Laser printer problems and suggestions (Printing Labels)

[Admiral]

We have about 6 laser printers here, 1 color one that isn't used much and the quality is subpar on it since it's sat so long, 4 small Lexmark e260dn, 1 Brother HL-5470 with 2 trays.

They all work fine on paper but we print a lot of labels.  The problems with the sheets of labels are that the toner can smudge off.  On the Brother, the middle labels are the ones that smudge, the sides are fine.  On the Lexmark it isn't as bad but the sheets don't feed right at all, it pulls in multiple sheets and then it's off for a lot of sheets and a lot of lost labels and trouble.  The Brother feeds labels fine from the top tray but has the toner rubbing off issue.

I believe the toner rubbing off is not enough / even heat on the drum when being printed so perhaps a replacement drum would fix it but I replaced it only 1k prints ago...The Lexmark feeding issue isn't really solvable since we sometimes print stacks of sheets of labels and can't feed them all individually.

Any suggestions on fixing it...or better yet a suggestion for a great low cost to operate laser printer? That will print labels endlessly just fine.

Thanks

[Frog]

I don't use a laser printer any more, but it sounds like a fuser issue to me.
I am not aware that they have "zones" like a heat platen on a heat press, but your description sounds like it.

[Admiral]

Sounds like you're right.  Weird that the middle is the part where the heat isn't right...

http://www.brokenprinter.com/bad-fuser/

Reading this made me hate all laser printers even more.

All it tells me is that the laser printers we have are crap and I need a reliable one with a good fuser...

Any suggestions? Surely someone prints a lot of labels.  I wish we could do roll labels and have a nice thermal label printer but it's not an option since it's all sheet format.

[mk162]

yeah, the labels are so thick that it's hard to heat them enough...I hit mine with toner darkener so they don't rub off in shipping