Solutions for Brother Printer Not Printing – A Detailed Guide

There’s no doubt that Brother printers are one of the best in the market. However, sometimes, reliable products can also turn moody. The same is true for the products of this printer brand. It is common for users to find their Brother printer not printing after a period of the device working well. 

This problem is usually a result of simple to advanced issues. They include the printer being offline, not set as default, to a glitch in the printer software. An insecure connection between your PC and Brother machine also results in the printer not printing black. But there are many approaches to fix the issue. Read this article till the end to find some effective troubleshooting.

 

Quick Methods to Fix Brother Printer Not Printing

You can use many basic troubleshooting steps when the Brother printer won’t print. These are pretty straightforward but yield the desired outcome in many instances. 

• Ensure that the Brother printer is turned on and there aren’t any errors. If your Brother printer’s status LED isn’t lit, it means that it isn’t powered on. Ensure that it’s plugged into an active outlet. Also, see the LEDs for any error lights.
• Check the connectivity to the access point or router. You must also see whether your Brother machine and the router have a secure connection. Reseat the cable on your printer and the access point to ensure a good connection. 
• Restart your Brother printer. Shut down the printer via the Power button. Take the printer’s wire away from the wall outlet. Wait for a minute before plugging it back. Now restart your printer. 
• Use the troubleshooting tool if you find your Brother printer not printing in Windows. To use the troubleshooter, go to ‘Update & Security.’ Choose ‘Troubleshoot’ followed by ‘Additional troubleshooters.’ Choose your printer icon followed by the ‘Run the troubleshooter’ option. 

 

Advanced Fixes for Brother Printer Not Printing

If the basic troubleshooting doesn’t work for you, you will need to follow certain advanced fixes. Before you go ahead with them, disable any active firewall programs. Enable them after you can print.

 

Run the network repair utility and verify communication between your system and printer

Try downloading and running the network repair utility when your Brother printer malfunctions. Tap this link to download it. Then, verify the communication between your Brother machine and system.

• After downloading the network repair utility, create a folder on your hard disk drive. Here you can save the downloaded self-extracting file.
• Open the folder after the download process ends and double-tap the file in order to extract it. You will find a ‘nettool’ folder being created.
• Open it and click ‘exe’ file two times.
• Go by the instructions on your screen.
• Now verify the communication between your printing device and system. For it, get the IP address of your Brother machine and computer.
• Now in the Command Prompt, type ‘PING’ followed by the IP address of your Brother machine.
• Press ‘Enter’, and you will get the PING statistics.
• If you get replies, confirm that they are from the right IP address. But suppose you don’t receive replies, or they are not from the right IP address. In that case, it indicates a communication issue between your Brother printer and the system.

 

Conduct a network factory reset

You must conduct a network factory reset if there’s a communication issue between your Brother machine and system. Follow these instructions for it.

• Switch off the Power of your printer.
• Now, hold and press the ‘Go’ button. 
• Keep holding it while you are turning the power switch. 
• Keep pressing the ‘Go’ button till you find the LED lighting up, and the status LED switching off. 
• Now, release this button. 
• Hit the ‘Go’ button again 10 times. You will see the status LED flashing, and the printer will be reset. 
• Once you see your printer powering back, wait for some time till the access point and the machine establish a network connection. 
• After a network connection is established, repeat the step of pressing the ‘Go’ button 10 times.

 

Check the purge pump. 

A common reason the InkJet Brother printer won’t print black is a malfunctioning purge pump. The purge pump is the device whose whizzing sound you hear on installing a new cartridge. It functions to prime the installed cartridge by taking the ink out from the cartridge and putting it into the printhead. 

 In case of a faulty purge pump, the printer will be unable to get the ink flowing as it should. It will either cause your pages to come out blank or some bits will be missing from the pages. 

 You must first visually check the purge pump seals. Check that they aren’t distorted. Then, give a thorough cleaning to both the pump and the seals with a non-oily cleaning liquid. You can use Isopropyl Alcohol for this purpose. 

 

Fix the clogged intake nozzle valve

If the intake valve behind the cartridge ink outlet is clogged, you will find that your Brother printer won’t print black. So, fix it by removing the ink cartridge. Use a Windex cotton bud to dab the valve. Be careful when you do this. The cotton from the bud should not go into the valve.

 After some time, you will find the inlet valve appearing clear and ink-free. Do not touch your printer overnight. Try printing from it the next morning.

 

Update the Brother printer driver

Printer drivers commonly create issues with proper printing. So, check if you have an updated printer driver installed in your system. You might need to install new drivers to fix issues with the printer not printing black and color pages. If you use Windows 10, it has the feature to update the drivers automatically. Use this feature and work with an updated driver.

 

Final Thoughts

Now the issue of the Brother printer not printing optimally will not worry you. Follow the quick methods first and then go ahead with the advanced resolutions. If still, you don’t find the printer printing correctly, contact Brother technical support services to sort your problem.