BH1050 poor quality & toner rub off

[Desert Rat]

I had a sample of this but am having trouble uploading. I will try again later.

I got a call from a new customer. He is a quick printer and has the BH1050, BHC6500, an ES5540C and a Ricoh Pro C700ex.
He has been doing the service on the BH1050 himself. This was my first call. And I'm not familiar with the BH1050. I did service
a BH750 for a couple of years. I was not impressed with the 750.

Anyway the copy has light bands in the middle of the page. It reminds me of a low toner condition in the dev unit.
Here's what the customer sez he did. Changed the developer, changed the upper fuser roller and replaced the
corona wires. The corona wires he used were from a spool of Canon gold plated corona wire. I don't recall if the BH750
used gold plated corona's. I would like to save the developer material if possible.
He has never reset any of the counters for the parts replaced.
He also did not run any of the programs after replacing parts.
He said he replaced the developer and the customer for the job canceled
so there has not been any copies to speak of made on the machine since then.
My gut feel is to start with the corona's.
I did go through the adjustments for the developer with no help. The LD1 & 2 pages started the squares 3-4 bars over the black
lines. It did complete the gamma adjustment and I reset the dev counter.
The lower pressure roller is stained and the toner rubs off a little with my finger. There are marks on the back of the page
from the lower roller. I think he said he did replace the fuser cleaning roller.

I feel like I have opened up a big can of worms.

I'm looking for some direction with this call.

Thanks
DR

[allan]

The corona wires are gold plated but i will recomend using the OEM stuff. For the the voids should be toner on the LPH unit ( LED print head right on top of the drum next to the charge unit. These machines are good, but without the PM's it will be a headache.

Its an easy machine to work on.

For the toner rubbing off i would check for bad toner or the pressure adjustment.

[allan]

Oops, no LPH on this model. Mabe dirty laser glass.

[tech51]

So how many prints has it done? When was it last serviced with a pm kit,dev & drum?
These machines don't react kindly to a lack of proper servicing but can run well when looked after.
The voids could be caused by the charge grid and wires for example, but on high volume machines developer units and cleaner units can fail.
As for the toner rubbing off, I've had upper roller heat sleeves break, cleaner web motors fail and even other technicians forgetting to put the pressure back on after changing a roller. Also the heater roller for the lower roller can get dirty.
All in all I think you're correct when you say it's a can of worms it sounds like it needs a good (probably expensive) service to get it back on track. I personally wouldn't touch it unless I absolutely had to!

[blackcat4866]

I'd like to see a sample before commenting, and mark the feed direction.

Yes it could be a huge can of worms, especially if it's going to be billable. "Can't you find a cheaper part to change?" =^..^=

[Desert Rat]

Allan, I agree I would rather use the correct corona wires. As for the the void streaks they run across paper feed. The are not well defined bands.
They are about an inch apart. They are most pronounced in the middle of letter paper (portrait orientation). And it gets more solid toward the
edges.
Tech51, this was my first look at this particular machine, so I can't tell you when the last time a PM kit was used. From the looks of it, its been
awhile. I may get a chance to look at it today so I can check the pressure setting. I'm thinking the void bands are caused from a low toner
condition in the dv unit. I'm thinking to hot shot the developer with toner just to see if I can strike a nerve.

Yes Blackcat a sample would be nice, I will try and post it today. And yes, "I can find a cheaper part to replace but it
would have nothing to do with the problem.:)" Is my usual response.
Sometimes I like it when the customer helps me, I usually make more $. And this is a billable service call.
But when I get this straightened out I will have another customer with at least 2 more machines to service.
As an indy I have to take advantage of every opportunity to secure another customer.

Thanks for the input

DR

[Desert Rat]

Blackcat,
I re-scanned the sample as a .jpg and I still could not upload it with the attachment icon. I've done this before.
I'm not sure what the problem is?

DR

[techno77]

I would check the bias connection,and if you have serious overtoning in the dev unit above the h-cut your developer could be spent.

[blackcat4866]

I know that it doesn't seem like the intuitive answer, but you might take a look at the fuser speed. It can cause compressions or expansions crossfeed. It takes about an hour but it would be worthwhile to do the image adjustments.

The largest files I've been able to successfully load were less than 1MB. How large are your scans? You might have to turn off color scanning, or reduce the resolution a little. =^..^=

[Desert Rat]

Blackcat,
Not having much experience on this model I am willing to try those adjustments.
And I will re-scan as a b/w. Not sure what it was set at. But I have scanned
11X17 test prints from the C6500 to this site without problem. This page does have
about 10 times more coverage.

Thanks

DR

[Iowatech]

Just to add to blackcat4866's point, for the toner contamination on the fuser's pressure roller you might want to make sure the fuser rollers aren't past their PM rating. Or that something is preventing the fuser to reach an adequate temperature or apply the appropriate amount of pressure.
Although this is starting to sound a little more like an issue with incompatible aftermarket toner. (From an end user's point of view, it's all just black powder after all.) (Sorry!)

[allan]

The lamps and the thermistors ware and age, and the pressure assy needs lubrication and a motor replacement with time.

[Desert Rat]

Iowatech,
The upper roller was just changed by the customer. The lower looks as though it should have been changed. Hopefully
I will have time to go back today and look into the fuser section.
And I think he was using Precision Roller aftermarket toner. I will double check on my next stop. If it is, will it have to be purged
and set up with fresh developer? Or can I run black copy till its gone? The customer sez he just changed it a week ago.

Allan,
If I get the time I will check the thermistors and lamps. My experience with lamps is they work or they don't. Does the output of
these lamps diminish over time? I can ohm the thermistors to see if their resistance changes while holding the thermistor between
my two fingers.

Thanks for the input

DR

[allan]

It you want all of the toner out of the system you are in for a treat. Just replace the toner and let it run thru, but that could take forever.

Changing the developer will give you an instant answer on the toner question, but the "bad" toner will run back in soon enough.

Changing the toner and the developer and cleaning out the hopper and the pipes will be the best way.

The lamp does lose intensity after a long time in operation, combined with a bad thermistor the temperature regulation would be abnormal and you could find that the machine would stop in the middle of a run to heat up.
Or simply overheat sligtly because of a buildup on the thermistor.


Meter reading?

[Synaux]

Maybe I missed it, did you clean the laser glass (and did it help at all)?

Upload the sample to photobucket or dropbox so we can take a look at it :cool:

[blackcat4866]

You'll have quite a job purging generic toner. The large volume of developer on this model holds about 3000 copies worth toner. Like allan suggests, the best course is to vacuum out the hopper and sub-hopper, installing OEM toner, and do a complete developer change. Between generic toner and a worn out pressure roller, that could account for fusing problems. I'd still be interested in seeing that sample. =^..^=

[Desert Rat]

I called the customer yesterday so I could stop by and he said he would call me later.
I still haven't heard from him yet. I may just stop by without warning. I know he is
concerned about the charges.
I'll see what I can do about that sample.

Thanks

DR

[Desert Rat]

I rescanned as a gray scale and resolution at 300dpi. Still could not up load.
I will work on this later. My gut feel is that the aftermarket toner is at fault.

DR

[Desert Rat]

Here is the meter reading from the BH1050 4019452.
DR

[CompyTech]

If he changed the upper fuser roller.. If it's anything like the 950, there is a soft fuser roller that requires different pressure springs and dipswitch settings to run. Make sure the upper fuser roller is a hard roller, if he just slapped in a soft upper roller with out doing the mods, it would cause poor fusing. Sounds like this machine is a bag of mess, I wouldn't touch it either.. But good luck.. At least it's chargeable. :)

[allan]

If he changed the upper fuser roller.. If it's anything like the 950, there is a soft fuser roller that requires different pressure springs and dipswitch settings to run. Make sure the upper fuser roller is a hard roller, if he just slapped in a soft upper roller with out doing the mods, it would cause poor fusing. Sounds like this machine is a bag of mess, I wouldn't touch it either.. But good luck.. At least it's chargeable. :)

Do you mean the red roller for the B1250? I know the black roller for the B050 fits the B1250, it's a lot cheaper but i would not use it there.

[Desert Rat]

Compytech and allan,
Thank you for that input. I will try and get the customer to let me come back and check those rollers.
I will also check the product code.
So far I have not charged him anything.
I thought for sure that using the canon spool corona wire would be causing some of the quality problem.

Here are those samples I spoke of. The first one is #8 test print at 255 density and the next one
is #8 at 70 density. The lead edge is on the left side. It exited face down.
The streaks from the lead edge to about the center of the page can be matched to the lower fuser roller.
Its the vertical bands that I am concerned about. Those are the ones that remind me of a dev problem.

Thanks for advice on posting these samples
DR

http://i1028.photobucket.com/albums/y344/desertcopy/DCS/8255dens%20001_zpsiczbnyjt.jpg?t=1444220819
http://i1028.photobucket.com/albums/y344/desertcopy/DCS/870dens%20001_zpsobsie8be.jpg?t=1444220828

[allan]

Just start with a basic PM. Drum, blades, developer, corona wires and grid, vibration rubbers and discharge wire. And get rid of the toner in the system.

[Desert Rat]

Alan,
That was my gut feel from the start. Start over on the PM.

DR