3 Mar
2013
3 Mar
'13
10:47 p.m.
On 03/02/2013 04:52 PM, Mr Ian Primus wrote:
Speaking of old LaserJets - does anyone aside from me
collect them?
I've got a decent collection older models, although somehow I don't
have a LaserJet II or original LaserJet. I do have the oddball 4V
though.
Yep, I have to admit that I also collect printers, and not just one series at that... I do
have some rather common models as "workhorses" (NEC P2200, LJ3, LJ4, -L, -M
plus) or because I was given them and couldn't bring myself to throwing them out yet
(far too many HP, Epson and Canon inkjets) but tend to focus on exots and niche models
otherwise - NEC CP7 and Star LC24 with their multizone color ribbon, Citizen Overture and
Sharp JX lasers which very visibly are early copier descendents, two OKI linear LED array
printers, one of the infamous Tektronix "edible solid ink" power-hogs (a 340 I
think; wish I could scrounge up a few reasonably priced ink sticks for that one, hint
hint!), the "professional" HP Deskjet 1200 and 1600 models. Also three
thermo-transfer units for various print sizes (all made by Mitsubishi, I think, two of
them large flat things close to 19" format, one smaller desktop unit), which while
primary intended for video still printing, also have parallel in!
terfaces, but with consumables prohibitively costly for any kind of operation).
What I'm missing yet is a "real" daisywheel printer (I have both a
Triumph-Adler and an IBM typewriter with bolt-on interface boards - not that I would mind
having a Diablo terminal at some time too), any sort of High Speed Printer from the olden
days (drum, chain, belt, shuttle, or single-line needle) or truly esoteric stuff like the
(DataProducts) hydraulic driven needle printer our local university collection has.
Happy printing, guys!
So long,
Arno
3 Mar
3 Mar
11:45 p.m.
On 03/03/2013 10:47 PM, Arno Kletzander wrote:
What I'm missing yet is a "real"
daisywheel printer (I have both a
Triumph-Adler and an IBM typewriter with bolt-on interface boards -
not that I would mind having a Diablo terminal at some time too), any
sort of High Speed Printer from the olden days (drum, chain, belt,
shuttle, or single-line needle) or truly esoteric stuff like the
(DataProducts) hydraulic driven needle printer our local university
collection has.
I can't give the darned things away. I have both a Qume and a
AT&T-badged daisywheel at the moment with absolutely no one willing to
spring to ship the the things.
My favorite workhorse small printer was the Teletype Model 40 line
printer. It would just run and run and could sit on a tabletop.
Multipass dot-matrix with downloadable NLQ fonts are another
soon-to-be-forgotten technology. I think Sanders started that one...
--Chuck
4 Mar
4 Mar
10:15 a.m.
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 2:45 AM, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
I can't give the darned things away. I have both
a Qume and a AT&T-badged
daisywheel at the moment with absolutely no one willing to spring to ship
the the things.
I used to use a daisywheel printer at work in 1984, but even I would
pause at the shipping cost of one. They aren't light.
About the only one I'd even consider taking on (and that's *consider*,
mind you) is one that worked with WPS-8 and the LPQ8 interface. I
don't remember the exact DEC model number, but they bought someone's
daisywheel printer and mounted it into a rubber-rimmed hole in a small
rolly office supply cabinet as their high-quality (non-dot-matrix)
printer option for WPS. It's heavy enough that it would have to go
palletized via Craters and Freighters or some similar service.
-ethan
12:55 p.m.
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 2:45 AM, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
The daisywheel printer that I would like to find (although how I would
get ti shipped is another matter) is the HP9871. It was commonly driven
my an HP9830 (and I ahve the itnerface for it).
It's a very odd design. Msot diasywheel printers have a motor to move the
carriage and a motro to spinf the daisywheel, the latter motor being
mounted on the carriage. The HP9871 has 2 motors alrightm, but they're
both o nthe chassis. If they turn in the same direction the carriage
moves. If they turn in oppsoite diractions the daisywheel spins. All done
with a long toothed belt that runs about 4 times acocross the chassis.
And that alas is the problem. AFAIN no such belts have survived, all have
decayed iwth age. I would like to see if there is any workaround....
-tony
I can't give the darned things away. I have
both a Qume and a AT&T-badged
daisywheel at the moment with absolutely no one willing to spring to ship
the the things.
I used to use a daisywheel printer at work in 1984, but even I would
pause at the shipping cost of one. They aren't light.
About the only one I'd even consider taking on (and that's *consider*,
mind you) is one that worked with WPS-8 and the LPQ8 interface. I
don't remember the exact DEC model number, but they bought someone's
daisywheel printer and mounted it into a rubber-rimmed hole in a small
rolly office supply cabinet as their high-quality (non-dot-matrix)
printer option for WPS. It's heavy enough that it would have to go
palletized via Craters and Freighters or some similar service. 
5 Mar
5 Mar
12:09 p.m.
I think that was a Diablo 630. I had a few of the parts here
somewhere. They here table top units with an optional table.
! wouldn't mind picking up a DEC LP01 (80 col) or LP02. Data Products
made them for a lot of companies. I'm not sure, but might be 2210 and
2230.
Thanks, Paul
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 12:15 PM, Ethan Dicks <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote:
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 2:45 AM, Chuck Guzis <cclist
at sydex.com> wrote:
I can't give the darned things away. I have
both a Qume and a AT&T-badged
daisywheel at the moment with absolutely no one willing to spring to ship
the the things.
I used to use a daisywheel printer at work in 1984, but even I would
pause at the shipping cost of one. They aren't light.
About the only one I'd even consider taking on (and that's *consider*,
mind you) is one that worked with WPS-8 and the LPQ8 interface. I
don't remember the exact DEC model number, but they bought someone's
daisywheel printer and mounted it into a rubber-rimmed hole in a small
rolly office supply cabinet as their high-quality (non-dot-matrix)
printer option for WPS. It's heavy enough that it would have to go
palletized via Craters and Freighters or some similar service.
-ethan
12:26 p.m.
On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 3:09 PM, Paul Anderson <useddec at gmail.com> wrote:
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 12:15 PM, Ethan Dicks
<ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote:
That sounds right. The printer I mentioned earlier was a "real"
(un-rebadged) Diablo 630 that we used to hang off of an Apple II
for most of our printing.
The ones for WPS systems were, IIRC, tabletop printers with a
largish (smalll lunchbox-sized) external PSU that tucked nicely
into the custom tables/cabinets. With room for paper, ribbons
and extra daisywheels.
I think I had one in college that was left behind in a move long
ago. Kept the WPS rig (PDP-8/a in a 48" rack with one RX02
pair installed and room for more drives). That one has a
programmer's panel on it now.
-ethan
I used to use a daisywheel printer at work in
1984, but even I would
pause at the shipping cost of one. They aren't light.
About the only one I'd even consider taking on (and that's *consider*,
mind you) is one that worked with WPS-8 and the LPQ8 interface.
I think that was a Diablo 630. I had a few of the parts here
somewhere. They here table top units with an optional table.
2:12 p.m.
On 03/05/2013 12:26 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
That sounds right. The printer I mentioned earlier
was a "real"
(un-rebadged) Diablo 630 that we used to hang off of an Apple II
for most of our printing.
The ones for WPS systems were, IIRC, tabletop printers with a
largish (smalll lunchbox-sized) external PSU that tucked nicely
into the custom tables/cabinets. With room for paper, ribbons
and extra daisywheels.
There were the 630s, which were Hitype IIs, and then the earlier ones
(model escapes me at the moment) with the external power supply with
some very noisy fans.
All were, IIRC, available in RS232C, "centronics" parallel, as well as
12-bit OEM interface. KSR models as well as ROs.
The Artec Wapros, for example, used a KSR Hitype with what was about a
40-character LCD tacked onto the front. Wang used the Hitypes quite a
bit, but had their own typewheels. I believe that CPT used them also.
Then there were the wide-carriage Hitypes for bank use with three
printheads. A wonder to watch operating.
A collectible printer today might be the Diablo dot-matrix printer.
About the size of a regular RO Hitype, but with an incredibly loud
shrieking 9-wire printhead. I've only seen (and used) one.
--Chuck
2:23 p.m.
On Tue, 5 Mar 2013, Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 03/05/2013 12:26 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
Then there were the wide-carriage Hitypes for bank use with three printheads.
A wonder to watch operating.
I had a Mannesmann-Tally(sp?) printer that had three printheads on it.
Each did a third of the page, but were also stepped a line up vertically.
A collectible printer today might be the Diablo
dot-matrix printer. About the
size of a regular RO Hitype, but with an incredibly loud shrieking 9-wire
printhead. I've only seen (and used) one.
The most interesting printer I've seen was an Epson MX-80 (I _think_).
What made it interesting was how it was driven. The print head had a pin
in the bottom of it that followed a spiral groove cut in a spinning
cylinder that went the width of the printer. Very neat to watch. :)
g.
--
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.
http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home.
Some people collect things for a hobby. Geeks collect hobbies.
ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment
A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes.
http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_!
2:50 p.m.
On 03/05/2013 02:23 PM, geneb wrote:
ing 9-wire printhead. I've only seen (and used) one.
The most interesting printer I've seen was an Epson MX-80 (I _think_).
What made it interesting was how it was driven. The print head had a
pin in the bottom of it that followed a spiral groove cut in a spinning
cylinder that went the width of the printer. Very neat to watch. :)
A lot of those types of things were used on narrow cash-register tape
type printers. One side to the other and back again.
There was a printer that was advertised that wrote using a stylus and
even had software to add a bit of randomization to the character
formation to emulate human handwriting. I don't recall the model.
Still, an old drum line printer would be pretty cool to have...
--Chuck
3:42 p.m.
It seems the main thing that impedes collecting printers is the same
thing that impedes people from collecting terminals: size and weight.
Printers tend to be even larger and heavier than terminals. Plus they
have associated consumables that may not be obtainable anymore. For
instance, Tektronix printers for storage tube terminals use a funky
silver-halide dry print process and the paper is now unobtainium and
has a short shelf life, even in ideal storage conditions.
Printing terminals tend to sit on ebay for a long time, unless they
are the portable thermal printing variety. When thermal fax machines
finally become obsolete, it will become very difficult to obtain paper
for those terminals as well. Right now you can use the fax machine
thermal paper rolls for those printing terminals, but there will come
a time when they're not making that paper even for fax machines.
Even printing terminals like the LA36, for which many DEC collectors
have a soft spot, don't sell very well on ebay. It could be because
the sellers ask too much money, but I suspect mostly it's due to the
fact that freight shipping is going to be required.
Teletypes have a soft spot in enough people's hearts that they are
willing to pay the expense of having them shipped. Flexowriters,
which I consider to be a kind of teletype on steroids, not so much,
apparently.
Maybe there are some printer collectors out there, but I haven't met
any. You could easily create a 'printers wiki' that would be as
expansive as the terminals wiki, based just on printers produced for
the PC market alone.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" free book
<http://tinyurl.com/d3d-pipeline>
The Computer Graphics Museum <http://computergraphicsmuseum.org>
The Terminals Wiki <http://terminals.classiccmp.org>
Legalize Adulthood! (my blog) <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>
6 Mar
6 Mar
2:12 a.m.
On 5 March 2013 23:42, Richard <legalize at xmission.com> wrote:
Printing terminals tend to sit on ebay for a long
time, unless they
are the portable thermal printing variety. When thermal fax machines
finally become obsolete, it will become very difficult to obtain paper
for those terminals as well. Right now you can use the fax machine
thermal paper rolls for those printing terminals, but there will come
a time when they're not making that paper even for fax machines.
I don't know about elsewhere, but in the UK it seems that the vast
majority of supermarket and similar receipt printers are thermal, so I
suspect that the paper itself will be manufactured for a good number
of years yet, even if finding the right roll size becomes harder. .
11:51 a.m.
In article <CAApARtuVMHJ5pz0OWzoCgV6q-H=pkt=kPtQFAPpizw-Ms+QU2Q at mail.gmail.com>,
Rob <robert at irrelevant.com> writes:
I don't know about elsewhere, but in the UK it
seems that the vast
majority of supermarket and similar receipt printers are thermal, so I
suspect that the paper itself will be manufactured for a good number
of years yet, even if finding the right roll size becomes harder. .
It won't be of any use unless it is in the fax-machine sized rolls.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" free book
<http://tinyurl.com/d3d-pipeline>
The Computer Graphics Museum <http://computergraphicsmuseum.org>
The Terminals Wiki <http://terminals.classiccmp.org>
Legalize Adulthood! (my blog) <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>
12:56 p.m.
On Wed, Mar 6, 2013 at 1:51 PM, Richard <legalize at xmission.com> wrote:
It won't be of any use unless it is in the
fax-machine sized rolls.
For now, at least, I pretty regularly find boxes of thermal fax paper,
unused or with one roll missing, at Goodwill and other thrift stores.
Naturally, me being a therminal fan and a stockpiler in general, I buy
them when they're a buck or two. I'm up to about 1.5 banker's boxes
full now. I figure they should keep indefinitely as long as they stay
out of the light.
--
jht
1:50 p.m.
On 03/05/2013 02:23 PM, geneb wrote:
ing 9-wire printhead. I've only seen (and used) one.
IIRC, the printer used in the HP Topcat calculators (HP91,92,95C,97,97S),
the HP41 priner (HP82143) and HPIL thermal printer (HP82162) used a coarse
leadscrew to move the head, but reversed the motor to move it back again.
The mechanism i nthe Sting (HP10, 19C) calculators and the IR thermal
printer (HP82440?) used the dual-thread leadscrew I mentioned last night
and always turend the motor the same way
The most interesting printer I've seen was an Epson MX-80 (I _think_).
What made it interesting was how it was driven. The print head had a
pin in the bottom of it that followed a spiral groove cut in a spinning
cylinder that went the width of the printer. Very neat to watch. :)
A lot of those types of things were used on narrow cash-register tape
type printers. One side to the other and back again.
There was a printer that was advertised that wrote using a stylus and
even had software to add a bit of randomization to the character
formation to emulate human handwriting. I don't recall the model.
Still, an old drum line printer would be pretty cool to have...
Indeed it would.
I half-seriusly collect printers -- ones with unusual mechansims or
printing methosds. Among them are :
HP7245. This is a thermal plotter/printer. It has a strange printhead
with 22 elements to print dot-matrix characters i nthe normal way and a
13th element to use as a 'pen'in plotting mode. In that mode the paper is
scroleld backand forth, the arriage moves back and forth and it plots vectors
Some odd Cewntronics thing where there's a continuusly driven belt
running across the chassis and a solenoid mechanims on the chrrriage that
crips eitehr the top run or bottom run of the belt to move the carriage
in onde direction or the other
Axiom EX820 II think). a 7 pin spark tpe printer using aluminiumised
paper Also the Raido Shack aluminum paper strip printer
Sanders 12/7 and 700. Sanders made soem interesting 7 pin printers where
the mechanism could move the head and paper precisely enough for _8_
passes fo th ehead to eb worth doing. The 12/7 uses a Sanders mechansim
and is controlled by a Z89 CPU, a souple of Z80 DMA chips and a state
machine. The 700 uses a Diablo 630 mechanism with a dot matrix printhead
on the carriage. It is controled by a Z80 and a pair of Z8s.
DEC LA100. The 9 pin printhead is shifted mechanically by a solenoid
mechanism to give an 18 pin reslution in 2 passes without moving the paper.
Olivetti 'Sparkjet'. This is an odd device. It electrostatically
transfers toner from a little glass-encased rod on the carriage to the
paper. Print-out qulaity is poor, but it is still an interesting object
Vesatec V80. An electrostatic matrix printer. It builts up a charge
image on specially coated ppaer (pased between a set of electrodes) and
then passes pliquid toner over the paper which is attraced to the
charaged parts.
That little Epson mechanism, used in the HX20 and elswhere which has 4
pins in a line on a shuttling carriage. It prints a line of dots,
advances the paper, prints another line of dots and so on.
Is that little Alps 4 pen thing (Radi Shack CGP115, etc) a printer or a
plotter? Anyway I have variosu versions of it.
Of course I ahev a few more normal printers in the collection too.
-tony
5 Mar
5 Mar
2:57 p.m.
The most interesting printer I've seen was an
Epson MX-80 (I _think_).
I thought that was the TX80. The same mechanism was used in the Commodore
2022 and 2023 printers IIRC
~
What made it interesting was how it was driven. The
print head had a pin
in the bottom of it that followed a spiral groove cut in a spinning
cylinder that went the width of the printer. Very neat to watch. :)
It's more complicated than that. There are 2 threads of differnet
pitches in that sylinder -- and of opposite handedness. The 'pin'
actually has a follower on theen. as the cylinder rotates -- always i
nthe same direction, the head moves on the finer pitch from left to right
and then o nteh coarser pitch from right to left to give a faster
carriage return (it only prints in one direction).
I have a couple of spare mechanisms for that printer somewhere.
-tony
6 Mar
6 Mar
4:13 a.m.
On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 10:57 PM, Tony Duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
A company I worked at modified the TX80 to colour becoming the CX80
We added a ribbon moving mechanism to the head and drove it from an
added interface board
where the serial/whatever interface went.
I do still have my Commodore version of the TX80
Dave Caroline
The most
interesting printer I've seen was an Epson MX-80 (I _think_).
I thought that was the TX80. The same mechanism was used in the Commodore
5 Mar
5 Mar
9:14 p.m.
On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:26 PM, Ethan Dicks <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote:
The ones for WPS systems were, IIRC, tabletop printers with a
largish (smalll lunchbox-sized) external PSU that tucked nicely
into the custom tables/cabinets. With room for paper, ribbons
and extra daisywheels.
I have this very combo in my storage unit, lonely and looking for a
home. It received it with my WP-78, so I was told it was a companion
for that system. The cabinet has a cut-out that fits the Diablo
daisywheel printer and a recognizably DEC PSU inside, as you say.
Unfortunately, it sat in a garage for 20+ years and the printer is
badly rusted and who-knows-what-else. The cabinet is probably
salvageable but not of much use, given the custom hole in the top.
Could always bolt another piece of wood on it, I suppose....
Anyone want it? (in Chicago area.)
j
9:41 p.m.
On Wed, Mar 6, 2013 at 12:14 AM, Jason T <silent700 at gmail.com> wrote:
On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:26 PM, Ethan Dicks
<ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote:
That sounds exactly like the one.
The ones for WPS systems were, IIRC, tabletop printers with a
largish (smalll lunchbox-sized) external PSU...
I have this very combo in my storage unit, lonely and looking for a
home. It received it with my WP-78, so I was told it was a companion
for that system. The cabinet has a cut-out that fits the Diablo
daisywheel printer and a recognizably DEC PSU inside, as you say. Unfortunately, it sat in a garage for 20+ years and
the printer is
badly rusted and who-knows-what-else.
:-(
The cabinet is probably salvageable but not of much
use,
given the custom hole in the top.
Could always bolt another piece of wood on it, I suppose....
Or install a good Diablo 630 in it.
Anyone want it? (in Chicago area.)
I'm not in the area, but I have a VT78 and no printer cabinet. How
rusty is it and how badly do you want to get it out?
-ethan
6 Mar
6 Mar
1:13 a.m.
On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 11:41 PM, Ethan Dicks <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> wrote:
I'm not in the area, but I have a VT78 and no
printer cabinet. How
rusty is it and how badly do you want to get it out?
IIRC, the cabinet is in fairly good shape. If you're interested, I
can take pics on the next trip to storage. Here is one photo of the
outside that I had forgotten I had when writing the earlier post:
https://picasaweb.google.com/102190732096693814506/BigDECPickUp#57499412265…
The white dust is just drywall from the garage and was brushed off
later. It's the inside of the printer where it gets nasty (mouse
house!)
I am moving storage units so it would be nice to not have to move this
piece, tho I expect I will be doing just that sometime soon, if the
alternative is to continue paying for the old storage just to hold
this thing. As you can see from rest of that gallery, I've got plenty
of restoration work ahead, after the last ice melts. A printer stand
is relatively low on the list.
--
jht
12:17 a.m.
In article <CAEfH1SEjt0vCM=XaAMm8ZPnhpKeP5ZRowYq+kYoxhVJYvExc-g at mail.gmail.com>,
Jason T <silent700 at gmail.com> writes:
Unfortunately, it sat in a garage for 20+ years and
the printer is
badly rusted and who-knows-what-else.
The thing with these largely mechanical pieces is that the rust and
lack of lubrication are generally conditions that can be reversed enough
to put the machine back into working order. The rust generally
results in cosmetic damage, but for many parts not enough damage to
prevent it from being put back into operation.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" free book
<http://tinyurl.com/d3d-pipeline>
The Computer Graphics Museum <http://computergraphicsmuseum.org>
The Terminals Wiki <http://terminals.classiccmp.org>
Legalize Adulthood! (my blog) <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>
3 Mar
3 Mar
11:54 p.m.
On 2013 Mar 3, at 10:47 PM, Arno Kletzander wrote:
Yep, I have to admit that I also collect printers, and not just one
series at that... I do have some rather common models as
"workhorses" (NEC P2200, LJ3, LJ4, -L, -M plus) or because I was
given them and couldn't bring myself to throwing them out yet (far
too many HP, Epson and Canon inkjets) but tend to focus on exots
and niche models otherwise - NEC CP7 and Star LC24 with their
multizone color ribbon, Citizen Overture and Sharp JX lasers which
very visibly are early copier descendents, two OKI linear LED array
printers, one of the infamous Tektronix "edible solid ink" power-
hogs (a 340 I think; wish I could scrounge up a few reasonably
priced ink sticks for that one, hint hint!), the "professional" HP
Deskjet 1200 and 1600 models. Also three thermo-transfer units for
various print sizes (all made by Mitsubishi, I think, two of them
large flat things close to 19" format, one smaller desktop unit),
which while primary intended for video still printing, also have
parallel in!
terfaces, but with consumables prohibitively costly for any kind
of operation).
What I'm missing yet is a "real" daisywheel printer (I have both a
Triumph-Adler and an IBM typewriter with bolt-on interface boards -
not that I would mind having a Diablo terminal at some time too),
any sort of High Speed Printer from the olden days (drum, chain,
belt, shuttle, or single-line needle) or truly esoteric stuff like
the (DataProducts) hydraulic driven needle printer our local
university collection has.
Glad to hear somebody is. What about teletypes as printing
mechanisms? I can think of three mechanisms offhand: the typewriter
style, the type block, and the type cylinder.
I had a selectric-mechanism printer-only (no keyboard) (was used for
printing airline tickets or boarding passes) 10 or 15 years ago,
which I threw out (regrettably).
Haven't even seen a daisy-wheel printer since about 1982.
4626
days inactive
4628
days old
21 comments
12 participants
participants (12)
-
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
Arno_1983＠gmx.de -
cclist＠sydex.com -
dave.thearchivist＠gmail.com -
ethan.dicks＠gmail.com -
geneb＠deltasoft.com -
hilpert＠cs.ubc.ca -
legalize＠xmission.com -
robert＠irrelevant.com -
silent700＠gmail.com -
useddec＠gmail.com -
wdonzelli＠gmail.com