HP Original Cartridges




Reliable Remanufactured Cartridges

One of the merits of the P4014 against a new printer is the low cost of good re-manufactured cartridges.


At the moment we don't sell in the US, but we hope to soon
64A cartridge in a new-style box

HP LaserJet P4014, P4015 and P4515 Cartridge CC364A and CC364X.

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The LaserJet P4014, P4015 and P4515 all use the same print engine and can take one of two print cartridges.

  • The P4015 and P4515 printers can take either the CC364A and CC364X cartridges.
  • The P4014 printer can only take the CC364A cartridge.

Basic cartridge information is:

  • The CC364A (64A) cartridge has a charge of about 470 grammes of toner (total weight 2.47 kg) and a life of 10,000 standard pages.
  • The CC364X (64X) cartridge cartridge takes just over a kilo of toner (total weight 3.33 kg) and has an expected life of 24,000 pages. The extra toner is held in a larger cartridge body and the waste in a longer "nose". Plastics in the P4014 don't accomodate it.
cartridge position sketchHP_CC364A print cartridge

The print cartridge is located in the front upper part of the printer under a cartridge door that lifts from the left. The cartridge slides in and out diagonally with a certain amount of clunking as the shutter moves and electrical connections make.

To remove a used cartridge open the cartridge door upwards and pull the black cartridge upwards and outwards by the hand grip on the top. Cartridges that are to be used in future should be covered as they potentially suffer light damage if they are out of the machine for more than a few minutes.   Ideally put them in the black bag they came in and in the box. As a temporary cover whilst you do things like inspecting the innards use a piece of paper over the laser slot.

An HP original new cartridge comes in a light-proof bag inside a cardboard box. An old cartridge might be put in the bag and the box for disposal (- they should be recycled.)

cartridge removal sketch

Historically, people often shook a cartridge a bit before using it. This was because toner tended to "cake" a bit over time. Modern toner formulations contain a little bit of amorphous silica to reduce caking.   HP recommend rocking rather than shaking the cartridge - probably because that too often leads to a mess. Merely rocking it a bit will help distribute the toner along the hopper and break up any tendency to caking.

The cartridge seals need to be removed. One blocks the laser access slot against light and dust. The sellotape-like strip at the side seals the toner hopper so that it doesn't leak in transit. Pull the ring pull firmly and keep going until the whole strip is free from the slot.

New cartridges slide into place with a bit of pressure but no great force. If there seems to be a problem make sure the lid is fully up, a lever at the right side disengages the cartridge drive shaft. Remember that CC364X cartridges aren't meant to fit the P4014.

Strange Economics

Back in the '90s manufacturer, distributor and dealer straight forwardly made money from sale of a printer. Much the same went for consumables like cartridges. Actually, at one time they made quite a lot of money but then Internet competition squeezed the dealer and distributor part.

There are about a dozen large manufacturers, headed by HP but with Canon, Epson, Brother, Konica-Minolta, Lexmark Oki, Ricoh, Samsung and Xerox jockeying for position. Each has strengths and maybe a lead in some segment. With a dozen players the market is competitive, hardly a cartel.

You join a cartel when you buy a printer.

The only source of "official" CC364A cartridges is HP, which is why something with complexity equalling a clockwork toy sells for £100 rather than the £10-20 or so the lump of plastic might seem to merit. (Other brands do the same thing).

Counterpoint to this has been a decline in the price of printers. At one time printer cost was in thousands (of dollars of pounds) but now it is a few hundreds.

Brands keep the price of printers down to ensure their products sell well. Cartridges sell in turn. Typically a user might use ten or twenty cartridges before they buy a new printer - and spend five or ten times as much as they did on the printer. Cartridge choice is limited as well - manufacturer originals or "remanufactures".

Counterfeits are another possibility.

Counterfeits are clone or refill cartridges sold as originals, Counterfeiting emerges wherever a brand charges a big premium over real manufacturing costs. Unfortunately in the print industry we seem stuck with low cost printers, high price cartridges so some counterfeiting is inevitable. The big distributors we deal with are unlikely to do that, but let us know if you have a problem.

cartridge from bag sketchcartridge from bag sketchremove seals sketch

Competition

HP had some competition from re-fillers within a year of introducing the P4014 series in 2008. That is in the nature of things, the machine builds on the LJ-4000 heritage Re-manufacture of these cartridges is now well established. Re-fillers can offer cartridges for under a third of the HP price. Because the low capacity version of the cartridge uses the same OPC drum, doctor and scraper blade as the larger ones, a refill may well be possible without changing those components. Although there are kits for "home use" the P4014 series tend to be used in professional offices. If your office is interested in simple refills then speak to your local refill shop about it - the 64A series are fairly easy to handle but it is advisable to have a local shop doing the job. If there is an issue a local refiller can remedy it most easily, and without all the delays imposed by couriers.

To get full life out of high capacity cartridges a full refurbishing would be needed, not just a refill. Local shops can do this if they can source the right materials and that might imply buying through a franchise. Cartridge refill franchises provide technical support, parts supply and legal backing but they do charge more for parts and limit what the franchisee can do.

Another way to tackle the job is to rebuild cartridges in a factory. Most but not all are in Eastern Europe and China, not only to get low labour costs but China makes the majority of components and has the network of contacts. Factories can also afford laboratory technicians to reverse engineer products, analyse problems and research to help engage in the patent and copyright war. We recommend refilled and compatible products to users who have sufficient technical ability to distinguish problems with a cartridge from faults in the printer.

With a bit of knowledge and a toner-rated vacuum cleaner to deal with any problems, a mid-sized organisation can save a lot of money by running big printers like these using refilled and refurbished cartridges (and that is the heart of managed print contracts).


If you just want to buy a cartridge there is no need to read further. HP cartridges are highly reliable. The ProCopy alternative we sell have proved so as well. Returns of both are not unknown but rare. Problems come in flocks of course, (bad batches).

The remainder of this page has some hints on dealing with cartridge problems and some others that might get blamed on the cartridge.

What Cartridges Do

cartridge operation

Print cartridges deliver a controlled pattern of toner powder to the page being printed. Toner is made from microscopic particles of plastic with electrostatic properties. Laser printers work by attracting toner from developer to drum, then from drum to page using static electric charges. The laser-scanner controls where charges appear on the drum.

These HP print cartridges contain most of the main components of the print process: toner, developer, doctor blade, developer roller and waste scraper. This makes print problems easy to solve - if there is a problem with print quality change the cartridge.

These cartridges are quite expensive of course, so parting with a defective one is a bit of a strain. Sometimes an engineer call-out might cost a bit less but then the first answer might be to change the cartridge!   We look below at how you might rescue situations where the cartridge isn't to blame.

HP Say:

HP LaserJet CC364 Family Print Cartridges offer page after page of trouble-free, consistent printing. Office printing runs smoothly with Original HP cartridges and enhanced toner, so you have time for the bigger challenges.

As well as being fast these printers offer some of HP's lowest costs per page - the standard cartridge retails at fractionally over 1p per page and the CC364X two-pack offers about 0.7p per page.

These cartridges were introduced in 2008 alongside the printers. Construction is fairly conventional with a toner-hopper developer half and a drum half.   Its a conventional design that has been in use for a long time.

HP says these cartridges use Enhanced Low-Melt Toner Technology using 15% less energy. The toner formulation is based on polyester rather than the more common styrene acrylate plastic. The MSDS for the toner says:


cartridge sketch
Component/substanceCAS number% by weight
Iron Oxide1317-61-940-50
Polyester resinTrade Secret45-55
Amorphous Silica7631-86-91-2

recycling print quality

Print Quality Problems

A potential problem with these big cartridges is that people will be reluctant to write off a cartridge that develops a fault half way through its life.   These are relatively simple mono cartridges - so most problems will be fairly straightforward to sort out. The printer is quite sophisticated but its complexity is mostly behind the scenes and shouldn't get in the way of sorting out problems related to cartridges.

Some hints on what is wrong can be gained by looking at the vertical pitch of marks on the page. Marks recurring at regular intervals down the page can be used to identify the probable culprit - the distance between the marks being equivalent to the circumference of a specific roller within the printer.

Repetitive Defect Chart
AreaComponentCircumference
Tray 1Separation Roller79 mm
Tray 1Feed Roller79 mm
Tray 1Pickup roller63 mm
Tray 2Separation roller79 mm
Tray 2Pickup roller79 mm
Tray 2Feed Roller79 mm
CartridgePCR37.7 mm
CartridgeMagnetic Roller63 mm
CartridgeOPC Drum94 mm
Transfer Roller47 mm
FuserUpper fuser sleeve94 mm
FuserLower fuser pressure roller94 mm

Drum, fuser sleeve and pressure rollers regrettably all have the same diameter, so the only way to tell them apart is the kind of marks they tend to make. We can also look at the mechanisms that might actually make marks.

Looking into a P4014 cartridge

Outline Working

Understanding cartridge faults needs a bit of detail about what is in it. The diagram at the right is a simplified view of an HP/ Canon type cartridge. (Its a cut-down explanation as well).

The bulk of the cartridge is plastic box or hopper for toner. In this case the toner is roughly half made of polyester mixed with a magnetic iron oxide. There is less than 1% colourant and most black toners use carbon black. In this case it makes up a small part of the composition so HP don't have to state what it is. Colorants provide very solid cover in small quantities. There are also charge-agents to control how the polyester responds to static electricity. Polyester will generate and hold huge static charges, as you may have noticed from clothing.

Iron oxide is used to help the developer. Within the developer rotating magnets carry a continual deluge of toner under the doctor blade. The gap between blade an developer roller is narrow so that a thin even layer of toner escapes through it coating the developer drum.

The heart of the cartridge is the OPC drum. Organic PhotoConductor (OPC) is made from two very thin layers of plastic, coated on a metal cylinder. The top layer will take up and hold an electric charge. The layer underneath is non-coductive in the dark, but will conduct in light. When the OPC is hit by the laser electric charge drains into the metal backing of the drum.

Electric charge on the drum comes from the PreCharge Roller (PCR). The PCR is a conductive foam roller, counterpart to the transfer roller under the cartridge. It is supplied with a powerful electric charge by a high voltage section in the power supply circuit through a metal pad on the right side of the cartridge. The drum axle acts as the ground contact. The developer and wiper blade also carry charges.

In operation the drum rotates at a speed to match the paper. The drum takes up a charge from the PCR but carries it past a slot which the laser scans through. The laser scans back and forth as the drum rotates building up a latent image in static electric charge.

As the charge moves next to the developer you might expect that it would pull toner off the developer roller - and this is what often happens in copiers. In printers the charge repels the toner and it is areas discharged by the laser that actually take up an image. (So a white page could be no laser, or an inability to discharge the drum.)

As the drum get over the apper the charge on the transfer roller begins to dominate and it attracts the toner across onto the page. Rather faded pages could be a poor transfer roller - or a bad transfer voltage.

Examining the Drum

The drum is easy to see, with the cartridge out turn it over, push the shutter out of the way and have a look. Do not touch the drum (unnecessarily) as grease from hand contact will damage it. Avoid leaving the shutter open, or keeping the cartridge bottom-up in a lit place (too much light will damage it). There is the possibility that some toner will spill so be careful about where you examine a cartridge - especially if you already think it is defective.

Looking into a P4014 cartridge

The drum should be fairly clean, green and shiny except perhaps at the ends. Only about a quarter of the drum is visible at any moment, the drum stops turning in an arbitrary position. If there is a blemish patch it may be hidden. It is possible to turn the drum by finger pressure on the cogs at the side if you must- but not easy. There is a substantial resistance from the waste-scraper blade. make sure you turn it the right way - the drum surface moves towards the nose - it goes with the travel of the paper. If you push the drum round the wrong way there is a danger of the wiper blade flipping into the wrong position (it is usullay at something of an angle to the drum)

Continual thin marks vertically down pages tend to be scratches in the drum. This ccould be due to a foreign object like a staple , hair or iron filing getting into the printer. The magnet in the developer will pick up small stray things if you incautiously put the cartridge down on them. There is no cure for this kind of damage to the drum; where it is scratched it no longer repels toner, the mark will not go away.

Sometimes the drum has a raised line of black toner round it. This is likely to be damage to the wiper blade. Just sometimes, if you rub the band of congealed toner away with something like crumpled paper it might not recurr.

A common problem with recycled catridges is a damaged recovery blade. Its an inoffensive looking strip of transparent plastic an a typical problem is that one corner is buckled and dribbling toner into the printer. With the P4014 cartridge there seem to be fabric end-seals that may help avoid this.

The main purpose of examining a cartridge is usually to look at the contacts, both on it and the printer. If the contacts are dirty the voltages will be incorrect and the printer will do odd things. The contacts usually look like nothing - bits of tin and protruding bits of axle. Nevertheless these are what carry the PCR, developer and drum ground voltages into the cartridge and it will misbehave if they are dirty. Isopropyl alcohol on a cotton bud is the professional way to clean them (spit on a tissue works too).

recyclingLooking into a P4014 fuser

Fuser Faults

The fuser can only be examined by taking it out. This is easy, take the rear door off, press the fuser blue release tags, then pull the fuser towards you. You may need to wiggle the fuser a bit.

The sleeve is the brown film like material with a black stripe on one side, only a fraction of it can be seen through the paper entry.   However a good portion of it can be seen by lifting the paper exit rollers. Scarcely any of the pressure roller can be seen - however they can both be turned by hand using the fuser drive cog.


fuser-sketch

Irregular shaped blotches at intervals of 94mm down a page tend to be degeneration in the fuser sleeve. There is almost invariably visible damage on the fuser sleeve. Do not touch the sleeve with anything more aggressive than a cotton bud, they are easily damaged.


Cleaning Page

After a new cartridge is fitted its a good idea to run a cleaning cycle. Instructions are:

  1. Press MENU on the control panel.
  2. Press the down arrow until CONFIGURE DEVICE shows on the display.
  3. Press the down arrow until PRINT QUALITY shows on the display.
  4. Press the down arrow until CREATE CLEANING PAGE shows on the display.
  5. Press OK.
  6. Remove all the paper from tray 1.
  7. Remove the cleaning page from the output bin and load it face down in tray 1.
  8. Press the down arrow until PROCESS CLEANING PAGE appears on the display.
  9. Press OK.

Test Pages

  1. Press MENU on the control panel
  2. Press the down arrow until INFORMATION shows on the display
  3. Press the down arrow to get one of:
    • PRINT MENU MAP
    • PRINT CONFIGURATION
    • PRINT SUPPLIES STATUS PAGE
    • PRINT USAGE PAGE
    • PRINT PCL FONT LIST
    • PRINT PS FONT LIST
  4. Choose the page.

Supply Errors

These cartridges are "chipped" to record toner consumption and verify their authenticity.

Chips do also make it a bit more difficult to refill cartridges, however there are substitutes available.

Errors that can be given by a bad chip are:

  • 10.10.00Cartridge Memory Error: Bad chip
  • 10. XX.YY Cartridge Memory Error: An error has occurred in one or more of the printers supplies. (The other supply is staples on some models)
  • 10XX00 = Cartridge Memory is defective
  • 10XX01 = Cartridge Memory is missing
  • 10YY00 = Bad Cartridge
  • 10.94.YY = Remove the shipping lock(s) from the cartridge.

Unexpected cartridge memory errors might be cleared by cleaning the chip contacts. There can be expected errors; a simple cartridge refill will go on indicating toner low.

Refurbishers will replace the chip. However note that cartridge-chips cannot be bought from HP so any replacement will be reverse engineered to work with the printer. It is possible that an "upgrade" to printer firmware will reject a chip.

Other errors are

  • 13.X = Paper Feed Errors - rarely caused by a cartridge.
  • 41.X = Temporary Errors
  • 50.X = Fuser Error
  • 51.X = Laser-Scanner Error
  • 53.XY.ZZ = Print Memory Issue
  • 54.XX = Sensor Issues