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8400- text quality- need cleaning too often?

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nicksims

Technical User
Feb 13, 2005
212
US
I wonder if I need to go through the cleaning process too often. For example, today I ran through 500 double sided, letter size pages. Text weight. Side 1, plenty of black text. Side 2, plenty of black text and a 2x2 color graphic. About midway through, there was a single line of text that consistently had this slight blurring or extra pixels around the text. One particular text line only. I run the ink draining cleaning process and it is ok through the end of the project. I'll probably have to do this again within the next few hundred prints. Am I expecting too much? Is this normal to run the cleaning program so regularly? If so, I'll drop it. I just hoped I wouldn't have to stagger a print job into smaller printings so as not to waste paper (and time).

The problem exists regardless of paper weight or texture, software choice, font, size of page, color, quality setting (standard, enhanced, etc...)- just that when it happens, it happens within the same area of the job (at least I know where to look quickly while it prints!). From job to job, it does not necessarily happen in the same area.

This is really one of the few problems with this printer. It is generally a very good printer. So should I just let it go? Oh, I could not see this addressed on the Xerox site at all.

Any thoughts?
Thanks,
Nick
 
are you using xerox ink? it also could be paper dust getting on the printhead. Maybe try a better paper.
 
It is most definitely Xerox ink. I've been tempted to try the 3rd party ink for cost, but I've also read too much to dissuade me from experimenting.

We use so many different types of paper I can't quite nail which one is the culprit.

Thanks for the help.
Nick
 
It sounds like it might be your drum maint pivot plate and/or drum maint cam shaft. Xerox has a known issue on some of the earlier 8400 where this pivot plate will crack, and prevents the oil drum from making good contact with the drum. One way to check if you have the old pivot plate, is to remove the Oil Roller, and look inside the hole where the roller goes. Look to the front of the printer in this hole. The old style pivot plate is white. The new style is black. It's pretty easy to change out if it's just the pivot plate. Xerox advised me that the cam shaft is also prone to breaking due to the failure of the pivot plate.

Now for the good news. If you do have the old style Pivot Plate, Xerox will cover this repair under warranty, even if the printer is out of it's warranty period. You can take it to your Xerox Service Center and have them do the work.

367-0531-81 Kick Plate
401-1003-80 Cam Shaft

Timothy N. Couch
A1 Printech
Anchorage, AK
 
Thanks T.
I'll look into this and get back here. Always good to know about something before it becomes a serious problem.
Nick
 
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