"Hammer" won't strike; printwheel won't turn; code key not workin

The print hammer is striking between the letters. Two thing
you may have a petal, letter broken off. If its the same letter every time usually thats it, need new daisy wheel.
Or Homing is off when the wheel turns hammer hits between letters. Needs repair.
Or
Daisy wheel petals are bent.

The printwheel may be in wrong. Unsnap the printwheel, set it back in and make sure the pin seats in the printwheel when you snap it in. It should spin when you turn the power on.
Or.... it cound be the print hammer solenoid which strikes the hammer to print is cracked and not working correctly (this should be done by a qualified tech)
Hope this helps...
Mike

depends on the model could be a cracked hammer or hammer driver

The "print" solenoid is what hits the hammer that hits the printwheel and makes it type on your paper. If you remove the ribbon and look straight down in the carrier on the left side you can see the solenoid. It is below the blue piece of rubber that sits on the hammer arm. The end of the solenoid is supposed to have a cap on the end of the plunger. This cap gives a specific clearance so when it is activated, it hits the hammer arm to propel it forward to strike the printwheel.

There is a clutch system under the ribbon carrier that has to rotate to move the hammer, see if you can see if this part is rotating, also there is a spring that puts pressure on the hammer. If this clutch is not moving it may need replacement,, or cleaned with alcohol.

It sounds like you have a Wheelwriter 15 Series II based on the model number you gave, but the answer is probably the same for almost any Wheelwriter: There is a small mechanism, I believe called a solenoid, that moves a horseshoe-shaped part that actually "fires" the striking hammer against the individual letter-spokes of the daisywheel print element, to put letters/numbers/symbols on paper. I have posted a close up photo of the left hand side of the carriage that moves back and forth while you type, which holds the ribbon, correction tape, and mechanisms for positioning the daisy wheel print element so that the hammer can strike the correct letter, number, etc. when selected from the keyboard. If you go to your machine and remove the ribbon and correction tape from the carriage, you will see that right in the middle of the picture is the thing I'm talking about. It looks like a small electric motor like you might find in a toy racecar, is about the same diameter as a USA "quarter", and is I think about an inch thick. I've replaced one of those once, using the part from a damaged typewriter to replace the matching part in a typewriter that worked except it wouldn't print, just like the problem you describe. It's been a few years since I did that but it did not require any specialized tools, and I did not have a manual or a video to refer to. I think this mechanism has stayed mostly the same for about 20 years worth of Wheelwriters, though I can't promise that a part from a Wheelwriter 3, for example, would work to replace the seemingly same part in a Wheelwriter 15 Series II like yours. I think there are many places you can buy this part from online, and with the information I've provided here they may better be able to help you trouble shoot your problem. I can't promise that this will fix your problem but there's a pretty good chance that it will. As far as what I do is concerned, I buy, fix where I can, and resell Wheelwriters, mostly on ebay, and some time in the next month or so I'll start selling Wheelwriter parts. I bought a pallet of 20 Wheelwriters a few months ago and it turned out that many of them were damaged from how they were stacked on the pallet (which I kind of expected even though I couldn't look through them all ahead of time). I've sold the undamaged ones and parted together a few more to sell, but soon I'll run out of enough undamaged cases to sell complete units and that's when the parts sale begins. I don't think you'd want to wait until I get around to selling parts, but if you do want to check out what I've listed, I'm on ebay as "greatsurplusbuys". -- Dan

Check to see if you are in the display mode (it displays what you are typing, the carriage moves along, but only prints when you hit the return key)

could be a broken drawband or maybe the carriage lock (to lock it in center position)

If it is stuck in the middle of the page it probably has a carriage lock usually just below the carriage on the R. or L. side.

DickyO

It sound like you have a broken part. If the hammer is not hitting hard enough, the armature theat make the hammer strike the keys is broken. This is a common problem with the ax's