Brother laser printer HL-1440, how to get rid of horizontal bands on print-out?

[GundamF91]

Just changed the toner cartridge on my Brother HL-1440 laser printer, it has separate toner and drum units, the toner is out but drum seems to work fine, but toward the end, it was also printing with vertical black streaks, so I figured the drum was dirty too.

While I replaced the toner unit, I cleaned up the roller area of drum to brush off the excess toner collected there. Now the printer with the new toner works great, also the vertical streaks are gone too. However, now I'm getting horizontal bands (like smudges not lines) on the print out, about 3 bands on a single page, each is a few inches apart (just imagine 3 hole punched paper, the bands more or less correspond to where the holes are). Any idea what's causing it? I wonder if I should take out the drum unit and clean it up.

 

[corkyg]

That could be coming from a dirty fuser roller. Sounds like the printer needs a goodf total servicing and cleaning.

 

[gsaldivar]

You may have contaminated the drum when you cleaned it. The drum is very sensitive to light as well as the oils on your skin and clothing. Depending on the printer, the streaks may disappear over time or not at all. In the future, be very cautious when cleaning the inside of a laser printer.

I definitely would not remove the drum for further cleaning, as that will probably damage it. If anything, a light brushing with a clean, dry, paper towel (that has not been touched with your hands!) is all that should be done. Any further cleaning should be done by a pro.

Good luck!

 

[pepperbegs]

Long shot but you may be losing the ground connection for the drum.

Is there a metal tab that touches the frame. Different designs do it differently. If so clean it and bend it so it makes a good connection.