1. Unplug the printer and disconnect any cables. Remove the ink cartridges and any paper.

2. Lift and remove the covers on the right and left sides. Locate the index strip and remove the screw holding it in place.

3. Stick the Torx screwdriver through the exposed hole in the index strip and loosen it just a bit to remove the retaining nub.

4. Loosen the screws and remove the service station on the right side. Remove the print head assembly and loosen the screw until you can raise the carriage, then release the clip to separate the carriage and disconnect the black cable.

5. Slide the retaining clip off the white cable’s connector and disconnect the cable, then slide the carriage free.

6. Carefully remove the belt, noting its orientation so that you can place the new belt on properly.

7. Wind the new belt around the carriage, and then reverse the instructions to reassemble the printer.

Once you have reassembled the printer and put the covers back on, reconnect the cables and plug the printer into the wall. Print a test page by going to the Control Panel and clicking “Hardware and Sound”, then clicking “Printers”. Right-click the printer’s icon and choose “Properties”, then click the “General” tab and click “Print Test Page”. Don’t forget to add paper. If the printer prints correctly, you have successfully completed your repair.

Light Stripes

Some printouts may exhibit light vertical lines that often run the length of the paper. Most printers have a menu option called “Eliminate Light Stripes” for this very issue. It is usually located under Troubleshooting – Print Quality Problems in the menu. Run this feature a few times then print a test page to see if the problem is solved.

Printing Is Slow to Start

If you find that your Phaser printer is slow to start printing, adjust the power saving settings for quicker starts. Turning Fast Resume on will make printing start faster, though it uses more power throughout the day. You can also adjust the amount of time before the printer enters standby mode.

Problems After Moving Printer

One of the most common problems is bad print output after the printer has been moved. This is often the result of moving the printer before it has properly cooled down. Consult the manual for the proper cool down procedure before moving a solid ink printer. Unfortunately, once this problem exists, it generally requires a repair technician to fix.

Printer Using Too Much Ink

Many users may find that a solid ink printer seems to be using too much ink, specifically that it is dumping a large amount of ink in the waste reservoir of the printer. The printer will generally dump excess ink to remove air from the printhead. This problem is especially present when the printer loses power. To remedy this issue, make sure the printer is not losing power during the day, and keep the printer in sleep mode to ensure that it isn’t shut off unnecessarily.

Laser printers work by transferring toner (a carbon and polymer powder) to the paper to create an image. Most of this process is done by the drum, which is a large roller that becomes electro-statically charged by the laser, causing the toner to adhere to it in a specific pattern as it is rolled across the drum.Once the toner is transferred to the paper, which is where the fuser comes in. The fuser assembly consists of rollers that are heated. As the paper rolls through the heated rollers, the toner is fused to the paper.

Most fusing units consist of two rollers. One roller is usually hollow, with a heating element inside of it. This allows the heat to be transferred to the roller, and therefore the paper as well. The other roller is generally covered in rubber to ensure a good grip on the paper as it rolls through. The paper is rolled through with the toner side facing the heated roller to fuse the toner to the page. The heated roller must be uniformly heated to achieve the best results. Less expensive printers often roll pages through more slowly, to ensure they are properly heated and fused, which often accounts for the slower printing speeds of inexpensive laser printers. Heating up the fusing unit often accounts for most of the warm-up time of laser printers.

A laser printer is a finely-tuned machine that must accomplish many steps in a fast and efficient process. The fuser is an important component, and now that you understand its part, you can appreciate its role in the laser printing process.

As toner cartridges get used, paper dust and toner can collect and settle beneath your toner cartridges. This can accumulate until it becomes big enough to begin to stick to pages as they route through your machine. Once this dust is attached to your page, it passes through the printer’s fuser rollers as normal and comes out the other side. Unfortunately, the fusers finalize the process of the toner dust settling on the page and in doing their job, fuse that dust onto your page, creating a streak or smudge effect.

To remedy this, you can typically remove the toner cartridge, or cartridges if it applies, and wipe them down, as well as the interior of your machine. For best results, take a vacuum inside your printer and around your removed cartridge, then go in with dry, lint-free cloth and wipe up any remaining dust or particulate. When doing this, also check each cartridge for possible leaks or spillage. A toner leak is much more worrisome a problem however and typically requires professional repair. Additionally, a cartridge leak can compromise much more of your machine than simply a streaked page.

If the toner in your machine has begun to spill or leak, the toner can get onto the transfer rollers. These rollers do exactly what it sounds like they do, they transfer the toner onto the page, ideally in the computer designated format. However, if toner is spilling onto those rollers, it will be directly place onto the page, ruining your print.

In many cases, if there are no signs of trauma or spillage, shaking the toner or directly replacing the cartridge will fix the problem. If this recurs often or is not fixed by replacing the toner, contact a printer repair technician for further assistance.

One of the easiest solutions and most common causes of a printer jam is an over-filled paper tray. Once you can confirm that the printer is clear of any jams, try running a page through individually in the tray, removing the other pages in the tray. If this goes through without any problems, try keeping a small stack of paper out of the machine and only filling the tray partway.

Check also that the paper you are using adheres to manufacturer recommendations. Some heavier weights of paper aren’t as easily manipulated by your printer to run through the machine, and thus can get stuck. This is especially true when printing on a material such as card stock. Some paper as well is only designed for use in ink jet or laser printers, and will cause problems for a different type of printer.

Most printer manuals, and even some printer displays, have directions for removing paper jams when they occur. This will typically consist of opening certain trays or doors on the machine to access particular sections on the inside of your printer where paper can commonly become stuck. You should also check for cracked or glazed rollers, which can consistently create paper jams. Broken teeth on gears can also cause paper jams which can be usually be tracked down by checking where the paper stopped in the printer.

After clearing the jam, run a single page through the machine to ensure that the path is clear, and that there isn’t something wrong which is causing a recurrent jam. If pages are getting stuck in your printer over and over again, consult your user manual, or have it inspected by a technician.

If you are unsure if your printheads need cleaning, the easiest way to be sure is to run a job through your printer. If the print is missing lines or dots in your text or graphics, your printheads need to be cleaned. Be aware however that the cleaning process will use ink, so you should only run the cleaning process when absolutely necessary. On most HP printers, the cleaning process will take approximately three to three and a half minutes.

In HP printers, the cleaning process is either initiated through the control panel of your printer. Refer to your owner’s manual or to the manufacturer’s information on how to initiate the cleaning process through your printer’s control panel. The cleaning process consists of multiple levels. When cleaning printheads, you should first initiate a level one cleaning, and then test your print again. If there is still an issue, proceed to a level two cleaning. Repeat this process again, and if necessary perform a level three cleaning.

Alternatively, printheads can be manually cleaned. First, open the top cover of your machine, and be sure that the printer is on. Wait a few seconds, and then unplug the machine without powering it off. This prevents the printer from shutting down, which would move the print carriage out of your reach. Then, lift the printhead latch and printhead handle, and pull the printhead out of the slot. Carefully clean each printhead with a dry, soft, lint-free cloth, making sure you only wipe the contact pads. Be careful not to touch the nozzles as these are very delicate and you can cause severe damage to them. Once printheads are clean, plug the printer back in and turn it on. Reinsert the printheads and re-latch them into your machine. Then, close you cover and the printer will finish the rest.

Afterward, use a can of compressed air to clean away and dry the components. This will prevent and solve most simple paper jams that occur while loading paper. If the loading problem persists after cleaning, pull out the paper tray and examine it for obstructions or wrinkled paper. If no obstructions can be found, print a test page and watch for the printer’s “task” window on your desktop. It should display an error code that can be found in the user’s manual and will tell you what might be the problem. Then take a look at the paper rollers closest to the tray; pay attention to any abnormalities on the roller mechanism. You may need to use a flash light to get the best look.

Over time and with heavy use the rollers can become damaged and may need to be replaced which can be done by virtually any professional printer repair shop or store. If, after all of this a “paper won’t feed” or “load paper” message is present in your display screen examine the printer settings to determine if “manual feed” has been selected. If it has, the printer is probably looking for paper in a different tray; reset this to auto feed or auto detect on the printer and perform the print again. If none of these fix the problem then the probable cause is a bad paper out sensor and will need to be taken to a repair professional.

Spread old newspapers or some rags over a table or counter to prevent a lot of clean up. Gently and slowly rotate the toner cartridge above the rags and look for loose toner falling. It will move similar to light snow falling. It may be tempting to use tape to cover the leak, resist this at all costs. If the leak is miniature use a small bit of clear or black nail polish. It will act like an epoxy resin but is light weight and thin when it dries. Should the hole be a bit large use a small short screw and then glaze it with the nail polish.

If the leak cannot be found using the fore mentioned method a seal leak is probably the culprit. A larger leak, such as one located in the seal of the cartridge itself, will need to be replaced. It is much more difficult to find the leak in the seal than a hole in the plastic casing. The seal is under pressure in the laser printer and when removed the leak may not present itself as the seal is at its fullest shape outside of the unit. The only choice left is to replace the cartridge entirely.

This occasionally does not happen and the user will receive a low toner message when the cartridge is full. Some printer and toner manufacturers have chip “resetters” to return the chip to its original state. They operate by lining up the metal leads on the toner cartridge to leads on the resetter; the resetter runs a diagnostic and resets the internal chip. A user could just ignore the toner level indicator, but when the toner is low, the user will be unaware and runs the risk of no toner at an inopportune moment or worse the printer will not print.

Toner chips are also used by OEM manufacturers to ensure the use of their products in their printers. OEM parts and internal components will recognize the third party chip as an empty toner cartridge making it difficult to use lower priced toner cartridges. The third party manufacturers have developed a set of instructions to override this feature; however, it should be noted that not all third party vendors have these instructions, nor do all toner chips accept the override making it difficult to use less expensive toner cartridges.