3rd party laser toner and drums?

[zqwerty]

I wonder if the powder could be a bit damp, try putting the toner pack in your hot water cupboard for a few days. I normally reach up and put things to dry out (ie cell phones that have been in water) on the top of the tank, there's usually space there.

[Nomad]

There appears to be a grey background. This points to 3rd party toner or the development unit is stuffed.
Looks like the dev unit is part of the drum unit so replacing the drum unit and fitting a Brother toner would fix your problem.
Myself I would empty the dev unit and tone it up with Brother toner (assuming it is monocomponent toner) . A messy job, but could save you a few dollars.
Just replacing the toner will not fix the problem as it will take ages for the 3rd party toner to bleed out of the system.

Only ever used original Brother parts. 1) the original came with the printer and 2) the toner we bought was a Brother brand.

[Nomad]

The toner powder is a very fine powder and becomes compacted a bit like cement dust does when it's been sitting around for a while.

Bang it down carefully on something solid like a tree trunk judging how much impact you can use without breaking anything, better still an old car tyre or tube that is not hugely inflated, it's probably all gummed up in all the small tight orifices which it flows down when working correctly.

Try giving it more shakes from different directions at different speeds, I would do that outside in case something goes wrong and you have a leak.

We use gas water. Could use the conservatory. We've had the toner for least 3 or 4yrs now. The printer says the toner life is on the bottom level bar.

[Agent_24]

If it's a few years old and you've used it a lot, it might just be getting low? The toner level is not necessarily accurate.