【Oki Electric】 Oki Electro Printer

In 1972, Oki Electro Printer, based on a completely new principle, was released. It had the following features:

1) Extremely high speed of 8000 line/min.

2) No need to use special paper.

3) Low printing noise

4) Kanji (Chinese characters) and graphics could be printed.

5) Fewer mechanical moving parts.

In terms of its principle of operation, Oki Electro Printer printed on paper by depositing an ion stream controlled by an electric field onto an ink mist. The printer used corona discharge produced by applying a voltage of a few thousand volts to an extremely fine conductor, thereby ionizing molecules such as oxygen and nitrogen in the air around the conductor. On the other hand, ink was agitated using ultrasound, creating a mist of 5-20μ ink drops, and these drifted through the air. These were then sent out by air pressure between the platen and corona source at almost the same speed and in the same direction as paper feed. The ions moved into this ink mist, attaching themselves to the mist particles, moving in the direction created by the electrostatic force and mist stream, and attaching to paper placed in the interval with the platen, thereby achieving printing.