Printer only works in certain electrical outlets

[gilchrjo]

A lexmark printer when plugged into an outlet powered by one generator comes up with a fuser error immediately. This has happened to 5 of the same lexmark model, but when moved into a different building powered by a nother generator it works fine. Has anyone dealt with an issue such as this?

[fixthecopier]

It would seem the first building has a power issue, not the machine. If it does not get a steady stream of power, it will code.

[gilchrjo]

It would seem the first building has a power issue, not the machine. If it does not get a steady stream of power, it will code.

The strange part there are other devices plugged up that run off the same generator that work fine. A digital sender 2 other lexmark printers, the only difference on the non working one was it was a multi function all in one.

[prntrfxr]

MFP's require more power. I know with HP some of the power requirements of the machines are higher than they used to be. Power from outlets is never constant anyway. There are highs and lows. Machines are designed to work within certain tolerances. Maybe the first building is not within the tolerance of the MFP. Consequently, it does not work in the first building, but the second building it works fine. I have seen this happen in the field and have seen some machines not work with other machines on the same circuit. I had a fax machine not work on the same wall with a copier and paper folding machine. The copier required more power, but the fax was the one that didn't get enough to work. I plugged the fax on a different wall (different circuit breaker) and it worked fine.

[Hemlock]

MFPs, as with most copiers, use ground switching. If there's anything above a very low voltage on the ground line (or maybe even the neutral), you'll see either error codes or weird jams. Lights, radios and other basic devices aren't impacted in the same way (though you might have flickering lights or a background hum on the radio).

I'd speculate the generator may not be grounded properly, but that's just an off-site guess based on minimal info.

[I3FusionGuy]

Yep - generators dont provide clean, steady power and cause all sorts of problems. Any site survey invilving a generator is suspect - Id suggest all contracts involving a generator to be fully billable. We had a customer lease one blind....on a generator at a construction site...imagine what it did to the color copier.