When my Lexmark X73 starts up the printer cartridges slam hard into the housing of the printer on the left side. It hits the housing of the printer so hard that it knocks the print cartridges out of their holders. This error then causes printer to stay offline and I can not use it for any of its functions. Could someone please let me know if they know how to fix this problem.
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by roy (10/2/02 11:18 AM) reply
I fixed mine. If it's the same prob. its easy to fix. take the side panel off, the one under the controls. under the printhead trak there is a black tray (BEWARE VERY DIRTY WITH INK/GREASE) If the printheads are all the way to the right thats where it is, move the printheads away to the left. it is held in place by two clips through the metal plate use long screwdriver to unclip and pull out the assemble. What is broken is the spring connecting the base to the swivel arm on the back side. replace the spring so the arm stays up,put the assembly back and the panel and your all set. Mine works fine now. Good Luck.
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by lin (11/10/02 10:33 AM) reply
dropped a small pin (sewing) into slot where printer holds paper. tried turning upside down and giggle out, seems to be stuck on right side. can't get out. don't know how to open anything up to retrieve pin......
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by lin (11/11/02 11:32 AM) reply
Don't take apart that printer if your not a cert. tech.. I just finished removing a model car tire from the inner paper feed section of where the rollers were.. not a fun printer to re-assemble. Probably best just to either shake out the pin or get a new printer. sorry..
-Justin 11/14/02
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by Tanisha (2/9/03 2:21 PM) reply
When I request my printer to print. It just begins, or so it sounds. It takes the paper maybe prints one line and then I hear this loud sound like the cartridge is jammed and stops at the right side of the printer. The status light continues to blink. I have never been able to scan or copy anything. I wrote lexmark, they said to do the self starter test. I did that and it printed the lines, iwithout jamming. But if I try to print anything else, it does the usual thing. It is starting to get very annoying.
Also what the heck is ACMonitor X73??? It keeps popping up on my screen when I try to shut my computer off. It says that it is not responding, do I want to wait or end task or cancel. I have to press end task, before I can even shut my computer off!!!
HELP!!!!!!
Re: Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by SARael0774 (1/7/06 3:27 PM) reply
Hey Roy - I know it's been a while since you're post, but I just found it; how do you take the control-side panel off to replace the spring? My cartridge carrier is doin' the DamnSlamThing so hard, it knocks the ColorCart hold-pins right off the carrier! Any help would be appreciated!! Thanks.
Re: Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by Anonymous (1/10/06 4:13 PM) reply
SARael0774, With the slamming nonsense on these, make sure it is not a simple case of the encoder strip not coming out of the sensor slot behind the print carriage. If it is the machine I am thinking of you can slot it back in after a few attempts without taking the machine apart. The encoder strip is a thin piece of plastic attached from one side of the printer to the other, running behind the cartridge holder. Check this & let us know? Dazz UK
I have a lexmark x73.. 3 in one Printer.The printer cartridge also slams to the left,and power and status buttons are both blinking.I've unpluggeg it many times...cleaned inside with alcohol and am at my wits end.If I had of read all the stuff people are saying about lexmark...it would have been the last name i would have bought.Its been trouble from the start.There isn't a side panel to take off!The encoder strip seems fine...anything else you can suggest before I trash IT?
Re: Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by SARael0774 (4/1/06 10:28 AM) reply
hpwizard -- Dude! Wow - what a diff!! (Sorry 'bout the late reply -- feels like I've been unconscious the last month (or 2 or 3!!)) At any rate - Using a dental mirror to check behind the cart carrier (both sides), I was able to see EXACTLY where the sensor strip fit. Was a little anxious 'bout breaking the strip (from reading other posts), but - hey!! - no problem!!! There is sufficient play in the strip to fit back into the carrier strip-channel EASY!! My lady's back up 'n runnin'. MUCHO THANKS!!!
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by dracer398 (5/3/06 6:51 PM) reply
I wrote Lexmark support about this problem. I had the problem too...
Thank you for providing us the opportunity to assist you through our e-mail support service. We appreciate your business, and look forward to providing you with a prompt and successful solution.
The encoder strip is most likely the problem. Unplug the power from the printer. Open the front cover and move the cartridge carrier to the center. You should see a white ribbon cable, a thin plastic strip and a black belt with teeth.
The thin plastic strip is the encoder strip. It rides in a sensor on the back of the cartridge carrier that you will not be able to see. Reach in with the first finger of either hand and carefully strum the strip as if playing a guitar.
The strip will need to be lowered slightly and brought towards you slightly. Please be careful not to break the strip or your printer will not function. Once you believe the strip is set correctly, plug the power back and try printing the self test.
To self-test the printer, please follow the steps given below:
1. Power the printer off. 2. Press and hold the gray "Paper Feed" button on the right. 3. While still holding the "Paper Feed" button, press and release the green "Power" switch, but continue holding the "Paper Feed" button. 4. When the printer starts pulling paper, release the gray button. 5. This test is continuous, so when the first page feeds through, please turn the printer off.
The self-test should at least print out a set of either black or color bars, if not both (if you have a printer with both color and black installed simultaneously). Should this test fail, try it again without cartridges installed.
If it slams to the left again, the strip is not yet set correctly.
If you cannot repair the strip, please let us know so that we can assist you further.
Please Note: Fixing the encoder strip is a delicate procedure. During the troubleshooting, if the strip breaks, you will not be able to use the printer. We will replace the printer, only if it is under warranty.
If you have any more questions or concerns, please contact me at your convenience and I will be happy to assist you. (If I am not available, another representative will reply to you as soon as possible.) To respond, please select "Reply" in your e-mail software, and be sure that the past e-mail is included in this reply.
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If you need to reply, please be sure to include in your message all information from prior e-mail messages & replies. If your e-mail client automatically deletes prior e-mail thread information, it will cause a delay while we look up your support history. If this is the case you may want to save the old e-mails as attachments and attach them to the current e-mail.
I got this problem with the cartridges slamming to the left and being knocked out of their holders. I notcied there was something rattling about in the printer, and with a fair bit of shaking and tipping I recovered a small yellow plastic bracket about 3cm long. I identified it as the yellow strip that sits in the colour cartridge holder - you can see it if you take the colour cartridge out, the black cartridge has a maroon one in the equivalent place. The printer worked fine when I put this little bit of plastic back in place. Hope this helps!
PS - I'd remove the power cable from the back of the printer before reaching in there, those cartridges really do slam across very fast!
Pete
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by Helpx73 (9/7/06 12:40 PM) reply
Has anyone had any issues with the colour not printing. I have changed the cartiges with new ones and it just wont print colour no matter what itry, test page, allignment, scanning. Anyone got any suggestions before i bin it?
Cheers in advance,
p1pster
Re: Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by Anonymous (2/21/07 10:51 AM) reply
Love this site. Thank you for the message boards and the advice from Lexmark. I must have bumped the strip behind the cartridge carrier when changing cartridges. Have reset it a works beautiful so far. Thanks again you saved me $$ in replacement!
Lexmark X73 Ink Cartridges by Anonymous (6/19/07 10:59 AM) reply
I just picked up a used X73 from someone on craigslist. He and I talked and all seemed worth the $60 I paid for it, which included 3 color cartridges and a black ink cartridge. (He bought a laser printer and wanted to part with this one.
I just changed the black cartridge and printed 1 page of a word document. It printed the top half great (minus the colors I put on there to test out the color cartridge), but the second half of the page was blank. Now it acts as though it's printing alignment pages, test pages, etc., but nothing appears on the paper when it comes out.
Any thoughts on what I can do to get this thing working? Thanks so much!
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by rh (6/30/07 9:46 AM) reply
I'm getting a message "Scanner couldn't be enabled" when I try to scan, and then "Scanning terminated abnormally". I can print just fine, but not scan. This just started happening. I've turned everything off and restarted, but still have same problem. Any suggestions please?
Paper keeps jamming by Anonymous (7/9/07 5:48 PM) reply
i was recently givin a lexmark x73, and the paper keeps jamming, seems to be only feeding from the right side...i dont know how to take it apart...seems pretty intracate...any suggestions?
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by Mini75 (8/2/07 3:20 PM) reply
I have a brand new lexmark printer out of the box, I got it for free for buying my laptop. It is almost a year since I din't open it. Yesterday I opened it, I followed all the procedure mentioned in the mannual. My problem is when I try to print a page, it makes sound as though it is printing the page, but the page is empty. I tried printing in color and B&W. I have XP , Lexmark X73. I double checked the printer cartridge, to see if it still has the selow tape on.
My printer initially takes in the paper, but when it gets to the front, it will not advance any further and keeps making a clicking noise, over and over, until I reset printer. Anybody know what the problem is? I already turned over the printer and shook it to see if anything was trapped, and nothing fell out.
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by arbiter58 (1/9/08 3:18 PM) reply
My Stupid Printer Keeps Slamming To the Left Printer wall knocking out the cartridges And the power light keeps blinking and wont shut off if you press the button, and it says when i try to install it says it cant communicate with printer.
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by glasman (3/31/08 11:55 AM) reply
Ok so it's March now. Hopefully you got this fixed. But in case not, here's what I did when it happened to me: Model: Lexmark X73
Symptoms: The carriage carrier slams all the way over to the right when I power on. The greenpower light flashes continuously. "Problem communicating with the printer" is all I get from the Print Control program.
Fix: Re-postion the transparent plastic encoder strip as described in this forum.
i.e. "The strip will need to be lowered slightly and brought towards you slightly. Please be careful not to break the strip or your printer will not function. "
I tried many times to do this but it made no difference so here is what I did:
Brought the printer to a good source of light (window) and on a table where I could work on it safely.
Then I prised off the right front side-panel. It is just to the right of where the paper comes out of the printer when it is printing. I prised it from the front first, with my hands only; no tools. It is held with 'click' type pressure clips. Then I popped out the rear part, again held with 'click' pressure clips. The rear part made a loud crack when I removed it. I thought I had broken some part of the plastic but on inspection, it all looked intact.
Now I could turn the printer around and look in through the side and I could see clearly behind the cartridge carrier.
Here is a crude attempt to depict it pictorially. This is looking in through the gap in the right side of the printer. The X's represent the cartridge carrier. The dot's represent the tranparent plastic encoder strip.
To get to the 'AFTER' situation, carefully lower the tranparent plastic encoder strip and bring it towards the front of the printer. Then let it slide up in to the gap. Now it is in the correct position. Lexmark stress not to break it or the printer won't work. I had no difficulty getting it into position. Then I turned on the printer and instead of a high velocity slam to the right, the cartridge carrier gently wiggled a bit and settled down quietly in the centre (I had the centre hatch open). The final step was to replace the side panel. This was much easier than removing it. It clicked loudly back into place.
Hope it helps.
Ed.
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by glasman (3/31/08 12:03 PM) reply
A quick correction to the previous post. For symptoms, I should have said:
"The carriage carrier slams all the way over to the LEFT " and NOT to the right.
Also after I applied the fix, I should have said: "Then I turned on the printer and instead of a high velocity slam to the LEFT, " and NOT to the right.
Also the diagram got messed up a little after I submitted the post. But it is basically correct.
Re: Paper won't advance through by Anonymous (11/6/09 11:39 PM) reply
I just came across the forum and read your post. I had the exact same problem. There is some good news and some bad news. After taking it apart, and trying to figure out the problem, here's what I found. 1. There is a small gear that is on the (what I call) "paper advance roller" which has 4 rubber rollers. Facing the machine from the front, the gear is on the left hand side. The gear that is on this roller is cracked. I tried getting a gear off of another printer that I had laying around, and found it has the exact same problem. 2. However, (good news) I am going to try to put a small "lock-type washer" on this which I believe will work. I will let you know, if it does!
Good luck on yours, if you haven't gotten rid of it already, as I really like mine!
Re: Re: Paper won't advance through by Anonymous (11/7/09 2:12 PM) reply
Great News! Here's the deal! I got my Lexmark X73 fixed! Now, it is going to take some patience on your part and then a small part and tool you can find at your local Hardware store, i.e. Menards, Hardware Hank, etc.
The part is a 3/8 inch external retaining ring. You will need 2 of them; one for either side of the gear. My gear was cracked entirely into 2 pieces and I was able to put these rings on and it now acts like a brand new printer.
The tool is a snap ring pliers for external rings. I did this to both of my printers and THEY BOTH WORK! You are welcome to email me to find out how to get your printer apart and back together. This will take some time and a lot of patience! There is enough room on the gear for these retaining rings to fit and it will be a nice snug fit on the end of the roller!
Happy Fixing and I wish the best to all of you working on your Lexmark X73!
Tim
Re: Re: Re: Paper won't advance through by Anonymous (11/8/09 2:56 PM) reply
I disassembled an X73 today and voila a cracked drive gear. It's cracked all the way through in once place and has two smaller cracks working their way outward. So glad to find this thread. I'm going to try the retaining rings and will let you know how it goes.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Paper won't advance through by Anonymous (11/14/09 5:42 PM) reply
Sure enough the external snap rings worked and we can print again. As for the cost ... $0.68 in parts. Plus you need the snap ring pliers which can be had through begging, borrowing, or going to the Sears tool department.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Paper won't advance through by Anonymous (11/18/09 3:36 PM) reply
so.....I'm assuming if I opened the left side panel and half of a white plastic cog/wheel fell out, I should consider the printer a total loss? (can't find the other half or where it even was!)
Re: Lexmark X73 Start Up by Anonymous (12/13/09 8:27 PM) reply
just got through cleaning my x-73 and low and behold---i found an extra part. It is a yellow tinted cleatr piece of plastic about one inch long and 1/2 inch high with a tab on one edge. Anyone have any idea where it goes? Thank you
Re: Re: Re: Paper won't advance through by Anonymous (12/17/09 7:01 PM) reply
I used the 3/8" snap ring fix on my X73 and it worked! The printer disassembly/reassembly is quite complicated and requires lots of patience. Also most useful is the Lexmark X73 service manual 4402-001 which you can download for free (do a search). The manual will show you how to get to the print engine assembly. From there you can figure out how to remove the roller shaft to repair the cracked gear. This is a very creative solution and now I will be able to use all my spare ink cartridges, as the new printers don't use #20 and #70.
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