How I Beat the Credit Crunch with SaveMyPrinter.co.uk
In another edition of what appears to be a series of money saving tips from Badger Towers, I decided to give some love to SaveMyPrinter.co.uk for saving me money.
I have an HP Laserjet 1100 which sits on my desk doing very little to justify its existence, occasionally printing a boarding pass or a coupon because it can’t cope with a big job any more. I used to have an HP Laserjet 5L which did much the same thing. After about a year of service both of them started to sulk, picking up five sheets of paper at the same and jamming inside the works.
After months of wondering if I shouldn’t just chuck it and move on to another printer which inevitably starts to over-eat after a year, I found a kit on ebay for about £6 from a company called SaveMyPrinter.co.uk. It included a new Pickup Roller and corresponding rubbery bit for the back (Separation Pad). Couldn’t hurt to try this.
It had two basic parts. One was the Pickup Roller, the easiest part to replace on the whole printer, and the other was the Separation Pad and sub-assembly, about the hardest thing possible to get at.
SaveMyPrinter.co.uk sent a CD-ROM with the HP Service Manual in PDF. I thought this was going to be a waste of time, just a replacement for the original manual with troubleshooting tips like “Q: Nothing prints A: Ensure it’s plugged in”, but bugger me, it tells you how the whole thing was built and how all the subsystems work and which bits to replace, and photo guides on how to take it apart without breaking those plastic lugs off. Brilliant.
In about half an hour and 4 major pieces removed I had the top of the thing off and replaced the pad:
I thought it’d never work. It bloody did. So far it picks up the one piece of paper it ought to. And I didn’t manage to leave any bits out. OK, I know it took over an hour in the end, and time is money, and I could have bought a new one for under £100 and all that, but you can’t buy the smug feeling of having repaired something yourself and having that £80 to buy beer with.
Yeah, take that, consumer throwaway society. Credit crunch? Is that a type of cereal?
