Help with vertical scratch/white line on photo prints?

max6166

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My Canon ip4500 recently developed a problem. My prints have a very thin vertical white line/scratch/gap in them, always at the same location - about 1 1/4" from the left side.

The line occurs whether I print from the rear tray or front cartridge.

I think the line only occurs with photo paper. I did not see the line with regular paper.

Printer alignment with matte photo paper should a very faint hint of the line in only some of the patterns.

If I run glossy 4x6 paper through it without printing, a small indented line will appear on the paper surface in the exact same spot as the line would normally be.

I did the roller cleaning numerous times, and there is no sign of the indent waning or moving.

I ran all the maintenance functions numerous times, cleaned the printhead, and tried to clean the rollers as much as I could without disassembly.

I am pretty certain the warranty has expired.

My best guess is that something is scratching the paper at some point that is inaccessible from the outside.

Any advise, tricks, recommendations would be greatly appreciated.
 

mikling

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The mechanical roller is causing this. When the paper has ink on it, the paper is soft and will allow the roller to leave a track on it. It is most apparent on glossy paper. You could try a different brand of paper to see if your results vary.
 

max6166

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Thanks, mikling. Yes, it is much worse with glossy paper. I have tried 3 brands with no difference. It looks like a pin was scratched straight down the picture.

If I understand you correctly, something on the roller is scraping the ink off after it has been printed.

I can't find any likely culprits on the final roller that ejects the paper. There doesn't seem to be anything that visually lines up with the scratch line, including the rubber rollers.

I can see many little pins and metal wires behind the roller that press down from the top. I can't see any that line up exactly with the scratch, but it is very hard to see that area.

I have tried everything I can think of to clean/dislodge anything that might be caught around the roller, but am having no success. Compressed air, q-tips, running paper repeatedly through the rollers, etc.

I *think* I will need to disassemble the printer to see what is causing the problem. That doesn't look like it will be an easy task. :(

Before I go any further, I want to make absolutely sure that I am focusing on the right area. The scratch would be caused by something related to the final roller that ejects the paper, correct?

Incidentally, this is a brand new problem. The problem only started a couple of days ago, after about a year of occasional use.
 

max6166

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Fortunately, I was able to fix the problem and the long white scratch is no longer appearing on my photos.

It did require a fair bit of work though. I had to remove the case and disassemble everything until I could remove the wheel mechanism which lies opposite the front roller.

Above the roller is a long plastic piece containing a number of little wheels on springs. The paper is ejected from between the roller and these little wheels, which contact the upper printed side of the page.

One of the wheels was jammed and protruding out from the rest. Further investigation revealed a big wad of cat hair compacted behind the wheel. :)

That stuck wheel was simply scratching a big line through all my prints. I removed the cat hair and everything was back to normal.

Oddly enough, there really wasn't any cat hair anywhere else - just behind that one little wheel... ?

Ah well, just thought the info might be useful one day to someone else.
 

mikling

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Glad to see you solved your problem and that indeed it was related to the roller in some fashion. For myself the rollers on some of my prints leaves small tracks that one can see if one looks carefully. Most people don't see them but I do on glossy paper. It is undetectable on paper with texture.
 

max6166

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Yes, I started to notice all the other roller tracks on my glossy prints while troubleshooting this problem. Now I am always going to see them... :)

On the ip4500, the little wheel rollers that contact the ink side of the paper are actually sharp, thin metal discs - like mini-pizza cutters. I am sure there is a reason that design, but it virtually guarantees light scratches on glossy prints.
 

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