HP LaserJet P3015 phantom paper jam?

[NathSte]

We have the same issue on a few p3015(n):

- Some are fresh out of the box, page count in the 100s

- The "phantom" paper jam, as often is the case, looks like the classic worn-out pickup roller scenario = the pickup assembly does its thing, yet the page is not pulled forward*

- After a couple of attempts (by the assembly) the printer gives up with the "Paper Jam" message, resolved by the cover open/close.

- The file type doesn't seem to have a real effect; most of what we print are PDFs - and I've seen this happen both with longer and shorter printing jobs (more often with longer, but that may be simple statistics)

- In all cases (printers with/out the issue) the paper is our standard printing "plain" "letter"

- Always feeding from a single Tray 2

- These printers have a couple of older and newer firmwares

- Changing the Pickup roller on an older machine to a fresh, original HP one DID NOT MAKE A DIFFERENCE.

*The relevant details come from opening the back cover and shining a light on the pickup process; no real difference in sound or assembly movement.

Short of sending the whole defective bunch back to HP - any new suggestions?

Thanks,

N.

[RKandVK]

I was waiting for a larger print job and had one about a week ago. The 3015 was giving me phantom paper jams every 20 pages or so. I am totally frustrated and will be asking them to take the device back. For a while it was working right after they had me do a hard reset and update the firmware, but I believe the observation by NatSte is the issue. The paper roller is somehow not lifting the sheets properly. Thank you for letting us know a new roller will not solve the problem.

[Miszon]

Hello everyone,

I got the same phantom paper jam issue with P3015n printer I bought about 6 months ago. I made some investigation of what happens during printing and here what I noticed:

The printer indeed has problem with paper intake and this is the direct cause of paper phantom jam. When it tries to take new sheet of paper I can hear *click* comming from the right bottom side of printer chassis. When there is a problem with taking paper I can hear *click* two or three times and if it fails after three attemtps the printer stops and shows paper jam.
My first thought was the pickup roller. It was covered with white dust so I cleaned it up with water and lint-free cloth. After that I must say it was much better - I got only 3 phantom jams in 200 page print job. Before cleaning those jams happened after 5 pages or so.
However, the more I printed, the more often jams happened back again. Next 200 page print job resulted in 7 phantom jams, so I considered clearing pickup roller is not an ultimate solution.
The interesting thing is what happens in tray 2 after a phantom jam occurs. Sometimes when I open it I can see that next-to-be-taken sheet of paper is raised and stuck in the paper intake hole. So it looks like the pickup roller did its job but there is a problem with delivering the paper to the next stage of printing which is probably the paper feeder roller. Or maybe the pickup roller was able to deliver it to some point but it was not enough to reach the paper feeder roller.

Anyway, to my opinion installing new firmware is not a solution as the problem looks like a hardware issue and the root cause lies somewhere is the paper pickup or feed.

[-JohnB-]

The product you have seems to be a commercial printer. For the best chance at finding a solution I would suggest posting in the forum for HP Business Support!

The Commercial Laserjet board can be found here.

Best of luck!

[JoeTing]

I had the same issue, the problem is the tray. I swapped the tray with another from a working printer and the problem followed the tray. I could not identify anything wrong with the tray. After messing with it for a while, it seemed to work again. If you have another working 3015n, try swapping trays around.

[pupajoN]

Im having this issue and have tried another print tray, cleaning inside and cannot find a single jam. Will a factory reset or cold reset possibly fix this issue?

[Miszon]

Hi there,

Just for the record, I've moved my question to this thread, as well as described the resolution, which in my case was replacing the pickup roller.

[DocuFlow]

Has anyone tried changing the toner cartridge?  I know it sounds weird but try using an HP OEM cartridge.

[RKandVK]

I think I figured it out after many print jobs. When the data from the computer comes down and the printer buffer is quite full, it prints perfectly. But when the buffer seems to empty and the printer then has to print at a slower speed waiting for data to come down you get a phantom paper jam. When I open the tray and then the cartridge door, if I do it fast not enough data will come down so it will jam quickly. But if I take my time or wait to close the cartridge door longer, it seems the buffer will fill more and the printer goes fast again and longer until it will jam again. Still a frustrating thing. I have the printer hooked on my home network over a Cisco Wireless G router with the printer and computer connected through ethernet. Maybe the network is not fast enough to push the data down to keep the buffer full. Or maybe the firmware only works to accept data in steps.

[DocuFlow]

Since yo can get your machine into the "Ready" state.  I would upgrade your firmware and see if that fixes the problem alltogether.  HP.COM has "Easy update" firmware for most machines now especially those on the network.  It's free too!