> On Oct 13, 2015, at 12:13 PM, Mark J. Blair <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>> On Oct 12, 2015, at 23:42, Ethan Dicks <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> On Mon, Oct 12, 2015 at 11:32 PM, Nigel Williams
>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>> Has anyone ever seen one? I had an idea it used a silvered-paper and
>>> burned it off? or am I mis-remembering.
>>
>> I used one in the early 1980s but I never had to repair it. It was,
>> as Tony and others have mentioned, electrolytic, not thermal. I don't
>> know the details of the process either, but I remember the wet wick
>> and having to wait for the paper to dry.
>
> I wonder if the wet-paper printer that you remember used a similar process to
> the one that my folks' liquid toner photocopier did back in the 80s? It used
> an electrostatic toner adhesion process followed by a fuser. Just like
> contemporary laser printers and photocopiers, but with the toner particles
> suspended in a liquid carrier. The volatile carrier smelled awful, and the
> finished copies had a fingernails-on-chalkboard like gritty feel in the
> hands. I seem to recall that it needed specially prepared paper.
That sounds correct. Versatec made printers that used that process, I used one
(attached to the CDC 6500 at U of Illinois PLATO). Very nice for continuous
roll full bitmap graphics.
paul
