Bother Laser issue

[Don Moose]

Gentlemen -

I have a Brother HL-5040 monochrome laser printer that suddenly refuses to feed paper. I got it to print one page this evening, but that's out of a couple of hours of futzing with it.

The tray lifts the paper like it's supposed to.

Neither the main tray nor the bypass feeder will feed.

No evident paper jams.

Do I need to bust this puppy open and clean everything I can see?

Thanks!

[Steve A.]

Gentlemen -

I have a Brother HL-5040 monochrome laser printer that suddenly refuses to feed paper. I got it to print one page this evening, but that's out of a couple of hours of futzing with it.

The tray lifts the paper like it's supposed to.

Neither the main tray nor the bypass feeder will feed.

No evident paper jams.

Do I need to bust this puppy open and clean everything I can see?

Thanks!

I believe that was the model I had for a few years until it just stopped working. Perhaps it was a paper feed problem- I forget.

You might try taking out the toner cartridge and examining the entire paper path. I guess if it is not feeding paper then a laser cleaning sheet would not do a lot of good.

FWIW I got rid of the Brother and picked up one of those Samsung ML-1710's that was about $50. The ink was faint so I refilled the new cartridge with a toner refill- the prints look much better now. But I still miss my Brother...

Steve Ahola

[dwhutchens]

If you can pull the tray all the way out try cleaning the feed roller with some alcohol or some glass cleaner or 409 or such. The feed roller will be a rubber roller an inch or so wide in the center of the tray. If it feeds your good, if it feeds a few sheets and quits the roller probably needs replacing, if it don't feed at all you may have a broken plastic gear in there somewhere. You should be able to see the feed roller in the bypass while its in operation to see if its turning. You could put a pen mark on the feed roller for the tray and try the tray then open it up and see if the pen mark is in a new position, if the rollers arn't turning something is def broken.

David

[Don Moose]

Thanks, fellas.

I can get the roller to spin like the printer is trying to pick up, so a good cleaning it will be.