Counter or workshop
The counter machine
In a shop or an agent's office the printer sits behind a counter, and the counter is where the customers are. A mechanic's job card, a rural supplier's account statement, a building supplier's delivery docket. The machine prints all day, and when it stops it stops in front of someone waiting.
The repair has to happen around the queue. We phone ahead to find the quiet part of the day, and we put tools down on the end of the counter, not across it. Most faults at a counter are feed rollers, a separation pad or a fuser that has started to smear. We carry those.
The workshop machine
A printer at the back of a workshop collects dust, grease mist and fine metal or timber particles. The fan clogs, the sensors fog and the rollers go smooth. It shows up as a dirty smudge on dockets, or a machine that complains about the paper when the paper is fine.
A clean and a roller change deal with most of it. Then the sensible bit: move the machine off the floor, up onto a shelf clear of the door, and keep the paper in a cupboard. That costs nothing and adds years.
Landsborough: the main street and the highway side
Landsborough is a railway town with a main street of shops and services, a museum, and a good number of trade and light industrial premises along Steve Irwin Way. Maleny Road leaves the town for the range, and a lot of business here is built on the people passing through to it.
Offices are small. A practice, an agent, a surveyor, a couple of builders. Most run one multifunction, usually Toshiba, Kyocera, Ricoh or Canon, and a desktop laser or two. They are kept long and looked after. When the faults come, they come from wear: drums, cleaning blades, rollers and fusers, all of which we carry the common parts for.
Plans and wide format
Builders, surveyors and designers in the area still print plans and drawings. A plotter has different faults from a desktop printer: a roll that feeds crooked, a print head that bands, a cutter that tears the edge of the sheet. Skew usually means the roll is loaded off the guide or a pinch roller is worn. Banding points to the head or to a clogged nozzle.
We service wide format machines on site and we do not treat them like a copier. Our plotter page goes into more detail if you want to compare symptoms before you ring.
Mooloolah Valley
The valley lies inland along the Mooloolah River, with farms, acreage, small producers and a village centre. Offices are in houses, sheds and converted garages. The machines are the sort that have never asked for much: a laser multifunction doing an invoice run and a few scans a day.
Storms are what usually cause trouble. A surge restarts the machine in the middle of a job, or the router loses its settings, and the printer vanishes from the network. We check the network side first, because it is half the faults we see in the valley.
Please give us the property name and the gate arrangements. If the access road has a low crossing, mention it.
Month end at a trade counter
A rural or building supplier has a clear rhythm. Daily dockets and invoices, then at month end a hundred statements in one go. A copier or laser that handles ten pages an hour on a Tuesday is stretched on the last day of the month, and the weak part shows: a fuser that cannot keep temperature, a pickup roller that skips, a drawer that overheats.
If the month end run is the heavy one in your business, tell us. We service a machine ahead of it, and we can say whether it will cope. We also tell you if the volume has grown beyond what the machine was bought for.
What rubs off, and why
Toner that smears under a thumb on the way out of the machine has not been bonded to the paper. The fuser is the part that does it, and it fails slowly. Dockets on thick or recycled stock make it worse, and so does a fuser that has done a few hundred thousand pages.
Before the fuser is blamed we look at the paper. Damp stock and unusual weights cause the same symptom, and a different ream sometimes cures it. If the paper is fine and the fuser is worn, we replace the unit and tell you what the old one looked like.
Brother, HP and the small trade office
The workhorses in the small offices here are Brother HL and MFC lasers and HP LaserJet Pro machines, and a good many have run past their fifth year. They are not designed for service parts on every unit, but the common faults, such as pickup roller, fuser and drum, are repairable on site where the machine is worth it.
A drum or fuser on a cheap desktop laser costs a good part of what the machine did. We say that on the phone, because there is no point repairing something that the next bad month will finish.
Palmview and the new estates
Palmview is growing fast with new housing, and that brings builders, landscapers, trades and the home offices that run them. Most of those offices are new, and so are their machines, often a laser multifunction bought with the business. New machines have their own early faults: a driver that has not been set up properly, a scan folder that was never shared, a network address that changes every time the router restarts.
We fix those in the first visit and write the settings down.
How a visit goes
- You phone with the make, the model and the symptom. We ask a handful of questions and agree the price.
- The technician arrives with the likely parts already on the van.
- The machine is repaired on site. We test with your own paper and a scan to email if you use one.
- You get a plain explanation of what was worn and what to watch for.
Technicians are trained, experienced and certified. 98% of repairs are finished on the first visit, and if the same fault returns we fix it again at no charge. Our work is warranted.
If the machine is tired
Some machines are worth another round of parts. Others are not. If you are leaning toward replacing one, we buy and sell commercial machines and can talk through size, volume and what it will cost to run. The machines we sell are warranted, and we collect the old one.
The second callout
The first repair is the cheap one
A builder in Kunda Park does not have a spare morning to stand next to a copier while the same job gets done twice. Neither does a school office in the last week of term. We try to find the cause on the first visit and say plainly if we cannot.
About 98% of our repairs are done on the first visit. When the odd one is not, the second visit costs you nothing.
- Find it once. The cause, not the nearest part.
- Say so honestly. If a visit does not finish the job, you hear it from us.
- Come back free. Same fault, no charge.
More for Sunshine Coast offices
Photocopier repairsCopiers fixed at your desk, one call, price agreed first.
Commercial printer repairsCommercial laser printers, label printers and fleets repaired on site.
Plotter serviceHP DesignJet, Canon imagePROGRAF and Epson SureColor plotters repaired on site.Maleny and the Blackall RangeMaleny, Montville, Mapleton and the hinterland towns.Kawana and BirtinyaMedical suites, Kawana Way offices, Birtinya and Bokarina.
Photocopier paper jamsWhy copiers jam, what you can do at the machine and when to ring.
Copier not printingJob sent, nothing comes out. Check these before you ring.
Photocopier salesHow a sale goes with us, from the first call to a working machine.Buy, sell and lease
Buy, sell and lease commercial copiers on the Sunshine Coast
We also sell new and second hand commercial copiers and buy used ones. Same team, same technicians.
Around the coast with the van
What people ask when they ring
Do you do printer service in Landsborough and Mooloolah Valley on the same day?
Same day service is available. Phone early with the make, the model and the symptom.
Why do my dockets come out smudged?
Dust on the rollers or fuser, or a worn fuser, is the usual cause. We clean the path and change the worn part.
Can you repair a plotter used for building plans?
Yes. We repair wide format machines, including skew, banding and cutter faults.
My printer drops off the network every time the router restarts.
The printer is probably set to receive a new address each time. We set a fixed one so it stops wandering.
Do you cover Palmview?
Yes, along with Landsborough, Mooloolah Valley and the country between them.
How do I tell if the fuser is the problem?
A copy that rubs off, wrinkles, or has a shiny band often points to the fuser. We check the paper path first and only go to the fuser if the evidence leads there.
Should I replace my old workshop printer?
If it needs several parts at once, probably. If it needs a roller and a clean, probably not. Phone and we give a straight opinion.
What do I do while I wait for the technician?
Switch the machine off, note any message on the panel, and keep paper wrapped. Do not force a jam out with tools.
Can you service a copier before month end statements?
Yes. Tell us the day it is heaviest and we plan the visit ahead of it.
Why does toner rub off my dockets?
It points to the fuser or to damp or heavy paper. We check the paper first, then the fuser.
