MPC 3003 No Black toner icon on screen

[leo34staffs]

Hi all,

I have been to a machine 5 days ago where the customer said the black toner was out , so they replaced it, then after a day it said it again . I went to site to find 2 half full bottles. If the machine is switched off then on again 2 bars would appear on black toner level. but would soon indicate no bars.

What i have done so far, i have replaced k dev unit and also the rear sub hopper, i also added a new black toner as i could not get the machine to read the level of the old bottles Then as a test i did a forced add toner to make sure toner was supplied to the dev unit. the vt lowered below the vref value and all was well.

Today i have had a call for added black toner, still asking for black.

Anyone have any ideas what other checks i can make?

[Cipher]

Yeah the toner level can become undetectable / hence the level indicator disappears for that colour.

Customers swapping toner bottles around before toner end can screw things up.
Each toner bottle has a chip which writes unique identification values back to the machine.
Basically when a new toner bottle is installed, you should not remove it and re-install a older half-full toner bottle back in.
And of course if there is a toner supply issue to the dev unit after 'x' amount of toner motor on-time the toner level can show as empty / undetectable until the problem is corrected.

I assume the customer isn't changing the toner on the toner low warning displayed in the corner of screen, and is actually waiting for the machine to stop and display the large message box saying to replace the toner.
(Soooo many customers do this... well the prints were a little light, and machine did say the toner was low, so I changed it).

You have changed the sub-hopper and dev unit for K.
So failing that you could try switching the K ID PCB on the rear of the toner supply hopper around with another colour and see if the problem moves.

[leo34staffs]

Yeah the toner level can become undetectable / hence the small level indicator at the bottom of the screen (if enabled) disappears for that colour.

Customers swapping toner bottles around before toner end can screw things up.
Each toner bottle has a chip which writes unique identification values back to the machine.

I assume the customer isn't changing the toner on the small toner low warning in the corner of screen, and is actually waiting till the machine stops and displays the large message box saying to replace the toner. (so many customers do this).

Failing that there is bottle ID PCB on each toner hopper, you could try switching K around with another colour and see if the problem moves.

Thanks for the reply,

I changed the sub hopper so i would think this would have the bottle ID PCB?

I will try a forced add toner tomorrow and inspect the new sub hopper to see if its full or not and check the auger, however, this was fine on the old hopper. EDIT i will check the bottle ID PCB on the hopper (is this the one with the pins on that contact the bottle)

[Cipher]

The sub hopper has the toner end sensor on it.

The toner bottle ID PCB is higher up in-line with each bottle (yep the one with pins).
I've had bent pins before but normally that will trigger a communication 6xx service code.

[Oze]

This will sound stupid but check SP3-110-1 hasn't been set to 100 rather than 0 .
I have had this once in the field believe it or not.
Machine was nagging for yellow toner...tried a different bottle and was about to order a sub hopper assy when I checked the setting on an off chance.
It was set to 100 by a previous tech.

[leo34staffs]

This will sound stupid but check SP3-110-1 hasn't been set to 100 rather than 0 .
I have had this once in the field believe it or not.
Machine was nagging for yellow toner...tried a different bottle and was about to order a sub hopper assy when I checked the setting on an off chance.
It was set to 100 by a previous tech.

Thanks for that. However when I returned today I noticed the toner end sensor was not connected when I put the new hopper on and the sub was empty possibly because of this. Although the toner bottle says no bars on the black I will see how it goes.