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I'm big on recycling paper once it's gone through the printer, but one aspect of this has puzzled me somewhat. Not a big deal, just one of life's eternal puzzles which occurred to me today when I was de-stapling old printouts for recycling.

The network printer uses plain paper, and is perfectly happy when I present it with sheets of paper which it has already printed on one side.

The network fax machine uses the same plain paper: yet, when I offer this faxed-upon plain paper up to the printer, the printer gets very angry. Paper Jam! No can do!

I've never understood this, but just accept it - as you do.

Faxed upon - one side - in the wastepaper bin it goes.
Printed upon - one side - go ahead and print the other side too.

They're both the same manufacturer BTW. (Brother)

Why is this?

(my life is full of conundrums, it seems) (none of them the end of the world, but puzzling nonetheless)

I'll take a guess. The fax machine may heat the paper somewhat and change its chemical composition. My fax machine imparts a curl to the paper so that's a possibility. Also, the nature of the dyes used by the fax may not play nicely with the printer.

Just speculation, of course.

Could be either the fax's toner weight or consistency doesn't sit well with the printers feed path and/or rollers or the fax machine's feed path beats up the paper in a way that it doesn't sit well with the printer's. Obviously every print device handles the paper differently, so what you're seeing isn't uncommon. I applaud your conservation efforts, though.

I don't know whether your Fax machine uses toner or a tape, but both of them sit on the surface of the paper I believe, unlike printer inks. Bits of toner or ink could be could be loose enough, or if the surface is sealed, it could be just slick enough for the cogs in the printer to slip instead of gaining traction. I know the small copier I once had couldn't handle super smooth papers.

My Epson printer rollers are really fussy. Although they don't seem to have a problem with atmospheric dust, when I use dead matte papers, I have to run a cleaning sheet through them pretty regularly. I think it's because there's more friction with matte papers, which leaves surface residue in the printer and leads to all kinds of eccentricities. It's probably like that impossible dust you get from sanding wallboard plaster. I can only put 4 or 5 pages in the sheet feeder at once. Otherwise the printer won't pick them up at all or will shoot them straight through without printing anything, and warn me about adding or correctly positioning the paper. That gets progressively more frequent, till I can only load one page at a time, which is when I use the cleaning sheet. The first time I run one of those through, it's as likely to jam up in inside the printer as not. It's a royal pain.

If doubt that cleaning sheets will help if the first FAX sheet itself is jamming, though. If you do use them, be sure to check on whether your particular machine can use the sheet that is sometimes included in the package with the paper. I've had to order a different kind directly from Epson, whose website seems designed to make them really hard to find. Actually, everything about Epson printers is a royal pain, except the prints they (eventually) produce.

I save all my misfires for use as fill in sculpture projects. I've been saving the mountains of unsolicited catalogues I get too. I've been trying to find out whether the printing inks used to produce them are hazardous to plants or soil, because I'd like to run them through the shredder (an appropriate fate!) and use them for mulch.

Jim (I don't know if your name is Jim, but that's how my brain read it first time around, so Jim it is), you're a man after my own heart.

Really fussy printer rollers, tell me about it. (That's UK-speak for "Yeah, I know!")

(Now I'm assuming not only that your name is Jim, but that you're not in the UK either...)

I bought a ream of "green" recycled paper for the printer. The printer hated it. Stack up 20-odd sheets and they were all grabbed at once and rejected without being printed on, plus multiple flashing lights. I had to feed them through one sheet at a time, which doesn't suit me, so therefore the ream of "green" recycled paper is just sitting there on the floor.

When you've had a printer long enough you get to know all its funny little ways. For instance, when the (Brother) printer's toner light starts flashing, I know I can get another whole month of life out of the toner cartridge, from experience. I suppose it's their way of bumping up sales.

Thanks for the great response.

Sorry, Jim it ain't...

Ha ha! So, Jim's a dame?

I'm sure she won't mind. But thanks for the heads-up.

Best wishes

Not a guy, not in the UK, not to worry. For a shaggy dog story that I'll refrain from relating, I switched to my gender neutral initials on purpose. I was interested to discover that the default internet assumption is that initials make the man, but maybe it was all just because JM looks so much like Jim. I sometimes even suffer from the same confusion myself, name-wise that is. On other sites where I'm a regular, folks usually end up using JMH. When you're talkin' to me though, I ain't complaining.

At least your green paper comes pre-re-cycled, so on the bright side, you've already done your duty, no?

Are fine paper recyclers in the UK that anal about staples being removed?
In these here parts they really don't care.
(Now paper clips, spring clamps and such are a different story.)