hardly give problems, Redcow is just saying the expensive way, far too much for it.

Much cheaper than a expensive fuser.

[napprox]

I would just like to thank everyone for all the help that they have been.

I'm still in the process of hunting down the cause of the squeek. I swapped out the fuser with the fuser of a non-squeeking machine, and this one still squeeks. I also figured I'd give swapping out the toner a try, that was a no go. I took the side panels off and powered on the printer. This is a high pitched squeek that seems to be comming from the back half of the printer. I moved the fan (still had power to it) and put my ear to wear the fan was (middle of the left hand side of the printer). The noise seems to get louder towards the back of the printer.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what to clean or replace? I apologize if someone has already said what the cause would be. I checked over the thread and if its there I have either misunderstood or missed it.

Thank you all for you time

[napprox]

For those that are interested, I found the cause of my squeek. Turns out that it was the transfer roller. So I slapped on a pair of gloves, removed the roller, cleaned it with a cloth, and then blew out the place where the roller sits (not sure what the name is ). There was quite a bit of toner built up inside the printer, not so much on the roller itself. Seems to have solved the problem.

As my first repair, this wasn't all that bad of an experience. Took a bit longer than it should have, but thats ok by me. If anyone has any tips they'd like to give on troubleshooting things like squeeks, sounds, or anything else I'd greatly appreciate it.

Once again, I'd just like to thank everyone that took time to post on this thread.

[redcow]

Thank you for responding with the fix.
Good info for all