Not what I planned to do tonight...

I managed to come home a little earlier than normal (oh for the day when I have my own toy car and can come home at a reasonable time!). I remembered that it’s Friday tomorrow, and I wanted to get some stuff ready to send off. Stuff to the DWP, stuff to the bank, a never-ending pile of paperwork. Then I remembered mom has a small NHS pension, so I phoned them, did the necessary, and they’ll be sending me paperwork too. Oh joy.

Because I’m paranoid used to beaurocratic incompetence, I make copies of everything. Every paper filled out, the envelopes, all of it.

I noticed that, as of late, scans have two streaks of faded. Not white, not missing pixels, just faded. So I got a microfibre cloth and opened the scanner cover of my HP3630 and…

…oh my God, all that crap is on the inside. Clearly the HP bod that assembled this printer washed his hands after using the toilet, right?

So. That’s it then. There is some sort of mouldy gunk inside the scanner assembly. Time, I guess to toss this printer and look for another one.

And… if you believed that last sentence, you don’t know me very well. :-)

There are four screws. Two at the front (hidden behind the ink cart flap) and two at the back (hidden under the paper flap). There are some clips too, but they’re so flimsy that just tugging the top assembly is enough for it to come away. But don’t tug too hard, there are ribbon cables from the buttons and the scanner.

You know, it was such a doddle to get this thing apart that I really don’t know why HP bothered with those odd little star-shaped screws. I mean, it must be a complete rank amateur that gets fazed by something that isn’t straight or philips. I have a kit with a ratchet driver (‘cos I’m just that lazy) and a number of different types of screw head. I’ve had kits like that since I was about eight and had the bright idea of taking the washing machine apart.

Four screws to take the top off, about twelve to get into the top. It’s supposed to be “mostly sealed” to stop dust and stuff getting inside. You should flip it and lift the scanner glass off. Do it the other way around, the scanner head will fall out, that’s not to be recommended.

Surgical spirit (ethanol, isopropyl, propan-2-ol, or whatever the hell it’s called now) was liberally applied and the glass scrubbed with the microfibre cloth.

A clean, dampened (in the alcohol) piece of the cloth was rubbed gently over the scanner element, and also the lamp element. In cheap scanners you have only one fixed sensor that sees “light”, and how it works is the lamp element pulses rapidly through red, green, and blue (or just green if mono scan). The scanner sensor will take a copy of what it can see with red light, again with green light, and finally once more with blue light. That will be merged to form a set of colour values representing every pixel on that row. The entire scanner head will step forwards, and the process will repeat. This sort of scanner is known as a CIS (contact image sensor) scanner, and it’s dirt cheap, extremely simple mechanically, and very low power. Perfect for an inexpensive printer/scanner combo.

With all the inner optics cleaned up, time to put the scanner assembly back together, then clean the outside of the glass (for good measure) and then reassemble the printer.

The alcohol evaporated in the time it took to put the printer back together, so I powered up and printed a copy of a random page from a magazine. Perfect.
Well, not perfect. The copy quality is actually a bit rubbish – there’s no way to specify the copy quality, it just does “normal”, and it always seems a little on the dark side. But “perfect” in the context of “it’s like it was when I first got it”.

Not what I intended on doing this evening, but I guess it needed done.

oh my God, all that crap is on the inside. Clearly the HP bod that assembled this printer washed his hands after using the toilet, right?

No. It’s just ink.

No. It’s just ink.

Bzzt! Try again! ☺

The ink is down below. Very messy and very obvious.

I’m talking about inside the “sealed” scanner unit.

Not what I intended on doing this evening, but I guess it needed done.

It’s like a classic example of the content of a conversation with Christine¹ earlier today in which I commented on the throw away get new attitude of most people today.
They are usually younger than us lot and don’t have the “make-do-and-mend” mentality we have but it isn’t really the money or scarcity from the era that phrase originates.
They don’t mend because they don’t have the first clue how. I started with a kitchen clock, when I was 6 or 7² and went from there. Dad reckoned fixing things was a skill you needed.

¹ My wife, who will be without my 24 hr presence again from Monday as she’s recovered quite well from the shoulder rebuild³ on the 11th, so far anyway – let’s see what the consultant and physio do on Wednesday and Thursday.

I’m talking about inside the “sealed” scanner unit.

Yes, and it’s ink…

With inkjet printers, the ink tend to evaporate while printing. Most if it goes on the internal face of the glass of the scanner, and also on ribbons (where it can cause shortcuts). This is why the scanner unit is most of the time sealed (but of course imperfectly). It’s a common issue with inkjet printers. The “my scan is grey” effect :)

a conversation with Christine

Considering where the thread started, I assumed

Yes, and it’s ink…

Sorry, I don’t buy that.
There’s no evidence of ink contamination on the little motherboard inside the main body of the printer, yet somehow ink managed to find its way into the middle (not the edges, the middle) of the dust-sealed scanner unit?
Naaah.

What’s more likely is that the person assembling the thing wasn’t wearing gloves (or had dirty gloves), a warm summer coupled with a damp old stone building… basically provided evidence in support of Charles Darwin.

basically provided evidence in support of Charles Darwin.

You were thinking of removing the assembly person from the gene pool? ;)

I’ve just acquired an HP printer/scanner (on freecycle) with a pretty messy inside of the scanner. I’m pretty sure the crap is actually silicone grease that’s supposed to be a very light smear of lubricant on the slide rods.

I’ve seen Epson scanners come straight from the factory with a nice liberal coating of dust on the underside of the scanner glass!
I should look to see what state my Epson GT-5000 parallel port scanner glass is in, I’ve only had it since about 1995!

Clive, I should probably email you, but that keyboard has not yet surfaced at Nemo Towers.

Erk. I have the post office receipt, and will chase. It was well packed, and with a return address on the label. Was supposed to arrive by Tuesday.

You have email, Nemo – Mystery solved, I hope the keyboard is recoverable from where it’s been delivered!