Maintenance kits are a vital part of keeping your equipment running in tip top condition. This article shows the reasons why you should install the maintenance kit when it is called for on a regular basis.
Many businesses purchase a maintenance kit and they don’t quite understand why they need one or what there purpose is. I will explain the purpose, definition and results of installing and not installing the maintenance kit at recommended intervals in laser printers and copier machines.
Definition
An assembly of Consumable parts and supplies that are replaced at regular intervals in many types of office equipment. Copier and Laser Printer are most likely to have a kit that needs to be replaced.
Common Replacement Items
•Fuser assembly- heat and pressure
•Feed and PU Rollers
•Transfer rollers
•Corona wires
•Cleaning felts
•Grids
•Filters
•Sep pads
Purpose
Maintenance kits keep your machine running at optimum performance. Toner yields decrease while a machine is not running at optimum. Your copy and print quality may be affected. Fuser wear will cause toner to not be fused as it passes through the fuser assembly. Double imaging and streaking is the print defect that is noticed. By replacing your maintenance kit when the perform maintenance light is on, it helps prevent or eliminate down time. Feed rollers wear out and cause mis-feeding and many other problems will be avoided.
Installation
Just replacing the items of a maintenance kit is not enough. You must first clean the machine inside and out. Vacuuming the paper dust and toner out of the inside of the machine is critical. These contaminates can find their way in to the photoconductor area and cause premature drum blade wear. This exhibits itself as streaking, double imaging and ghosting. Cleaning toner and paper dust in the paper path with a cloth will help make sure toner does not build up and create jamming. This is especially true on the fuser guide.
Cleaning mirrors, glass and slit glass
Dirty mirrors can cause back grounding. A dirty platen glass can have spots or smudges on it and a copier will copy this on to your pages. Keeping the slit glass clean can prevent lines on the copies. I have an entire article on this subject entitled, “Why are there Lines on my Copies and How to get rid of them."
Other items to clean
•Cleaning all rubber rollers that are not replaced with the maintenance kit.
•Clean all corona blocks and corona assemblies. By cleaning corona assemblies consistently you will keep them from arching.
Skipping the Installation interval
Some think they are saving money if they skip a Maintenance kit at recommended interval. You may get buy with it but you will sooner or later pay the price. Your machine will go down at the most inopportune time. The equipment will slowly deteriorate and will become less than what it should be. Think of it as a car. When things start going bad and you skip replacing them eventually it gets out of hand and it becomes junk. This is loss of your investment.
Where to get maintenance kits
Buy far the best place to purchase maintenance kits would be from your own service provider. My point is that you should have your machine cleaned at the time you replace the kit. My website provides maintenance kits also for the do it yourselfers out there.
Question
Can I install it myself? Yes, but you really should spend the time and give it a good cleaning. You could purchase a 3m vacuum. I advise never to blow your machine out with canned air, unless you strip off all of the covers and assemblies. The reason is that you never know what you are blowing on to a circuit board. By blowing it out the toner and dust will go into the bearings and gears and cause unnecessary wear and damage.
I recommend replacing maintenance kits at recommended intervals, but I also agree with others that the interval may be longer or shorter that the OEM recommends. If you follow this pattern of cleaning and installation I believe you will save money and down time, which of course the old saying is true, “Time is Money!"
Bill Tucker has been in the office equipment and supply industry for over 20 years and has several published industry related articles that help the end-user as well as the technician.
Disclaimer: All information on this site is provided for informational purposes only! By no means is any
information presented herein intended to substitute for the advice provided to you by any health care or other professional
or organization.
