2 Jul
2012
2 Jul
'12
3:23 p.m.
On 2 Jul 2012 at 17:02, Jason T wrote:
The "printer" is only a shell. I thought at
first it may have been
harvested for parts (I was told they came from the estate of a
deceased IL Bell repair instructor) but given the connections inside
the enclosure, I am wondering if it was designed to accept a standard
Teletype mech.
No, the model 40 Dataspeed printer was a band printer with a bank of
solenoid-driven hammers behind the band, one per column. Standard
tractor-feed forms. It could print a full 132 columns wide at a
time. I seem to recall that the rated speed was 150 LPM, not bad at
all for a tabletop unit. It really needed that soundproof enclosure--
it was VERY loud without it.
A couple of third-party vendors bought the basic mech from Teletype
and packaged it in their own enclosures with a standard Centronics or
Dataproducts interface. I still have some old documents printed on
one--the print quality is quite high.
I still have the schematics for the thing somewhere.
--Chuck