Laser Printer leaving vertical streaks down sides of pages
I have an old Dell 1720 laser printer that is leaving a dark, blurry streak down the left side of the page.
I pulled the drum/toner out and found there is a matching streak of toner on the imaging drum so I removed the toner cartridge and gently cleaned all of the toner off of the imaging drum with a paper towel. This did not seem to make any difference, so I pulled the drum out and cleaned it off again.
This time, I re-installed the toner/drum unit, powered on the printer, and then pulled out the assembly again. Without even printing a page the streak had returned to the imaging drum. That makes me think it's an issue with the toner cartridge itself, but I don't have anything on hand and I'm hesitant to start throwing money at this old machine.
Does anyone have any thoughts on what the most likely cause would be?
13 Answers
This issue occurs due to faulty alignment of the drum inside your printer or in the worst situation the drum is damaged. You should refer to your manufacturer's website on how to safely clean and align the drum.
2My guess is that the fuser is the culprit in your problem. The fuser consists of 2 heated rollers, usually red/orange in colour. The paper passes between them and the heat melts the toner so it sticks onto the paper.
If I'm correct, you should see a damaged area at the side of one or both rollers. You should be able to get to the fuser from the back panel. In most printers, the fuser is easily removable. I have not been able to find a service manual for your printer, and the User Manual says to call a technician to replace it.
While the manufacturers don't tell you, the fuser is actually a consumable, albeit rated at tens or hundreds of thousands of pages.
While for your printer is quite old, its fuser is still available. Make sure you get the correct voltage rating (110 or 220V) for your area. You'll need to determine whether it's worth repairing, as modern mono lasers sell for less than the cost of your fuser.
If the printer has value (you think it has good useful life left), then you should engage a local printer repair person.
They can diagnose, suggest the best course of action, and make necessary repairs.
It is usually the drum causing the issue as noted in another post here. Another person has also suggested fuser. For this main reason, a local repair person is your best bet to keep costs low.
The repair person will know how to clean and align if that is practical to do.
This is how our very small business clients work.
