Toner Refills

[neilslade]

Laser jet printers are THE option for much of your office work--

Lasers jets print black and white cocuments far faster and cheaper, at better quality, than any ink jet made. Of course, the downside is, color laser jets are absurdly expensive. So, their main function for most of us is volume text printing.

The only drawback is again- replacing toner cartridges, and just like ink jet carts, this is where all the manufacturers make their money. They give away printers at $100 each so that they can have you keep coming back for new cartridges that cost from $50 (for low volume) to $80 for high volume.

The BRAIN trick is to REFILL your own cartridges, and many companies sell toner refills.

If you look at every toner cartridge, you'll see a little plastic plug with a BIG WARNING STICKER that says "remove and you void warranty"

Okay, RIP OFF THIS STICKER and put it in the same place you put that tag on your mattress that says Federal Penalties For Removing This Tag.

Before refilling your toner cartridge, VACUUM OUT ALL THE OLD LEFTOVER TONER.

Are you suprised there is still a lot left in your laser cartridge even though the printer says "replace cartridge"??? Aren't these printer companies nice?

Anyway, shake out everything, then VACUUM out eveything you can. Old toner and new toner DO NOT MIX. The old toner in your cartridge has a static charge, and if you put new toner in the cartridge, everything will be contaminated, and your replaced toner will not work right.

It really shouldn't be necessary on the first refill to take apart your cartridge and completely overall and clean every part. However, on subsequent refills (I how many you can do depends on the individual printer) you may find that you will need to do this. LOOK ON THE WEB FOR INSTRUCTIONS ABOUT OVERHAUL OF YOUR PARTICULAR BRAND CARTRIDGE. It is common to "remanufacture" carts, and all this generally means is cleaning parts before putting in new toner.

If your cartridge has a DRUM, you will likely want to clean off the laser drum surface simply with a non-shreading cloth or kleenex dipped in a little rubbing alcohol or denatured alcohol (like the Brother or HP carts). You can rotate the drum with your finger on the GEAR- keep your fingers off the shiny roller part itself- a shiny green or blue roller in side the mechanism, and gently wipe off any loose toner particles or typically a line of toner.

Often when you see a repeating pattern, spot, or line on your prints- its just toner stuck to the drum. Get to the drum, wipe it off carefully, and you're back in business.
Don't scratch the drum- or you've ruined it, and drums are more money than toner by a long shot. You shouldn't need anything more powerful than alcohol- and solvents will likely ruin the drum.

After you've cleaned the drum, and vacuumed out old toner, then simply use a big funnel and put in the new toner.

For example, toner for my Brother Cartridge runs about $10. A new brother cartridge with the same volume of toner costs $70. You pick.

Replace inside the printer and go.

After much much printing, your printer is designed to tell you "REPLACE DRUM".

Bull.

Learn the reset code for your printer- its out there on the web. Clean the drum, and reset, and see if your printer doesn't continue to work flawlessly.

Have Printing Fun!

 

[marchgk]

I dont think that sucking out all the old toner with a household cleaner is a good idea. I have heard that the fine toner has been known to explode. I beleive a specialist vacuum should be used.

 

[Nifty]

marchgk I've heard the same thing.

I don't know if it is true, but even if it doesn't explode I'd be worried about minute toner particles in the air... unless you have one of those fancy super HEPA filters, but in that case why would you want to plug it up with toner?

I've been able to refill my toner cartridges a few times without having to empty the waste tank. The way I figure it is by the time the waste tank is full, the wipers, drum, etc. need to be replaced anyway.

 

[laserman]

My understanding is that toner is chemically inert and will not explode in the normal sense of the word.
However it is so fine that you should always take great care with it, wearing a mask (just a cheap one) is advisable and disposal should also be done with great care. By the way, most OEM drums will handle 1-2 refills (LJ4000 series will usually only handle the original fill !!!), cleaner blades and magnetic sleeves 3-5 refills and doctor blades (cleans the magnetic sleeve) many refills. Some cartridges however have a very limited waste capacity and need to be emptied, especially LJ4 which have a tendency to spill toner inside the printer anyway. Emptying most cartridges is not too hard, some are pigs without special tools or a bit of innovation. Keep light away from your drum (cover with a cloth) if you are working on the cartridge, light kills drums fairly quickly (think about how a laserprinter works).
Also....if you are going to clean the drum remember that it needs to be lubricated, professionals use a special dry powder lubricant but you may get away with using toner since this is the in-use lubricant, just a very fine smear on the drum is all that is needed. Failure to lubricate can cause the drum to bind and fail eventually.

 

[Nifty]

laserman, thanks for the info and welcome to the forums. I'm glad to see a little bit more info in the laser refill section. While inkjets are great for many purposes, they still have a hard time getting close to the price point of a nice laser printer for B/W documents. Refilling a cartridge just once make a big difference in price.

Thanks again!

 

[jesoonster]

After much much printing, your printer is designed to tell you "REPLACE DRUM".

Bullshit.


No shit???? you serious about this? Do you have some links and evidence to point out what you said was true???? Man if that is that's helluva good news!!!!

 

[ebiz96]

Hi Neil


Great post, very educating...


I am a inkjet refiller based in london uk, and would like to know if there are any training program for learning how to refill most common types of laser cartridges, or maybe just instructions detailed with refilling cartridge dismantled and fully refurbish, instead of creating a hole and pouring toner powder.


All help will appreciated.


Thanks

Ash

 

[d87cfv]

Ever thrown a handful of flour onto a fire to see what happens? Try it - big mushroom fireball!
Nearly everything in powder form is flammable, some toners are chemical based and some are basically powdered iron fillings - I have had reports of vacuums exploding if the bag bursts. We use special ones made by Black-Hole or smaller ones made by 3M. They have large expensive filters inside (about 20 each) once I dropped a bottle of toner and used the shop vacuum to clean up, it went strait through the paper bag/filter and through the motor and out the other side - I'm sure in greater concentrations than a small spill this could have been very dangerous!
The other thing with all the toner in the air is its not good for your lungs, prolonged exposure can cause emphysema. But a paper mask will be ok if your only filling on a small scale.

" you look at every toner cartridge, you'll see a little plastic plug " not so - Brother and Samsung are the main ones that have plugs, most of the main HP's are screwed together and need to be disassembled to fill. The other thing to bare in mind is that every HP for the last few years is now chipped, as are most new epson and dell/lexmarks. Samsung and QMS now have fuses that blow when empty which need replacing

At the end of the day you get what you pay for:
Samsung ML1610
Printer costs 69.00 (starter cart good for about 250 pages!)
Cartridge costs between 69-99 That gets you 2000 Pages
HP LJ4000 (old school I know)
Cartridge about 120 that gets you 10,000 pages

I get about 500+ pages out of my Bci3 Black and at about 10 for an OEM that's 40 for 2000 pages equiv of the Samsung - Laser isn't always king.

Back to re-man toners, Samsung are good re-fillers we usually get about 5 refills before we need to replace parts....Brother can have issues with static build up which is then transferred to the drum unit this then creates backgrounding (grey background across all the page) then you have to bin the lot the DR units for most brothers are well over 100 but then their carts are under 50 new so....


So yes, toner re-manning is viable, but its a pain in the arse you'll save 50% buying already re-manned ones my view would be to stick with that...For those of you who still want to re-man their lasers "Static Control" and Summit are two suppliers I would recommend for toner and parts. Most people who supply the kits will also supply the instructions for re-manning a cartridge - but google is the best source of info.

D

 

[ebiz96]

Hi d87cfv


Quick question..

Your quote:

So yes, toner re-manning is viable, but its a pain in the arse you'll save 50% buying already re-manned ones my view would be to stick with that...For those of you who still want to re-man their lasers "Static Control" and Summit are two suppliers I would recommend for toner and parts


Are "Static Control" and Summit' UK Based suppliers for toner & parts, can you please share there web address if there is one.


Would appreciate your feedback


Regards

Ash

 

[refiller]

Dear Ebiz 96,

visit www.tonermachine.com they sell vcd how to refill Q 2612 , samsung and more ..