Paper Jam & Cartridge Door Won't Open - HP Officejet Pro All-in-One

[MichaelPrais]

My HP Office Jet All-in-One printer announced that it has a Paper Jam. The cartoon on the monitor showed opening the paper feeder, the front, and the glass plate enclosure of the scanner. Like many other people, I could not open the the glass plate enclosure. The Paper Jam video and the Cartridge Replacement video show the user simply lifting the glass plate enclosure, but my enclosure seemed locked down at the left side near the power switch. Some people reported that their spouse or themselves at another time were able to immediately open the enclosure.

With a little inspiration from the videos and a little observation through the opening at the front of the printer, I could see 1) that there was top of a piece of paper sticking out of the visible rollers and 2) that the ink cartridges were at the left (under the power switch). The Paper Jam problem appears to be that the paper is in the cartridge path.

I tried to tear off as much paper as I could, but there must be some under the cartridges. I tried powering off the printer to release either the cartridge carriage or the paper rollers to no avail. So, I have to take my printer in to have a technician disassemble the printer to get to the Paper Jam.

[MichaelPrais · Accepted solution]

I called around to find someone to fix an HP inkjet, but found no one in the area willing to look at an inkjet: A service call is about half the cost of a new printer. So, I thought I would take it apart myself. If I can't fix it and put it back together, buy another. Well, most of the printer is assembled with snap parts--no screws.

Looking inside, I found a release for the cartridge carriage; so that wasn't holding the glass plate enclosure down. Looking for a release for the enclosure near the binding point, I closed the paper feeder to insert a little finger into a hole at the left of the glass plate enclosure. That released the glass plate enclosure so that I could lift it easily--as easily as in the videos. So it seems as though the release for the glass plate enclosure had come out of true.

Instead of opening the paper feeder first, open the glass plate enclosure first with the paper feeder in place on top of it.