Need source for FRESH #8755 ribbon for my Epson FX100 printer

You might try giving the ribbon a light spray of WD40 or something similar. I do mean very light. The old ink will often dry out,but some fresh oil will bring it back to life.

YOu may also try searching for reinkers. There used to be lots of them and ink around years ago before the ink jet printers.

I once found a dot matrix printer that was worth keeping for some reason, maybe it had a serial port or maybe it wsa the 24pin printer, but when I went looking for a ribbon cartridge, no luck.

I picked one about the right size, and transplanted the ribbone from one to the old cartridge. And that worked, but it wsa messy, keeping things lined up properly. They weren't on a roll, the ribbon was just filling the space in the plastic cartridge.

Michael

You old ancient dinosaur. Plus too cheap to buy a simple hundred buck monoc hrome LASER printer. You probably still got the first dollar you even made. But we loves ya anyway.

But really, I have heard of people trying to re-ink those ribbons, and for typewriters as well. Some I think had some success.

If it uses a plastic ribbon which IIRC the IBM Selectric did, no dice, but a cloth ribbon should be doable.

What keeps the ink dry is that it is all packed on the roll and not really exposed to the air much. Remember typewriters that would not type right awa y but after you type a while which advances the ribbon or you just grab it and advance it by hand it works fine ? So if you do this it has to go on th at spool fairly tight.

Damn, you make me feel old. Back in the annals of my memory seems to be som eone who needed a ribbon and took just half of the ribbon from another type writer so they would both work.

Kids today, you show them a dial phone and they have no clue, can you imagi ne showing them that typewriter shit ?

But seriously, if you are the type who does not print every day, do not but an inkjet printer. If they sit too long the heads block up. I used to have an HP 1100+ that I really liked, just black and white but when I hit print it printed right now and that could be after sitting a month, and it was q uiet.

Then I bought an HP CM1312MFP and I am sorry. These pricks don't even give you a full load of toner and a full set of toner cartridges is $280. The wh ole thing was $500 new.

One question though, does it use that tractor feed paper with the holes in the sides ? If so, can you actually still get that ? Or do you have a basem entfull (new word alert) of it somewhere ?

Anyway, if you decide to re-ink, I am pretty sure that ink is not the same as ink for an inkjet printer. (which is more expensive than gold) What you probably want it the type used to re-ink ink pads like for rubber stamps. O r simple printer's ink like for the newspaper or something. Not inkjet ink, you'll have to mortgage the house to get enough of that.

The ink for the old printers was very inexpensive. I used to buy some from the NCR that was about $ 3 for a tube that looked like a toothpaste tube. Only took a small ammount for the old teletype ribbons and later for my Okidata 82 that used the same type of ribbon. Unless you know someone that has some old stock I doubt you will find it. NCR K-575F ink. That is for the black. They made some purple or some such color that had a similar number.

Do not use stamp pad ink. It contains a fine abrasive that works to keep the rubber face in good condition. it will eat the pin guides in an impact printhead.

OHHH, this explains a LOT! Wish I knew that 30 years ago!

Thanks,

Jon

I bought a used re-inker about 25 years ago and the manual had that warning. It said that some type of clay was used in stamp pad ink. The ink they sold was cheaper, and denser. It had a hollow post with a tiny hole in the side. A clock motor turned the feed inside the cartridge, as a streak of ink was applied to the center of the ribbon. By the time it has made one full loop, the ink has spread across most of the width of the nylon fabric.