20 Oct
2008
20 Oct
'08
9:29 p.m.
Hey --
Stumbled across an old Teletype ksr-43 this weekend and couldn't pass it
up. Seems to be working but the ribbon's (obviously) dried up. Was
considering re-inking it but it's so worn through in places it's about
to fall apart.
Can't find anyplace on the 'net that still stocks them (lots of them
/list/ it, though, which is annoying). Anyone have any leads?
And while I'm on the subject -- anyone have any good leads for old
typewriter ribbons? I have an old L.C. Smith Bros typewriter that's in
need of one...
Thanks as always (and still working on the Otrona Attache...),
Josh
21 Oct
21 Oct
7:54 a.m.
I looked a while back, because I also have a KSR43. There was one company that listed
them but, when I ordered them, they informed me they no longer had some component or
another and refunded my money. I'll see if I can find the reference again - maybe
market forces (TWO customers!) would be stronger incentive. :-)
________________________________________
From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of
Josh Dersch [derschjo at msu.edu]
Sent: Monday, October 20, 2008 9:29 PM
To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Teletype Model 43 ribbons (and old ribbons in general...)
Hey --
Stumbled across an old Teletype ksr-43 this weekend and couldn't pass it
up. Seems to be working but the ribbon's (obviously) dried up. Was
considering re-inking it but it's so worn through in places it's about
to fall apart.
Can't find anyplace on the 'net that still stocks them (lots of them
/list/ it, though, which is annoying). Anyone have any leads?
And while I'm on the subject -- anyone have any good leads for old
typewriter ribbons? I have an old L.C. Smith Bros typewriter that's in
need of one...
Thanks as always (and still working on the Otrona Attache...),
Josh
9 a.m.
On Monday 20 October 2008, Josh Dersch wrote:
Hey --
Stumbled across an old Teletype ksr-43 this weekend and couldn't
pass it up. Seems to be working but the ribbon's (obviously) dried
up. Was considering re-inking it but it's so worn through in
places it's about to fall apart.
Can't find anyplace on the 'net that still stocks them (lots of
them /list/ it, though, which is annoying). Anyone have any leads?
I had the same problem. I kept hitting dead ends, as you, with all the
places that list that they have them - and don't.
I started calling back those same places - and leaving my name -
asking that if they ever found any, to please let me know. Several
weeks later, one of them actually called me back - they had found a
box of six ribbons. I grabbed them, of course - and asked if they
ever found more to let me know. They never called back again - and
that was over nine months ago.
The problem seems to be related to the unavailability of the unusual
Teletype 43 cartridge.
BTW: While I was waiting to get ribbons, I re-inked the one ribbon I
had (there's a "reservoir" in the cartridge) and that worked - but
not as good as new.
So my suggestion is to just keep trying to find someone who has
them "stashed" in a back room someplace. It sure doesn't look good
for any new ribbons in the future...
And while I'm on the subject -- anyone have any
good leads for old
typewriter ribbons? I have an old L.C. Smith Bros typewriter
that's in need of one...
I use Los Altos Typewriter, 300 State St, Los Altos, CA 94022, Phone:
(650) 948-0714. If you're in the SF Bay Area, Weirdstuff Warehouse
has lots of them.
Cheers,
Lyle
--
Lyle Bickley
Bickley Consulting West Inc.
Mountain View, CA 94040
http://bickleywest.com
"Black holes are where God is dividing by zero"
10:34 a.m.
In article <48FD5AA8.6050402 at msu.edu>,
Josh Dersch <derschjo at msu.edu> writes:
Can't find anyplace on the 'net that still
stocks them (lots of them
/list/ it, though, which is annoying). Anyone have any leads?
A guy apparently found a case of ribbons and was selling them on ebay
for a while. He had them at $15 ea. IIRC. I ended up purchasing two.
He wouldn't reduce the per-unit price if I bought several of them. He
claimed that lots of people were willing to buy them, so there was no
need to reduce his price. My regular ebay searches turned up him
lowering the price after I bought two at $15 ea. Grrr. The seller's
ebay id is mikesdavis -- he has some vintage gear up for sale now, but
not the ribbons.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
11:01 a.m.
On 21 Oct 2008 at 11:34, Richard wrote:
A guy apparently found a case of ribbons and was
selling them on ebay
for a while. He had them at $15 ea. IIRC. I ended up purchasing two.
He wouldn't reduce the per-unit price if I bought several of them. He
claimed that lots of people were willing to buy them, so there was no
need to reduce his price. My regular ebay searches turned up him
lowering the price after I bought two at $15 ea. Grrr. The seller's
ebay id is mikesdavis -- he has some vintage gear up for sale now, but
not the ribbons.
Can the cartridges be reloaded?
Cheers,
Chuck
1:39 p.m.
In article <48FDB682.19000.1A30B12D at cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
Can the cartridges be reloaded?
Earlier on the thread, some success was reported for re-inking a
ribbon, although the results were less than what you'd get with a new
ribbon.
If you have an existing ribbon cartridge, I'd say re-inking is going
to be your best bet at this point.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
2:21 p.m.
On 21 Oct 2008 at 14:39, Richard wrote:
Earlier on the thread, some success was reported for
re-inking a
ribbon, although the results were less than what you'd get with a new
ribbon.
If you have an existing ribbon cartridge, I'd say re-inking is going
to be your best bet at this point.
Not exactly what I had in mind. I've had some oddball ribbon carts
in the past and have scavenged the ribbon from more widely-available
carts and used it to refill the hard-to-get-ones, bringing them
essentially back to like-new condition.
I've had less-than-wonderful results with re-inking, particularly
where the polyester fabric of the ribbon has been worn away.
I've got some large HP-style line-printer carts that are stuffed with
single-strike film ribbon for NLQ use that I've found can be refilled
with ordinary typewriter (IIRC, IBM Selectric) film ribbon quite
successfully.
In the case of fabric ribbon as an endless loop, ends can be
ultrasonically welded or even stitched together.
Cheers,
Chuck
4:42 p.m.
In article <48FDE560.10606.1AE7C442 at cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
Not exactly what I had in mind. I've had some
oddball ribbon carts
in the past and have scavenged the ribbon from more widely-available
carts and used it to refill the hard-to-get-ones, bringing them
essentially back to like-new condition.
Yeah, that might be a better route unless you can find someone selling
NOS ribbons as I did.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
6:04 p.m.
On 21 Oct 2008 at 17:42, Richard wrote:
Yeah, that might be a better route unless you can find
someone selling
NOS ribbons as I did.
Computer Friends sells bulk ribbon by the yard. Might be worth
buying some and keeping it tightly wrapped in your freezer should the
need arise.
Cheers,
Chuck
4:54 p.m.
On Tuesday 21 October 2008 16:39, Richard wrote:
In article <48FDB682.19000.1A30B12D at
cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
And while we're on that, I remember those re-inking kits that were popular
some years back. Around the time when the c64 was too. :-)
Are they even being sold any more?
Anybody have opinions on spraying a ribbon with WD-40?
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
Can the cartridges be reloaded?
Earlier on the thread, some success was reported for re-inking a
ribbon, although the results were less than what you'd get with a new
ribbon.
If you have an existing ribbon cartridge, I'd say re-inking is going
to be your best bet at this point. 
5:23 p.m.
--- On Tue, 10/21/08, Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com> wrote:
Because WD-40 is easier :)
I don't remember spraying a ribbon DIRECTLY with WD-40. The trick was to spray the
WD-40 into a ziplock bag, then put the ribbon cartridge in there, and seal it for a day or
two. The WD-40 vapors would cause the ink that was already on the ribbon to soften and
flow, and 'fill in' the spots where the ink had been used up. It was a stopgap
solution, and of course, does nothing for a truly worn-out ribbon.
-Ian
Anybody have
opinions on spraying a ribbon with WD-40?
If you're going to that effort, why not spray it with
INK?
6:13 p.m.
On Tuesday 21 October 2008 20:23, Mr Ian Primus wrote:
--- On Tue, 10/21/08, Fred Cisin <cisin at
xenosoft.com> wrote:
Because WD-40 is easier :)
I don't remember spraying a ribbon DIRECTLY with WD-40. The trick was to
spray the WD-40 into a ziplock bag, then put the ribbon cartridge in there,
and seal it for a day or two. The WD-40 vapors would cause the ink that was
already on the ribbon to soften and flow, and 'fill in' the spots where the
ink had been used up. It was a stopgap solution, and of course, does
nothing for a truly worn-out ribbon.
I'll have to remember that approach. I have a *pile* of dot matrix printers
that have been sitting around for a while, and only need to print out a test
page on each of them, to sell 'em.
Got plenty of WD40 at the garage where I'm storing this stuff at, too. :-)
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
Anybody
have opinions on spraying a ribbon with WD-40?
If you're going to that effort, why not spray it with
INK?
6:11 p.m.
On Tuesday 21 October 2008 20:15, Fred Cisin wrote:
On Tue, 21 Oct 2008, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
Ink being a pigment and some sort of a solvent, when a ribbon dries out
there's plenty of pigment there already, it just needs a bit of solvent.
The one time I tried it the results were surprisingly good, for a while.
Then pushing my luck a bit further I repeated the application.
I was using a rebuilt printhead at that time and the front face of it got
loose, the company I was getting them from stood behind it. I still have
one of their rebuilds in my old Oki 92. :-)
And besides which, I'm not aware of any ink available in spray cans like
that, is it?
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
Anybody have opinions on spraying a ribbon with
WD-40?
If you're going to that effort, why not spray it with INK?
7:14 p.m.
On Tuesday 21 October 2008 21:33, Fred Cisin wrote:
On Tue, 21 Oct 2008, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
And I think I still have one of those in my desk drawer...
Dunno why, since there aren't any stamp pads in there, and haven't been any
stamps for a *really* long time. :-)
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
And besides which, I'm not aware of any ink
available in spray cans like
that, is it?
If there is, I don't know where to find it.
But, I have had good results using "roll-on stamp pad inker"s.
5:18 p.m.
On 21 Oct 2008 at 19:54, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
And while we're on that, I remember those
re-inking kits that were popular
some years back. Around the time when the c64 was too. :-)
Are they even being sold any more?
Yup. http://www.cfriends.com/dotmat.html Computer Friends is
apparently still selling the MacInker--I've got one from many years
ago.
Anybody have opinions on spraying a ribbon with WD-40?
If you've got a new-ish dry ribbon, it works, for at least a couple
of times. Very messy, however. It doesn't do that well on old worn
ribbons though.
Cheers,
Chuck
5:24 p.m.
On Tue, Oct 21, 2008 at 05:18:33PM -0700, Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 21 Oct 2008 at 19:54, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
Since I know I have some new-in-bag ribbons that will work with an ASR-33
(along with many classic dot matrix printers), and they are old enough that
I expect they are dried out, is there a better substance than WD-40 to
rehydrate the ink?
-ethan
--
Ethan Dicks, A-333-S Current South Pole Weather at 22-Oct-2008 at 00:20 Z
South Pole Station
PSC 468 Box 400 Temp -47.6 F (-44.2 C) Windchill -75.8 F (-59.9 C)
APO AP 96598 Wind 9.3 kts Grid 351 Barometer 679.1 mb (10662 ft)
Ethan.Dicks at usap.gov http://penguincentral.com/penguincentral.html
Anybody have opinions on spraying a ribbon with
WD-40?
If you've got a new-ish dry ribbon, it works, for at least a couple
of times. Very messy, however. It doesn't do that well on old worn
ribbons though.
6:15 p.m.
On Tuesday 21 October 2008 20:24, Ethan Dicks wrote:
On Tue, Oct 21, 2008 at 05:18:33PM -0700, Chuck Guzis
wrote:
Probably. The solution recommended with putting some in a ziploc bag with the
ribbon sounds good. WD-40 is only "Petroleumn Distillates" and kerosene,
and it's probably the latter that does the trick. I'd imagine that the
former is what would tend to gum things up...
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
On 21 Oct 2008 at 19:54, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
Since I know I have some new-in-bag ribbons that will work with an ASR-33
(along with many classic dot matrix printers), and they are old enough that
I expect they are dried out, is there a better substance than WD-40 to
rehydrate the ink? Anybody have opinions on spraying a ribbon with
WD-40?
If you've got a new-ish dry ribbon, it works, for at least a couple
of times. Very messy, however. It doesn't do that well on old worn
ribbons though.
5906
days inactive
5907
days old
18 comments
9 participants
participants (9)
-
cclist＠sydex.com -
cisin＠xenosoft.com -
derschjo＠msu.edu -
ethan.dicks＠usap.gov -
ian_primus＠yahoo.com -
IanK＠vulcan.com -
lbickley＠bickleywest.com -
legalize＠xmission.com -
rtellason＠verizon.net