HP LaserJet 2100TN: What is a fuser and would it be possible tofix?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Misha
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Misha

My friend is willing to give me his B&W laser printer:
HP LaserJet 2100TN

It still works but he says it does not print as dark as it used to.
Here is what he says.

Do you think, based on this, that the fuser is bad?

Here is what my friend wrote me just now:


Hi Misha,
Do you want my HP LaserJet 2100TN? It works ok but prints light.

I’m guessing the fuser would need to be replaced if you want it to print
dark although a new toner cartridge might also work. The printer says it
has printed 37k pages and the fuser has a life expectancy of 150k pages
so there is definitely life left in it. I was considering replacing the
fuser myself – you can buy fusers for about $30 and they are very easy to
replace on this model. But it just doesn’t make sense for me to invest
in this printer any longer

It has had the occasional paper jam but otherwise it has been great. It
has two trays that hold about 500 pages each, 24MB of memory, and a
Ethernet port. I still have some toner cartridges left but I don’t know
how much toner is in them.
 
Misha said:
My friend is willing to give me his B&W laser printer:
HP LaserJet 2100TN

It still works but he says it does not print as dark as it used to.
Here is what he says.

Do you think, based on this, that the fuser is bad?

Here is what my friend wrote me just now:


Hi Misha,
Do you want my HP LaserJet 2100TN? It works ok but prints light.

I’m guessing the fuser would need to be replaced if you want it to print
dark although a new toner cartridge might also work. The printer says it
has printed 37k pages and the fuser has a life expectancy of 150k pages
so there is definitely life left in it. I was considering replacing the
fuser myself – you can buy fusers for about $30 and they are very easy to
replace on this model. But it just doesn’t make sense for me to invest
in this printer any longer

It has had the occasional paper jam but otherwise it has been great. It
has two trays that hold about 500 pages each, 24MB of memory, and a
Ethernet port. I still have some toner cartridges left but I don’t know
how much toner is in them.
Click to expand...

Misha-

I think you can probably get the printer to work, and it should be a
workhorse.

It is my understanding that the fuser heats the printed page as it
passes through the printer, melting the toner into the surface of the
paper. If the ink does not rub off after it leaves the printer, the
fuser may be working correctly.

If printout is light, it could be caused by lack of toner, or the
photosensitive "drum" could be worn out. Some laser printers have the
drum in the cartridge, so a new cartridge would have a new drum. I do
not know about that model, but it would only cost you the price of a new
HP cartridge to find out.

I found a service manual at
<http://www.lbrty.com/tech/Manuals_HP/2100sm.pdf>. Its troubleshooting
section may be helpful.

Fred
 
My friend is willing to give me his B&W laser printer:
HP LaserJet 2100TN

It still works but he says it does not print as dark as it used to.
Here is what he says.

Do you think, based on this, that the fuser is bad?

Here is what my friend wrote me just now:


Hi Misha,
Do you want my HP LaserJet 2100TN? It works ok but prints light.

I’m guessing the fuser would need to be replaced if you want it to print
dark although a new toner cartridge might also work. The printer says it
has printed 37k pages and the fuser has a life expectancy of 150k pages
so there is definitely life left in it. I was considering replacing the
fuser myself – you can buy fusers for about $30 and they are very easy to
replace on this model. But it just doesn’t make sense for me to invest
in this printer any longer

It has had the occasional paper jam but otherwise it has been great. It
has two trays that hold about 500 pages each, 24MB of memory, and a
Ethernet port. I still have some toner cartridges left but I don’t know
how much toner is in them.
Click to expand...

It's not the fuser. The fuser is a quartz tube "lamp" that heats the
fusing roller - which melts the electrostatically deposited
polymer/carbon toner into the paper. Either it works or it doesn't -
(or just doesn't get hot enough) the toner smudges off the paper. If
it fails totally the printer shuts down and gives an error code.
 
Is that comment a clue for you?
Click to expand...
I've replaced fuses on printers a lot older than that because it made
good economic sense - but this was on heavy duty printers like Series
2 and LJ4000 printers.
 
Is that comment a clue for you?
Click to expand...
A 2100tn would be worth rebuilding the fuser on IF the fuser was the
problem and you are handy enough to do the labour. The tube itself is
cheap. A rebuilt fuser is only about $55 - $85.

I've bought the bare tubes for $30
 
Oren said:
Is that comment a clue for you?
Click to expand...
Hi,
Fuser is a heater which put the ink particles bond to paper for good.
I think the printer drum(where image is formed) is going.(usually a part
of toner cartridge) when image comes out light.
 
My friend is willing to give me his B&W laser printer:
HP LaserJet 2100TN

It still works but he says it does not print as dark as it used to.
Here is what he says.

Do you think, based on this, that the fuser is bad?
Click to expand...

I thought the fuser was the heater that melted the ink particles so
they became liquid ink and stuck to the page. Tony seems to say the
same thing.

When the fuser isn't working the ink comes out llike dust on the paper
and you can shake it off or blow it off. When the fuser isn't
working at all what you get looks like a blank sheet of paper. I
sort of think it's not possible for the fuser to be working but not
well so that it gives a light image.

When I had a laser photocopier, made around 1978, the thermostat on
the fuser was broken, and like I said, it looked like the page had
printed, but all the ink fell off when I took the paper out of the
tray, or blew off when I blew on it.

I have a B&W laser printer and it's nice that there are no little
holes to clog or dry out. And that if I don't use it for weeks or
months, it's still the same.

Mine has two settings, light and regular. Maybe yours is set wrong.
Mine has gotten a little lighter lately, but I haven't investigated
it. After it wears out or when it needs more toner, I'll switch to my
dentist's printer. It was out in the hall waiting for the janitor to
throw it away when I came for an appointment a year or two ago. They
said it worked fine, but they were upgrading the computer etc.


There is a whole printer newsgroup that was good last time I had a
printer question. Oh, I see you included it, comp.periphs.printers .
 
(e-mail address removed) wrote in

It's not the fuser. The fuser is a quartz tube "lamp" that heats the
fusing roller - which melts the electrostatically deposited
polymer/carbon toner into the paper. Either it works or it doesn't -
(or just doesn't get hot enough) the toner smudges off the paper. If
it fails totally the printer shuts down and gives an error code.
Click to expand...


The old LJ II and III printers used to have problems with the density board
that led to light printing. Would the OP's machine have a density board?
 
The old LJ II and III printers used to have problems with the density
board that led to light printing. Would the OP's machine have a density
board?
Click to expand...

I have no idea *what* a density board is.
My friend had appletalk; is that the same thing?

Here is a picture of the HP LaserJet 2100TN hooked up at my house:
http://i42.tinypic.com/kxq9t.gif

I plugged it into the router by the ethernet cable, but, nothing
happened on the WinXP PC connected to the same router by ethernet
cable.

Probably I need drivers, but, when I went to the HP support page,
they had tons of drivers. But which one is the one needed to enable
the WinXP PC (and the other PCs connected wirelessly to the router)
to see the printer?
http://i42.tinypic.com/2ro52ty.gif

Which of these drivers will make the ethernet work?
1. hp LaserJet 2100 PCL 5e Printer Driver
2. hp LaserJet 2100 PCL 6 Printer Driver
3. hp LaserJet 2100 PCL 5e point and print bundles
4. hp LaserJet 2100 PCL 6 point and print bundles
5. 3 - HP Universal Print Driver for Windows PCL5
6. HP Printer Administrator Resource Kit

And, which of those makes the scanner part work?
 
I found a service manual at
<http://www.lbrty.com/tech/Manuals_HP/2100sm.pdf>.
Click to expand...

Nice find! Wow. Very gracious of you. I love it!
Thanks.

For starters, page 45 showed me how to print the test page
from the "Go" button, and, guess what?

The results sure look dark enough to me!
http://i40.tinypic.com/eb3mnq.gif

So, now all I need to do is figure out how to network it,
by reading chapter 3 "Networking", page 54. I'll open a
separate thread on networking, if I have problems, after
reading the document.
 
I assume there is a JetDirect card in the printer, if not you will need
to either add one or use a print server if you want to network the
printer over Ethernet.
Click to expand...

I had never heard of a "JetDirect", but, clearly the printer has
an ethernet port as shown in this picture below:
http://i43.tinypic.com/1oosug.gif

Also, the test pages that printed show under "General Information"
1. HP JETDIRECT = J3110A
2. PORT SELECT = 10BASET
3. I/O CARD = READY
4. SNMP SET CMTY NAME = NONE
5. TCP/IP STATUS = READY
 
Well done. I like your use of the above .jpgs.
Click to expand...

Thanks. It was a lot of work to make them, but, I figured if people
helped me, I should help them by giving the answer which I sought
and found, with their help.
 
I found a service manual at
<http://www.marketpoint.com/Service_Manuals/3200 AIO HP LJ% 20Servic
e%20Manual.pdf>.
Click to expand...

Kewl! Thanks. My 3200m has two problems that I need to fix.

One is that it grabs too many sheets of paper in the fax feeder, making
multi-page faxes or copying impossible without hand intervention.

The other is that it streaks the paper with toner (so something must
be dirty).

I'll check out the service manual to see if it handles those two problems.
 
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