Thoughts For Design Engineers

[KapeKopyTek]

Design engineers should be required to actually work on the machines they design. What looks elegant on paper can be a really pain to fix/maintain/operate.

Ricoh/Savin in particular:
- please decide on either hex head or "button" head screws throughout the machine. I prefer hex head as a magnetized nutdriver is better for getting a screw into those tight places.
- Waste toner and web near end messages should not be little hints down in the bottom left of the screen where no one ever sees them. They should pop up in a big red notification on the screen requiring the user to acknowledge the message before they can proceed to copy/scan. That way someone might actually call for service before the machine goes down, and they can't claim to have "not seen" the warnings.
- please fix the 9040/9240/4002 mag roller coating issue once and for all or discontinue the line. 5 years or better seems like more than enough time.
- feed rollers in the MP6002 need changing every 40 - 50k if not before, regardless of what the stated yield (1000k - that's got to be a misprint, but even 100k is laughable) is. Anyone come up with an unapproved field remedy for these tires going so slick so fast?

[KenB]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Along the lines of Ricoh...

How about making more of the SP settings changeable (or at least viewable) via the WIM?

it's a colossal pain when you try to set a machine up (especially with some of the software solutions) remotely, and have to have someone standing in front of the machine either getting into SP modes or User Tools to complete the installation, or un-installation, for that matter.

Hands-on may be just fine in a lab, classroom, or at a very small customer location, but large scale installations suck the big one when it comes to deployment. It's a pain in the @$$ to make the co-ordination sometimes.

[emujo]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

KM needs to bring back load check to run motors, solenoids, etc. And how about a true "universal driver" !!! One driver to control them all....Emujo

[LNorris]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

i started out working on Kyocera, then went to Ricoh Direct, now working at dealer that services both....

never understood short life of drums and fusers on Ricoh....never seen a Kyocera 'spill" toner everywhere like a Ricoh.

get rid of the ricoh open-ended toner bottles, seal them off like a kyocera.

dont mind working on a machine, but somethings are preventable

[Techman1000]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Amen! I don't have the problems anymore since we service Kyocera's

Ricoh & Savin were the worst about leaking toner & developer.

[NeoMatrix]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Foremost, if machines never had problems, you would not require a technician.

The technicians of today are becoming obsolete, which is slowly becoming a reality given the dirt cheap disposable MFD's flooding the market. Gov't should look serious at placing heavy recycling/removal tax's on these disposable copiers as many perfectly good machines are just ending up as land fill in the city dump. The disposable MFD is not a very good environmental practice.
As people know, it's far cheaper to buy a new MFD than to replace the printer ink cartridges. This is exactly how my clients relate to technical service/repairs of these cheap MFD's. They throw away the entire printer instead of buying just the small print cartridge. Lets be realistic,the single print cartrige can be refilled an/or requires less recycling or land fill space than an entire printer. But the cheap MFD trend is happening because the larger MFD's are viewed as being unreliable and require an ongoing service contract to maintain. An as all technicians know all machines must be maintained to get optimum usability out of the machine. This is a fact of reality it'self.

Gov't could adopt the similar recycled bottle approach, whether by you bring your dispoable MFD back to the shop and swap it for a new one for a small fee. Call it "trade-in recycling". Would it discourage the disposable MFD's current sales trend???


I guess it's only a matter of time before we see the disposable ICE or electric car. Goodbye all mechanics.

[MHeon71]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

How about velcro on back covers, instead of screws.

[ZOOTECH]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

How about velcro on back covers, instead of screws.

Probably, a little too noisy when removing. I remember in the service, they had, what I think, was a "quarter-turn and lock" type fastener. Of course, the military had a big budget, and cost would be prohibitive for OEMs.

[NeoMatrix]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Probably, a little too noisy when removing. I remember in the service, they had, what I think, was a "quarter-turn and lock" type fastener. Of course, the military had a big budget, and cost would be prohibitive for OEMs.

What about push plug dowels? Four or six teardrop shape plugs on each corner of the backcover that pop in an out of a round socket on the frame. Repairs would drive you bongers when they fail or break though.

[NeoMatrix]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Bring back the old style Canon NP210, Toshiba BD7800,BD5500,BD4500 ,open up clamshell split frame design. Very easy machines to remove paper jambs and service internally. Mostly modular design plug&play with no extra wiring plugs/looms for the consumable items. Kyocera wiring looms concern me everytime I un-plug a dev or pcu unit.

[slimslob]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Design engineers should be required to actually work on the machines they design. What looks elegant on paper can be a really pain to fix/maintain/operate.

Ricoh/Savin in particular:
- please decide on either hex head or "button" head screws throughout the machine. I prefer hex head as a magnetized nutdriver is better for getting a screw into those tight places.

Hex head are best on the back cover and the inside where screws can get dropped. Chrome Plated round head or pan head can be used where the customer can see them in normal operation.

- Waste toner and web near end messages should not be little hints down in the bottom left of the screen where no one ever sees them. They should pop up in a big red notification on the screen requiring the user to acknowledge the message before they can proceed to copy/scan. That way someone might actually call for service before the machine goes down, and they can't claim to have "not seen" the warnings.

Configure email notification and the machine will send a email to up to 4 addresses. Of course you will still get a service call when the web runs off the end with the counter nowhere near the near end count.

- please fix the 9040/9240/4002 mag roller coating issue once and for all or discontinue the line. 5 years or better seems like more than enough time.

I had to clean one today. The problem actually goes back to a couple of the latter 35/45 models. At one time you could order just the mag roller assembly.

- feed rollers in the MP6002 need changing every 40 - 50k if not before, regardless of what the stated yield (1000k - that's got to be a misprint, but even 100k is laughable) is. Anyone come up with an unapproved field remedy for these tires going so slick so fast?

I usually get 600K to 800K when used with quality paper. I have never had a set go 1M. The older dark grey/black composition were specified at 300K. Could usually get at least 400K.

Along the lines of Ricoh...

How about making more of the SP settings changeable (or at least viewable) via the WIM?

it's a colossal pain when you try to set a machine up (especially with some of the software solutions) remotely, and have to have someone standing in front of the machine either getting into SP modes or User Tools to complete the installation, or un-installation, for that matter.

Hands-on may be just fine in a lab, classroom, or at a very small customer location, but large scale installations suck the big one when it comes to deployment. It's a pain in the @$$ to make the co-ordination sometimes.

Making it accessible to WIM invites problems. My belief is that when installing something, I like to be at the machine personally.

[KenB]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Bring back the old style Canon NP210, Toshiba BD7800,BD5500,BD4500 ,open up clamshell split frame design. Very easy machines to remove paper jambs and service internally. Mostly modular design plug&play with no extra wiring plugs/looms for the consumable items. Kyocera wiring looms concern me everytime I un-plug a dev or pcu unit.

i had a ton of those things back in the day.

The NP210 was a dream. The NP300 (same thing, just slightly bigger) was a freakin' nightmare.

[CompyTech]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

KM needs to bring back load check to run motors, solenoids, etc. And how about a true "universal driver" !!! One driver to control them all....Emujo

Actually there's a loadcheck on the new e series machines.. It's not as extensive as the older style, like on the production machines, but it works.. You just have to reboot the machine though to get back out of it.

As for universal driver.. Yes, a light weight basic driver. Especially good for the oddball installs or for the idiot IT that tries to load a 250 driver for a C554. I remember when the first uni drivers were released, I thought boy this driver is a POS. I never used it since..

[NeoMatrix]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

The latest technology in cookware is stonedyne hard surface non-stick coating. Why can't all copier and printer hot rollers be coated with a stonedyne hard waring surface with the same or similar properties? There should be no need to repair fuser units for the life of the machine. Normal maintainance on a fuser unit should be very minimal from there on.

At least allow factory service and dealer support access to the hard coating hot rollers to reduce their service contract pricing an remain competitve.

[MFPTech]

Re: Thoughts For Design Engineers

Canon - do something about WTC - $50 for a cheap plastic box? - give me a break! As a result techs are asked to empty them in every service call.
- in big machines make them accessible to the customer and display a big message with a big sound when they get full.
for monochrome machines you want techs to use a coil for coronas, really?
- is it so hard and expensive to send a drum blade rather than just the blade with 10 steps of screwing it?
Canon engineers, can't you design
- better toner bottle engagingmechanism
- relable inner finishers
- reliable OPC drums?
what about ADFs that cannot feeed an original and have a nightmare lable claiming the originals that are not supported - basically anything that an office has - a $200 scanner can do all that. How about piut that kind of scanner on the top of the copier instead of the ADF?

Enough about Canon ....

Kyocera
Why do you bother with color machines? - that is not your thing, stick to what you do best - monochrome machines

Konica
The worst copier engineers work for Konica. They don't know to design a simple feed unit so the technicians can replace the feed rollers quickly
The firmware update procedute is a nightmare - different levels, special firmware, horrible instructions.
- the worst clutches ever
- confusing (Admin) interface
How about stop manufacturing monochrome machines and stick to color ones only?

Ricoh engineers - do something else, copiers are not your thing unless you learn how to feed toner in the machine and get rid of the hoses?
I am not going to print drivers ...

Toshiba - are they still around?

Yes, I would like to have a job as a technician but not such a stressful one because machines have intermittent issues and customers are screaming because they want someone yesterday and parts department is not giving you parts to save money for the company!