cleaning charge rollers, arc marks

[Guest]

When I clean charge rollers, mainly on the 35 45 series machine, im successful about half the time. the other half I seem to arc the drum. advice would be much appreciated as to possibly why!

[banginbishop]

What you using to clean them with?

I use 2 things:

solvent cleaner on a cloth or WD40 - mainly wd40 as its better.

I dont get problems like your getting but if i suspect a charge roller i just replace it because its bugs me having to strip out the drum every time it doesn't work and i get covered in crap.

[rthonpm]

Despite Ricoh's suggestions to the contrary I just use good old plain cold water in a sink and a good thorough drying before putting back in, especially on the ends.

[cobiray]

When I absolutely can't replace it, I use Windex or a multipurpose cleaner. What makes you say you are getting arcing? Error codes? PCQ? Damage to the drum?

[dacdd]

thanks for the respones,

Sometimes ill get an arc mark or two after cleaning the charge roller, you know the little diamond looking marks. I have tried several ways to cleaning them, and letting them dry for a long time. So i get pcq in the form in an arc or two on the drum. I am mainly talking about 35-45 B and W machines, as those are the main machines I service. I take them apart and clean everything every call because we all know how dirty they asre

[CSI]

We need the company WD40 add this information to its list of 2000 uses of WD40

http://www.wd40.com

http://www.wd40.com/files/pdf/wd-40_2042538679.pdf

http://www.wd40.fr

http://www.wd40.fr/media/images/WD40%20Liste%20des%202000%20utilisation.pdf

[dacdd]

so you guys basically spray wd40 on a rag then clean the charge just with that and it works good?

[E Winter]

I take the roller to the next bathroom and clean it with water + hand soap (for the case water alone doesn't the job).

Then I take care that it's 100% dry (and my hands, too) before reassembling - no issues at all.

Other machines gets a different treatment, like the charge roller in the MPC2500-4500 series - I swap them out and clean them with plastic cleaner because water + light soap are not aggresive enough to clean them properly.

[Shadow1]

I'll vouch for the soap and water routine on the 35 / 45 cpm machines - works great. I've had machines approaching 1M on the original charge roller (the rest of the machine is trashed)

Some of the color machines are impossible to clean with anything i've tried:
Soap & water, WD40, Glass cleaner, belt cleaner (smells like mineral spirits), Isopropanol, Trichlorethan, various platen cleaners, and rubber rejuvenators. Seems like if it's strong enough to clean the buildup on it it's also strong enough to eat the coating off of it. I've given up on these. Actually the only reason I clean the 35/45 B&W's is because I don't have one in my car... takes more precious time to clean it than to replace it.

[CSI]

I clean the rollers load with hot soapy water and a Scotch-Brite. Drying is done with a hot air blower to leave no fiber.

[Fearless V K]

This may sound a little off topic, but let me throw this out there...

I think what you are seeing may not be related to what you are cleaning the roller with.

I think what you are seeing is not the charge roller arcing to the drum, (it is in contact with the drum already, and would not arc to it unless it was not in contact with it.) but rather the charge roller contact terminals inside the drum unit not making good contact with the charge roller end block terminals, and arcing to it.

The terminals in the drum unit are the flimsy spring steel tabs that stick out and are supposed to contact the ends of the charge roller. These often get bent back and no longer make good contact.

I always give them a bend forward before I put everything back in place and check them for good contact afterward.

As for cleaning the roller... plain water, lint free cloth or rag.

[E Winter]

But isn't it a strange coincidence that most "after repair arc marks" obviously occure after cleaning charge rollers (instead of replacing). So my guess is that it may have something to do with moisture wich can decrease the contact resistance.

[CopyClick]

When I clean charge rollers, mainly on the 35 45 series machine, im successful about half the time. the other half I seem to arc the drum. advice would be much appreciated as to possibly why!

I use Windex, never had a problem. WD40? hmmmmm....

[Shadow1]

(it is in contact with the drum already, and would not arc to it unless it was not in contact with it.)

True it can't arc to the drum unless the Chg Roller gets bumped away somehow, but it can still arc through the OPC coating if the charge potential is too high.

Something I didn't think about before - when I see small chevron shaped marks on the drum of a recently PM'd machine it's usually from the cleaning blade binding (not that I never nicked a drum myself)

[SGT_Snacks-64]

I tend to use Soap and water, if that doesn't work Glass cleaner also does the job.... then again, I really try to avoid cleaning Charge rollers anyway.

Had a lot of Engineers cleaning the MPC 2500 - 4500 Charge rollers alot, and now they're failing left-right and center