Ricoh MP301 "Toner depleted"

**copier tech** · 07-22-2016

I have had a few PCDUs on these little 301 fail in as little as 18k the gears get stripped so the toner doesnt get fed into the developer. Is any one else seeing this issue? It seems Ricoh isnt making any improvments to the drum/dev unit it keeps happening even after fitting a new pcdu on multiple machines.
Has anyone manged to replace the gears? are they the same as any other model?

**jeff33** · 07-22-2016

Try using a 1515 PCU you will ave to remove the one plastic pin on the copier then it will fit and you wont have to deal with crappy 301 PCUs. Its what I do and I get full life from them.

**slimslob** · 07-23-2016

This has been an on going problem with these entry level machines. About 25% of the drum units strips gears at about 50% of yield.

**copier tech** · 07-23-2016

1515 pcdu interesting! Tell me more is that a complete unit with dev etc?

**slimslob** · 07-23-2016

Originally Posted by jeff33

Try using a 1515 PCU you will ave to remove the one plastic pin on the copier then it will fit and you wont have to deal with crappy 301 PCUs. Its what I do and I get full life from them.

I have had the same premature failures with these as well.

**copier tech** · 07-23-2016

Shame about these drum units as I think the 301 is a nice little machine, fuser could be improved too

**copyaction** · 07-23-2016

_{where is the pin that has to be removed to make the 1515 unit fit?}

**Brianneoe** · 07-24-2016

We had a rash of these fail awhile back but things seem to have quieted down lately. Haven't had a problem in a few months. As far as the 1515 pcu are concern, I believe its on the operator side. I don't know if the PCU's were defective from factory or just what you see is what you get when you take a 15ppm design and use it for a 30ppm machine.

**Klydon** · 07-25-2016

As someone who works on a pile of these POS, I have some experience with them..

The 1515 drums can fail like the regular drums, but seem to be more durable overall. They are certainly cheaper than using the MP301 drums.

There is a post on the front of the machine that will block the use of the 1515 drum (won't let it slide all the way in). Clip that and it works fine.

The running joke I have going with these is a MP301 PM is every 20k.. replace drum and hot roller together. (Hot roller is supposed to go 90k.. not had one get there yet unless I have had a customer absolutely not care about a line right down the middle of the page).

At some point, Ricoh may come up with a improved drum unit, but considering the replacement for these machines is on the market, I don't know how much urgency they will give it.

**sturmtrooper** · 07-25-2016

Originally Posted by Klydon

As someone who works on a pile of these POS, I have some experience with them..

The 1515 drums can fail like the regular drums, but seem to be more durable overall. They are certainly cheaper than using the MP301 drums.

There is a post on the front of the machine that will block the use of the 1515 drum (won't let it slide all the way in). Clip that and it works fine.

The running joke I have going with these is a MP301 PM is every 20k.. replace drum and hot roller together. (Hot roller is supposed to go 90k.. not had one get there yet unless I have had a customer absolutely not care about a line right down the middle of the page).

At some point, Ricoh may come up with a improved drum unit, but considering the replacement for these machines is on the market, I don't know how much urgency they will give it.

We had a machine at a Walmart that went from new to almost 112K without a PM, of course the images looked like utter dog crap, but it still ran. They had a direct contract through ricoh but nobody every bothered to call it in. Doesn't surprise me though.