Ricoh Drum Life Question...

[kdw75]

Does anyone know why it is that the drums in Ricohs last so long compared to Xerox? Is there some downside to the drums that Ricoh is using? I really can't believe Xerox would be using drums that have such a short life span if there wasn't some advantage.

 

[AP90]

Does anyone know why it is that the drums in Ricohs last so long compared to Xerox? Is there some downside to the drums that Ricoh is using? I really can't believe Xerox would be using drums that have such a short life span if there wasn't some advantage.

My guess is it comes down to money. Im not experienced with Ricoh, but I've watched videos on KM's and they mentioned they had service come out to replace drums. Our Xerox 3100 is user replaceable in about 30 seconds. Im guessing Xerox could make drums that last substantially longer, but would increase manufacturing cost and raw materials cost, so they figured they can make more money by producing lower cost drums and letting users replace them more often.

But the drums in our 3100 absolutely suck as far as lifespan goes. Im pretty sure I've changed out the same drum in the same week before. Our old 1000i drums seemed to last a lot longer, and they had to be ordered by the tech's if I remember correctly. But a royal PITA to change. Had to get the screwdriver out and start taking off covers etc to get them in. And you better hope you lined it up correctly or you'll never get one of the screws back in lol.

 

[kdw75]

My guess is it comes down to money. Im not experienced with Ricoh, but I've watched videos on KM's and they mentioned they had service come out to replace drums. Our Xerox 3100 is user replaceable in about 30 seconds. Im guessing Xerox could make drums that last substantially longer, but would increase manufacturing cost and raw materials cost, so they figured they can make more money by producing lower cost drums and letting users replace them more often.

But the drums in our 3100 absolutely suck as far as lifespan goes. Im pretty sure I've changed out the same drum in the same week before. Our old 1000i drums seemed to last a lot longer, and they had to be ordered by the tech's if I remember correctly. But a royal PITA to change. Had to get the screwdriver out and start taking off covers etc to get them in. And you better hope you lined it up correctly or you'll never get one of the screws back in lol.

The Ricoh drums are almost as easy to replace as our 2100s. They are broken up so that you can replace just the drum separately from the wiper and other parts. We have over 250k large clicks on our first set of drums and they aren't even half worn out.

I always look for a downside when something seems better, though money would make sense. Considering shipping rates, I would think they would offset the price of better drums.

 

[easiprint]

I thought exactly the same when we switched from Xerox to Ricoh about three years ago. Xerox drums replaced every few weeks, but Ricoh drums minimum of 6 months+. But I've found it's the same with other parts. When we ran Xerox we used to have a tech visit at least once a week for dev's or something. Now with Ricoh, we can go a couple of months easily between service calls. So much better for reliability and up time. Now on our second Ricoh, after 10 years of Xerox, and wouldn't go back now....

 

[msaeger]

On the xerox one does the drum you are replacing include the cleaning and charge sections as well? On the Ricoh stuff the cleaning and charge are separate from the drum and the drum has a much longer life than the cleaning and charge parts.

 

[Shawnd]

I can also vouch for the longevity of the Ricoh drums, they just keep going on my 7110's, I could not say the same for my old Xerox 700's. I love the TRCU program, unless something happens we can't fix I don't see my service tech.

I am guessing the drums are higher quality with Ricoh, I hope it stays that way.

 

[PricelineNegotiator]

I thought exactly the same when we switched from Xerox to Ricoh about three years ago. Xerox drums replaced every few weeks, but Ricoh drums minimum of 6 months+. But I've found it's the same with other parts. When we ran Xerox we used to have a tech visit at least once a week for dev's or something. Now with Ricoh, we can go a couple of months easily between service calls. So much better for reliability and up time. Now on our second Ricoh, after 10 years of Xerox, and wouldn't go back now....

I believe the easiest explanation for this is that Xerox used to have their drums manufactured by Fuji and has since tried to bring the manufacturing to either in house or someone stateside. I agree that their drums are basically garbage compared to how they would last forever on our J75 and I could ebb out life past the "replace now" point. Xerox is definitely trying to rectify this but has yet to do so in a way that pleases their customers.

 

[Digital Insight]

Drums on our Ricoh 9200 are WAY better than what we saw on our Xerox Colorpress.

Not even close....

That being said....

The drums on the ColorPress were WAY better than the drums on the Xerox 5000 we had prior

Those were dogshit.....

Changes those about every 15k - 20k prints

Joke city.....

 

[namelessentity]

Xerox is the only one I'm aware of that has the fusers and drums as a user replaceable item. Our Canon Imagepress is rated for like 250,000 impressions, but at the same time, if it's damaged it's a service call. I think Xerox decided it was cheaper to make poorer quality drums, but save service calls, than it was to just make a higher quality drum.

 

[Digital Insight]

X drums suck in general....

Always have.

 

[Some Guy]

The drums that ship with your new Xerox are from FX. They will make life and are often a different color. Everything you replace after is domesticated by Xerox. Xerox does not have the in house expertise to make a good drum or run any sort of QA. The scientists and engineers who knew how to make something with quality were layed off long ago.

This started under Ursula