My HP Color Laserjet M452dw prints squiggly lines

[obei]

I just got this printer 2 days ago. I just not had to use it to print a report for my job and the lines are not printing straight. I tried looking for similar questions on google and I cannot find anything that has to do with this printer specifically.

Please help!

[Dovid]

Hi Obei,

Is it possible that you could upload an image of the squiggles?  please mark the top of the page before taking the picture or scan so we can know more about what this looks like.  Dovid.

[obei]

So, as you can see, the squiggles aren't like in your face, but with the kind of stuff we do, we send these pages to clients. We want to be confident that what we are sending looks good. I tried calibrating the printer, I tried the cleaning option. I'm just not sure how to go about fixing it. 

Thanks!

[Dovid]

Obei,

While it is hard to be certain, it looks to me as if there is an out of round rotation in the cartridge or the engine which is causing the periodic change in position of some component in the engine and therefore moves your image a slight amount each time it rotates.  I am sorry that I am going to ask a few more questions, and some may be in earlier notes.  The 452 DW is a color printer with 4 carts.  Are all 4 of your carts original HP?  Is the image that you sent actually a black only print?  If possible, please take a "good" scale (ruler) and measure the distance between any two of the squiggles down the side of the page.  For this engine, I expect your answer to be - from the list of - 22.6 mm, 23.6 mm, 29.6 mm, or 57 mm.  You might have to measure more than one and divide.  Find a zero squiggle and count down a few more, measure the total distance and divide by the number to get an exact spacing.  That will let us know what is out of round, as I suspect something is.

If you change the image to be all in "RED" lines instead of black just for one test, I expect the squiggles to disappear from the image?  You should just be able to print a page with red lines down the page near the edge and middle and see the bumps (or squiggles) in all the lines down the page at the same point in each line instead of the image you show.

Now for the solution.  How old is the cartridge?  The supplies status page will show us some of that information.  If it is original HP and still under warranty (has not reached Low status) the place where you purchased the cartridge or a big box that sells the cart should be able to replace it, once we verify from your answers above that the problem is in the cartridge. 

Hope all of this is understandable and do-able.  We can help you fix this and give your customers the kind of great image that represents your team and HP.  Thanks, Dovid 

[obei]

Good morning, Dovid.

When I measured the distance between the squiggles, (I measured the distance between 4 squiggles, which came to be 95mm), I divided it by 4 (the amount of squiggles I measured between) and came up with the number 23.75. I'm not sure if I did the math the right way. I'm assuming I followed your directions right. 

You were correct about it just being the black cartridge that is giving me these issues. I printed a page for each color with lines vertically down the sides and center, and just the black came up with the squiggles. The cartridge that is in there is the original one that was sent with the printer when we ordered it, so it is genuine HP. As for sending in for a replacement, the cartridge is "very low", so from what you're saying, I won't be able to get a replacement. My boss did order replacement cartridges for each color, so maybe once I replace it, it will be normal? So I guess what you're saying is that there isn't a problem with the printer itself, rather the cartridge? If so that would be great. I'm trying to empty out the cartridge that is currently in there so there is no waste, but if I still encounter issues after I replace it, which will not be long now, I will certainly check back. 

Thank you for all your help! :cathappy: