[Misc] RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

[Guest]

I have a Ricoh Color 5560 that makes light b&w and color copies. If you set the contrast to the next to the last bar the copies are fine.
I recently replaced all toners, but that didn't help. Any ideas what to try ... Thanks!

[TonerMunkeh]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

Dev within life? PCU was last serviced when?

[Eric1968]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

Clean the optics.

[slimslob]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

If copies are light but prints are are not, Eric1968 is correct. Dust buildup in the optics, especially the mirrors can cause light copies. When the white refference is read, dirty optics can make the machine think that gray is white and the entire grey scale is lightened. If every thing is light, clean the shield glasses.

[MIKE D]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

Thanks ... I'll try cleaning. I got the machine from a friend at a commercial print shop, who was upgrading to
newer machines. He told me about the light copies and said his service people had "tried a few things", but
it didn't correct the problem (the machine was out of service contract for about 6 months). So I don't know
if cleaning is that simple of a solution ... looks like the copier tech would have tried that first. Any deeper
ideas besides the obvious??

[Klydon]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

A 5560? That doesn't ring a bell as a current model. Are we talking about the old analog machine? If it is, I am surprised they even bothered to come out to service it this long. That machine belongs on Ricoh's wall of shame.

[Eric1968]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

A 5560? That doesn't ring a bell as a current model. Are we talking about the old analog machine? If it is, I am surprised they even bothered to come out to service it this long. That machine belongs on Ricoh's wall of shame.

If you don't know the machine, how can you say it belongs to Ricoh's Wall of Shame?

[Klydon]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

If you don't know the machine, how can you say it belongs to Ricoh's Wall of Shame?

I said I didn't know it as a current model.

I actually worked on 5560's back in the day. They were part of the 5000/5520/5560 series of analog machines that were capable of doing monochrome color if you switched the dev unit out. The 5560 was an absolute disaster with its own filing cabinet of service bulletins and replacement parts in order to try to get it to work worth a lick. The machine ran like a pig, even by the standards of the day and went through drums like crazy as well. I don't even know if it was worth being a boat anchor and I would have taken extreme pleasure of watching a pile them go through a metal shredder.

[totoro]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

You're probably going to have to change the developer, and maybe the drum as well. I have had this problem on this model before. If the developer is way over due it will cause this issue. I went round and round with thinking it had to be the optics because the prints were good, but new developer fixed it.

[MIKE D]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

The guy I got the copier from has a shop with about 8 copiers, so was there a specific contract on this machine ... I didn't
ask. He just mentioned the tech had looked at it. The Ricoh 5560 came out in 2005 which I wouldn't call ancient... it replaced a Cannon Imagerunner
that was way older than that and before that another older copier. The copiers replaced 1963 Multi 1250's and AB Dick 360 offset presses.
My generation repairs stuff our self. I've been in the print bus 35 years and never had a "service contract". I don't need your
opinion on the machine. I appreciate the info on the developer, which was my first thought.

[Klydon]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

The guy I got the copier from has a shop with about 8 copiers, so was there a specific contract on this machine ... I didn't
ask. He just mentioned the tech had looked at it. The Ricoh 5560 came out in 2005 which I wouldn't call ancient... it replaced a Cannon Imagerunner
that was way older than that and before that another older copier. The copiers replaced 1963 Multi 1250's and AB Dick 360 offset presses.
My generation repairs stuff our self. I've been in the print bus 35 years and never had a "service contract". I don't need your
opinion on the machine. I appreciate the info on the developer, which was my first thought.

Different machine then. The 5560 I am thinking of is circa late 80's, early 90's. A quick look on Ricoh's TSRC site didn't show me a 5560 model number and its not like Ricoh is in the habit of repeating model numbers.

As far as giving an opinion on a piece of equipment, this is a message board and that happens quite often here (people giving their opinions) on equipment one way or another. I could care less if you specifically don't need my opinion on a specific machine model. It was more of seeing the model number and having flashback nightmares from having to work on one of the worst machines I have ever had to work on.

[copiman]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

Hey Mike,

I think where the confusion came in was that Ricoh has two 5506 models. The first one was the Ricoh FT5560, which was a black and white machine. I think you are referring to the Aficio 5560, which is a color machine, introduced in 2005. Not a bad machine, if it is properly serviced. I serviced many of these in print shop environments years ago.

You said that you or someone there maintains your own equipment. I'm glad that you can do this, although these machines have certain procedures that must be done and in order, for it to function properly. Any deviation in the process will cause the machine to fail. You may already know this and have serviced this model before, but I thought I would mention it just in case.

Light copies can be caused by a lot of things. Usually, if the prints are fine and the copies are light, the issue lies in the optic section, which is why an earlier post mentioned cleaning the optics. Since you have already done that, the problem is deeper. Without actually seeing the machine, I not sure what to tell you. Running internal test patterns can aid in troubleshooting the problem. Another thing I found with this machine, especially in a print shop environment, is that the PMs need to be done on time and that the PM checklist need to be adhered to. Any deviation will result in failure of the machine to perform properly. When I worked on them, only trained techs were allowed to service them.

Hope this information helps and wish you luck in resolving the immediate issue.

[MIKE D]

Re: RICOH 5560 - LIGHT COPIES

Yeah ... the first thing I did was bought a service repair manual, the real one the techs use. I think it's
deeper because the original owner acted like his copier tech did the most obvious checks and it did
not improve the copy quality. On the PS test page the colors are gone until the 10 mark, then the rest
is light until 90. I'll be diving into this machine next week ... using some of the info I gather from this site.
I appreciate the time.