Thermal A4 printer?

[Refueler]

Inkjets have 'ink baths' that the head sits in while idle .... every few years they need changing as the foam pad fills with ink. In fact with most printers now - they can be not much more money to buy new instead of faffing about changing the ink bath !!

Many years ago - there used to be a dot-matrix printer that was flat / square and the notebook computer sat on top of it ... you fed the A4 paper in at the back and it came out the front ...
Battery powered.

 

[PaulRainbow]

Inkjets have 'ink baths' that the head sits in while idle .... every few years they need changing as the foam pad fills with ink. In fact with most printers now - they can be not much more money to buy new instead of faffing about changing the ink bath !!

The vast majority of consumer level inkjet printers have the print heads built into the cartridge these days.

 

[ithet]

So here is an example of what I am asking about:

Thermal Printer Amazon

 

[Graham376]

I have the same issue and have not found a solution yet. Printers are either good and big or useless and small there doesn’t seem to be a useful small one

I tried various thermal printers years ago, as well as small portables, non were much good and thermal images faded quickly. Have been using an HP 3760 for the last few years on board and it does what I need. Size (front to back) is roughly half that of the lift lid 3 in 1 types and runs fine through small inverter. Only copies/scans single sheets.

 

[Petertheking1982]

Just wondering about the mechanics of it.

Say I’m on a long trip, maybe round UK, in the morning I’d want to print out smaller sub-area of a chart, just to cover that day’s leg.

To do routine plots of my position on the print-out though, I’d need suitable lat/long scale along the edges.

Would there be any charting software that supports this - custom mini-charts of a chosen area complete with lat/long scales?

Memory map does this.

 

[RogerJolly]

Memory map does this.

That's cool thanks. Already have Memory Map land maps - can check it out.

 

[ylop]

The Amazon link for the matching paper (there may be other options) is £1.26 per page… as opposed to my local tescos where I pay £0.01 per page for plain paper that works in most other printers!

 

[Refueler]

The vast majority of consumer level inkjet printers have the print heads built into the cartridge these days.

Only a few actually .... its still prevalent for cartridges to be inserted into the mechanism to feed the head ....

I have an Epson .. a Canon .... on the desk to my left in service ... both have separate colour cartridges that then feed the head. Both are recent current models.

I have various other printers .. Lexmark etc that I no longer use - but are same separate cartridges to head ...

 

[lustyd]

are dried up ink cartridges still a common problem? I’ve not had that issue in a long time and assumed the makers had solved it?

Yes very much so. Once the tape is removed or the needle pierces it the ink is open to the atmosphere and will evaporate. Being mostly digital this drives me insane as I’ve only ever had about 5-10 pages from a cartridge. For home I’ve now moved to laserjet but that’s not practical for a boat

 

[westernman]

I have in the drawer another Citizen printer that is designed for portable ... about the size of a 200 cigarette block. It uses pressure transfer tapes ... but no longer works with todays windows versions / PC's as it uses the old parallel plug etc.

Its a virtual 64pin - so the fineness of print detail was really good - but what let it down were the tapes ... you could buy single use tapes or multi's ... single use - if you tried to use a second time - letters etc would have bits missing. The multi tapes gave very weak print as the 'ink' was harder so it didn't transfer all in one go ... you could get about 3 or 4 passes of the tape before it was binned.

I got fed up buying tapes - which of course would be very hard to find now - but first you'd need to get an old PC to use it with !!

Would this do the job??

Amazon.co.uk

 

[Refueler]

Would this do the job??

Amazon.co.uk

I tried adaptors - they didn't work ... but anyway the killer is no longer able to get the tapes for it ...

 

[Dagnall]

I see these small portable A4 thermal printers advertised for under £100 (under £50 on AliExpress or Temu). Thinking of one for being able to get a quick B&W print out on board, not for major documents or anything that would need keeping. Has anyone any experience? I know the portable inkjets are a better solution, but they are well over twice the price these days.

I used a cheap 55mm wide battery operated thermal printer to print out passage plans from PC and Neptune Navigation planner (now sadly gone). It was supposed to be bluetooth, but was hard to get that working.
I eventually used it USB. But I had the devil of a time getting sensible prints. I eventually set the driver to print sideways so I got effectively strips of A4 wide paper coming out "sideways". Paper is easy to buy and cheap. I just got a box of 20(?) rolls, and still have plenty left.
I could then use these 'on passage' as they had eta at various WP.
HOWEVER (big However!) It was a pain to have so many electronics boxes and since Neptune have discontinued I have decided to go totally IOS and avoid having to take a PC as well as tablet and phone.
Ios do not have Sw that can do the same Neptune planning job, so I have to get by with other apps and pen and paper.
(Before the small thermal printer I kept a dedicated cheap HP inkjet on the boat for the same task, and fed it from a tiny 50W 12V to mains adapter. I think the USB cable I ran from its storage space to the chart table is still in place! ) -
My recommendation would be to buy a £50 inkjet and try to find the space. For a bit more the new printers with wifi might be better than running cables. This was probably the best iteration of that PC based system, with a tiny PC tablet. (Printer sadly in this shot!)

 

[ithet]

The Amazon link for the matching paper (there may be other options) is £1.26 per page… as opposed to my local tescos where I pay £0.01 per page for plain paper that works in most other printers!

Er, the Brother paper is £14.99 for 100 sheets and other paper is £10 per 100. And no ink to add.

The cheap mains inkjets are a no go for me onboard and the portables are expensive. Was looking for an alternative. It doesn't have to be good but it does need to work.

 

[Petertheking1982]

That's cool thanks. Already have Memory Map land maps - can check it out.

The print option costs an extra couple of quid, but i have used it to print my own maps and charts for 20 odd years, saved me hundreds and a4 size easy to laminate. You can also make custom passage plan templates and print your routes in a text list format. I also like the interface customisation on the apps.

 

[ylop]

Er, the Brother paper is £14.99 for 100 sheets and other paper is £10 per 100. And no ink to add.

The cheap mains inkjets are a no go for me onboard and the portables are expensive. Was looking for an alternative. It doesn't have to be good but it does need to work.

That seems more logical. Amazon seemed to be promoting me a “people also buy this” link for £12.60 which said it was for 10 sheets but that must be a typo and it was 100!

 

[Daverw]

I’ve bought one of the small thermal a4 roll printers to use on board for our upcoming round Britain, just wanted something to use for passage notes etc, it’s small and regarchabke battery, works via app on phone or iPad, it’s works well for what I plan to use it for. Paper rolls not to costly for small use. Any other printer too big to have on board with ink drying up and paper to be stored as well but would be the ideal otherwise.

 

[ithet]

I’ve bought one of the small thermal a4 roll printers to use on board for our upcoming round Britain, just wanted something to use for passage notes etc, it’s small and regarchabke battery, works via app on phone or iPad, it’s works well for what I plan to use it for. Paper rolls not to costly for small use. Any other printer too big to have on board with ink drying up and paper to be stored as well but would be the ideal otherwise.

Thanks Daverw. That's exactly the information I was looking for. Do you have a link for the one you bought?

 

[Daverw]

Thanks Daverw. That's exactly the information I was looking for. Do you have a link for the one you bought?

This is the one I bought
Amazon.co.uk