There’s snow and ice where I live, and I live in the south. South + snow + ice = everything shuts down. In the meantime, this was perfect for finally getting to scrapping my semi-old Dell printer, as I got a new one, that uses easier to find ink (and cheaper).
Its mostly a photo-style blog today, so enjoy:
The Dell printer to be scrapped today!
Your standard Power Adapter. Output is 30VDC at 1A.
Device will be taken apart from top to bottom. This is the top document scan feed, ideal for faxing.
With the cover removed, the mechanical aspects of the top document feeder are exposed. Wonder what moves the small wheel on the metal bar?
Some disassembly later, find that the wheel box contains several gears. Looks like when the metal bar is moved and the wheel box can’t move any further (i.e. touched the paper), ithe wheel then turns to load the paper. This allows for multiple documents to be loaded at the same time.
Conductive threads remove static charge that may have built inside the paper, before the paper is ejected.
Close-up of the mechanism that controls the top document feeder.
Tensioner pulley that keeps the scanner timing belt tight.
Small stepper motor that drives the scanner
Total parts gotten from the scanner. Not as much as I was hoping.
Connectors hidden in the panel that contains the print cartridges.
Mysterious USB cable that was plugged into the main circuit board. Would say that it goes to the SD card, but from a top view, the SD card slot is built onto the main circuit board, so this isn’t possible.
With the top half done, the bottom half remains!
The mysterious USB cable goes to this black box. I forgot to get a picture, but this is a Wi-Fi module made by Lexmark. Possible to hack? A visible programming header is on the board…
RFID module, again, made by Lexmark. Used to id the print cartridges? Again, possible to hack?
User control panel. The chip is a 74HC166N, a parallel-in/shift-out register. Found traces going to the LCD. Strange way I think to drive the LCD…
Hidden access, presumably on a previous version, a user could access paper jams in the back of the printer. I guess they’re confident enough that this won’t happen?
Pump mechanism that keeps excess ink from leaking from the print cartridges
Main circuit board of printer.
Premade network module. Made by Lexmark again.
One of several IR boards that I removed.
The total parts I scrapped from the printer. Note: this does not show the metal that I removed and going to recycle.
In total, the parts I got from the printer include:
- 2 Stepper motors
- 3 DC motors
- Wires
- Power Adapter and cord
- Rubber grommets and wheels
- Piece of foam
- 3 Cloth Blocks
- A few various plastic parts
- Assorted metal bars
- Lots of gears, screws, and springs
- Some circuit boards to scrap
- Assorted metal and magnets
- Machined Aluminium to be recycled
Ok, that’s all for today, stay tuned!
– Eastern FireTail
MLCC Studios 