Paul Irey once more proffers a bogus argument that Obama’s birth certificate is a forgery, and then leaves the country.
In what he calls an “incomplete study,” Paul Irey, amateur birther image sleuth, professional typewriter user, and newly minted American expatriate1, has pointed out yet another “anomaly” in Obama’s long form birth certificate that he thinks may be the “best yet.” Irey says:
… I feel that this particular evidence is impossible to refute.
Irey’s argument, in a nutshell, is that comparing Obama’s birth certificate to another example seems to indicate that the security paper pattern on one is a different size than the security paper pattern on the other. For your reference, here is the image Irey made to show his observation (click to enlarge):
The Hawaii Department of Health does not routinely issue birth certificates like the long form supplied to President Obama any more. It requires a special waiver. The “Alan” certificate was reportedly printed in 1998, and it was almost certainly made prior to the Department of Health adopting its 2001 policy to stop issuing photocopied certificates. That means 13 years elapsed between the creation of the two certificates, which hardly qualifies as “from the same period” as Irey describes it. I am not suggesting that the security paper changed in those 13 years because while possible, it is to my mind unlikely; however, the method of photocopying the book onto the paper, the copy machine and its settings are very likely to have changed.
Irey doesn’t actually explain his reasons, why he thinks the security paper in the two images should be the same. It looks like Irey did what I would have done for a first pass, “calibrate” by resizing the images to match up the printed text. If one does that (and I tested it myself), the Obama security paper basket weave pattern does appear smaller than that on the Alan certificate, and I get a result just like what Irey presents. That calibration method is valid if and only if the text used for calibration is the same size on both certificates. It turns out that it isn’t.
Doug Vogt states in Point 5 of his Washington State lawsuit affidavit, that the Obama certificate was reduced to 87.5% size before printing onto the security paper. The Alan certificate was also reduced before printing. I discovered this by taking a sheet of Simpson Design Secure™ paper, the paper that I believe is used by Hawaii to print birth certificates, and simply typing on it. I then scanned that text and adjusted the Alan certificate’s text to the same size. The pattern on the security paper in the Alan certificate appeared much larger than the real typewritten example, showing that the Alan certificate printing was reduced. How much? To get a number, I took the size of the clip of the Alan certificate I was using to match text. The width of the clip was 2774 pixels. Next, I reduced the size of the clip so that its security paper background matched that of the real typewriting on security paper scan, and the clip width became 1926. That is, the Alan image by my calculation was reduced to roughly 70% size before it was printed on security paper.
So naturally when you shrink Obama’s certificate down to match the smaller text of the Alan certificate. the pattern on the security paper background gets shrunk too—what we see in the Irey figure.
Irey doesn’t say how he calibrated his images, but it is clear that the text size ended up being the same for both. Since the Alan certificate was printed smaller than the Obama certificate, we should not expect the background security paper to match when shrunk to make the text the same size.
I haven’t done all the work there is to do on this, specifically trying to use the difference in printing size to see if the security paper background enlargement exactly matches what it should be based on my calculations. I only showed that it changed in the right direction. A thorough job would also verify Vogt’s number for Obama’s certificate.
1For more on Irey leaving the country, see my article: “Disgusted birther leaves country.”
Thanks for figuring out Irey’s argument and showing its flaws. It was clear that his methodology was bogus, but I was too lazy to figure out exactly how that tripped him up…
One obvious flaw I see in his graphic is that the horizontal gridlines on Obama’s BC are not parallel with the horizontal gridlines of the bottom section of his graphic. The bottom gridlines are clearly sloping upward. The analysis he did only works if the horizontal gridlines are parallel. I don’t think this explains the entire discrepancy he observed, but it shows that his analysis is sloppy.
According to Alan it was printed in 1998.
http://snarkybytes.com/2008/06/18/hawaii-birth-certificate-1963/
“UPDATE: This is a certified copy made in 1998. ”
Seems to me a more valid comparison would be the one the DOH created in March, 2011. That is likely the same paper and reduction.
Here’s another problem. The letters in the word ALAN are not all the same size. The L and N are bigger than the two A’s. Doesn’t that mean that the BC is a forgery? Vogt and Irey got that BC from Miki Booth, right? Didn’t Vogt name her as an accomplice in usurpery and massive fraudulent forgery. And Johanna’s BC is a forgery too, right? So he’s actually comparing three forged documents without any certified authentic document.
These guys are pretty far down the rabbit hole with all this nonsense.
Frankly, I don’t think that any kind of analytical explanation for the differences is particularly useful under any circumstances. There are just too many reasons for the differences to make this distinction worthy of serious consideration.
The bottom line is that the State of Hawaii has, on three separate occasions, verified that the pdf of the President’s LFBC posted on whitehouse.gov is accurate and authentic. The discussion essentially ends there no matter how many “anomalies” one can concoct.
No, the ALAN BC came from Alan. Booth’s son is named Alan. She gave Corsi her son’s BC.
So this BC belongs to someone named Alan who is no relation to Miki Booth?
Totally useless exercise, but of course anyone grasping at straws will point to this explanation as bulletproof. Of course the ability to resize an image to shrink or expand is pretty standard in any kind of image or document processing for the last 20 years.
I’ve got three copies of my marriage certificate. The first was obtained on the day of filing before there was a chance to scan or otherwise copy the original license to microfilm. It goes almost “full bleed” and is I believe was a 100% the size of the original. I got two later copies (both from scans), including one that was severely reduced in size and kind of hard to read. When I went for another copy, I specifically noted my issue with the last copy and they made sure it was sized larger.
I’ve also noted my kid’s California BC, obtained separately from three different agencies. Each one was obtained from a scan. I don’t know if the scan was a different size or if someone specifically reduced them, but in any case they’re all different sizes. Of course these were printed on standardized California banknote style paper. However, what’s preventing Hawaii from doing the same?
Also – the paper comes in far more than 8.5″x11″. No A4, but they have it various stocked sizes bigger than that. I’m pretty sure that they could custom make a size if the order is big enough. It’s not that I think it matters, but that argument is simply weak.
http://www.simpsonsecuritypapers.com/pdf/Stocked-Items-Sheets.pdf
It seems extended exposure to birtherism has made Irey even stupider than he was a couple of years ago when I destroyed his “wrong letter size” analysis on WND (after which he did some research as to who I am and even sent me a friend request on Facebook).
Of course the genius also doesn’t seem to realize that the paper won’t stay the same over time, possibly varying from batch to batch, and that they will use different copiers/printers over the years, and that no two of them will work the same. Little minor details the copier expert doesn’t seem aware of or to even begin to understand.
Given that it is security paper, I would think that it is made to exacting standards and that it will be uniform over time, but the copier would certainly change after 13 years.
Yes.
Here is the guy -ALAN
http://snarkybytes.com/2008/06/18/hawaii-birth-certificate-1963/
And here is Alan Booth
http://nativeborncitizen.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/boothbc1.jpg
Edith Coats’ 1985, Ah’Nee’s 1995, ALAN’s 1998, and Danae’s 2000 BCs are on security paper which is considerable smaller than 8.5 x 11 (registrar stamp had to be on back of form).
Alan Booth’s 1981 BC is on 8.5 x 11 paper.
Nice job Doc. I was thinking about doing a similar analysis but I see no need to do that now. Of course Irey left himself an out saying that the study is “incomplete”. I think “incomplete” applies to his other studies too.
Both Irey and Vogt may be somewhat familiar with graphics, typewriters, and copiers but they are stuck in the 80’s. They show a complete lack of knowledge of how modern office center equipment works (like the Xerox WorkCentre for example). Unfortunately for them they decided to display that ignorance on the Internet and in the courts.
How do you know the size of the paper? Obama’s 2007 short form is definitely on 8 1/2 x 11 paper, but the registrar’s stamp is on the back anyway,
I thought I was out of the bit-measuring debunking business, but I looked at this thing and realized the assumption Irey was making. I wrote the article and I just wasn’t satisfied that my argument was rigorous, so I tried to answer the question of how the measurement could be made without assuming anything beyond the Alan certificate being authentic, the security paper not changing and Simpson Design Secure being the paper used. I finally worked it out, and was able to come up with a rigorous debunking of Irey’s jaundiced interpretation of the evidence.
By the way, when I do debunking articles like this, I very definitely want to hear any criticisms folks might have. The purpose of these articles is to provide the objective facts and rigorous analysis of the evidence, not to make something that just sounds good, like the birthers do.
Paul Irey simply hasn’t thought this out. He seems to think that the green basketweave pattern is part-and-parcel of the text of the bc. No. The green pattern is on otherwise blank paper and the xerox-type equipment of the Health Dept prints its old black ink image of the bc on that new green paper. The green pattern is the same on both specimens but the size of the black ink image that was printed on the green paper is slightly different size. You’d probably get a similar variation if you printed the same Obama bc on two different days; the paper is the same but the magnification of the xerox printer (or of the photo image being printed by the xerox) is a trifle different.
Birthers stopped being interested in the truth, about five seconds after the truth came out. And I think the reason that bigger and more convoluted lies keep getting pimped out as “what really happened”, is due to the old adage of “The truth is stranger than fiction.”, I think that birthers took that saying literally, and just kept running with it.
His analysis is premised on some basic assumptions (explicit or implied):
1) The paper used it 8.5″x11″ green basketweave and neither the size nor the pattern dimension have changed.
2) The original form hasn’t changed in its dimensions and the certified copy was made from the original form and not perhaps something like microfilm.
3) The copying process is made with a photocopier with only a 1:1 reproduction.
The last one is the part that make no sense. My understanding is the BHO III BC was prepared by scanning the original document from the big book, then the parts that don’t go on a certified BC were trimmed out, and the remainder printed onto the security paper (twice). It seems pretty obvious that there was some reduction there. Also – my experience with vital records is that an employee these days can typically control the enlargement or reduction of a document at terminal. I’ve gotten anything from microscopic to edge to edge.
I feel sorry for whatever country that little turd ran away too.
I thought maybe you were making a sovcit joke by distinguishing between the BC belonging to ALAN vs. one belonging to Alan. LOL.
Here is Edith Coats’:
http://passportsusa.com/wp-content/gallery/passportusa/edith_front.jpg
http://passportsusa.com/wp-content/gallery/passportusa/edith_rear.jpg
That’s either not 8.5 x 11 or it’s being held by Sissy Hankshaw.
It is on green basket weave paper.
Feel sorrier for US. They will at least find it easy to expel him. He’ll be back.
OMG! Gorefan….you know what this means…..Another fake!
I’m pretty sure that has been trimmed, perhaps by the DOH.
The security pattern isn’t the same. It isn’t “basketweave” per se where it looks like interlocking patterns. It’s something else. There are consecutive ==||==||==, unlike the Simpson DesignSecure which has a =||=||= repeating pattern.
Good catch.
So why isn’t Alan Booth’s 1981 BC trimmed?
http://nativeborncitizen.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/boothbc1.jpg
And the registrar stamp is on the front.
Alan Booth’s paper looks to be different also.
Also – the Edith Coats BC has a stylized version (with dashes) of the Dept of Health seal. The very same type that many pointed to in the Obama’s 2007 BC as being fake since it didn’t match the detailed seal.
Can’t tell what it is due to lack of detail, but that’s my impression to. I mean – there’s no way that anything the choice of paper could possibly change, could it? That would just cause too much chaos. I mean – they never change the details, like changing from photostats to transcripts to photocopies to abstracts. Can’t. Possibly. Happen.
Or the sizes.
http://wtpotus.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/090728-nordyke-wnd-honolulu-advertiser.jpg
I don’t know, but I can offer an hypothesis:
It didn’t need to be.
There was a time back before the turn of the century when the DOH made Certified Copies by photocopying the original ‘vault’ document. Their procedures and equipment were finely tuned to photocopy exactly the information required and nothing more, at the correct magnification, on the correct paper. Probably the information that was not required was on a second page that was folded under during the photocopying process, or whatever. The significant point of this process for the question at hand is that each original ‘vault’ document needs to be ‘loose leaf’ for this process, not bound up in a binder with dozens or hundreds of other birth documents.
Sometime in the past, perhaps the 1990’s or early 2000’s all that information was put onto a computer database, and when a Birth Certificate was required they could just print it off that database. The physical original copy is no longer required to be loose leaf for any ‘reasonable’ purpose. In fact, they can all be preserved and protected much easier if they are, in fact, carefully bound in archive folios where individual documents are not subject to folding and tearing or coffee spillage or whatever. Importantly, the bound document is, for all practical purposes not required for the day to day operation of the DOH – it can be locked up in an archive facility off site somewhere for access by interested scholars in the 22nd century or whatever.
Now, many years later, someone wants a photocopy of that original ‘vault’ document. The ‘finely’ tuned process for preparing a perfect document, common years ago, is obsolete now, and the photocopy equipment has probably gone through two or more generational changes. The document is bound in a book, so the information that needs to be ‘hidden’ can no longer be easily hidden. The fact that it is in a book makes it impossible to get a ‘flat’ image. The conditions just no longer exist to make a copy in exactly the same way as the ‘ALAN’ certificate. The operator would have gone to a bit of trouble to make the Obama document look as good as possible – this is an ‘historic’ image that people will be looking at for a long time.
The Nordyke BCs also appear to have been in a bound book (curved left margin). They were produced in 1965.
Vogt makes this declaration by declaring that the horizontal ruled lines are ‘really’ 7″ long. Does anyone know what he bases that on?
Further, all the images of the BCs are trimmed. It’s a bit much to think all the BCs were perfectly consistently positioned when filmed.
Having declared the horizontal rules are suppoed to by 7″, he then simplistically measures the horizontal rules in the WH LFBC PDF, from the vertical line on the left to the crop on the right, and—ignoring the curvature—notes they are 6.125″. Don’t sweat the crop or any split pixels either. Just take his word for it, 6.125 is 87.5% of 7.
But … where did the 7″ come from?
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I also like where Irey says he was looking at a “known” forgery (Is this the Miki Booth thing again) He’s assuing her BC is also a forgery?), and was surprised that the WH LFBC PDF didn’t match (in his mind), his “known” forgery.
Well, gosh, what the heck would that prove? Genuine docs tend not to match forgeries … unless the forgery is too good 😛
If you really want to blow a PDF Madness sufferers mind, point out that the raised seal in the Alan BC and the WH LFBC PDF are both the same size, 1.6875″D. Then ask them how that’s possible 😛
That’s certainly how it’s been done in my experience with California vital records. The paper is always 8.5″x11″, but the size of the information can vary and even be adjusted by the clerk.
This shows a sample birth certificate form that would normally be filled out at a hospital:
http://fhop.ucsf.edu/fhop/docs/pdf/manuals/epibc05/35_sample_birth_cert.pdf
For those who have seen various California BCs for kids of celebrities, the part on the bottom that says “CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION FOR PUBLIC HEALTH USE ONLY” doesn’t show up. I remember when someone got Jon Huntsman Jr’s BC from San Mateo County, I noticed it had a detail that didn’t look like somewhat lower res digital scan (like my kid’s BCs) but that it showed detail like it was printed from microfilm. It did have various spots and smudges, so that reinforces my belief that it came from microfilm at some point. It could have also been copied from the microfilm but scanned as a high-res image that could be pulled from a computerized database. Most of my California vital records look like they were printed from a FAX machine to save storage space, but there’s no particular reason to scan at low res given how little it costs these days to store to hard drive (including redundant ones in case of a crash).
I am not sure if Y-P-W is agreeing with me or ridiculing me. I think the anomaly that has Paul Irey’s knickers in a twist is simply a very tiny variation of the sizes of the black ink image of the bc that is printed on the green security paper between the bc made for “alan” and the one made for Obama (presumably the green security paper used for the “Alan” bc is exactly the same as the paper used for the Obama bc – but if that paper has changed, even minutely — and there are different paper companies that sell green basketweave security paper — then the whole argument is superfluous).
Even if the printing equipment used now is incapable of being adjusted (or, at least, if it was exactly the same for both bcs), this variation is still possible when the original bcs were being photographed for digital storage. The tiniest difference in distance from the camera (even the difference between a page early in the stack or book of originals and a page much further down) could cause the variant we see in the xerox print on the green paper.
In short, Irey has shown us nothing of significance.
Doc, it’s obvious Irey overthought this one (well, duh, he’s a birfer). He played around with something, and after making an alteration, he notice a new relationship—one created by his own alteration!—and then naturally declared it something previously unnoticed.
Being a type guy, Irey is obsessed with the letterforms. He “calibrated” his images by scaling the preprinted type to match between the WH LFBC and the Alan Certificate. You can see that he has “CERTIFICATE OF BIRTH” scaled to match, and all other elements are aligned.
For some unfounded reason, he made the assumption that all of these BCs must be copied/printed at the same size (if they were, and all the images are purportedly simple scans, then why would scaling be required to get the print to match? duh.)
Having scaled one image, he noticed the security pattern didn’t match, thereby confirming … that they weren’t printed/copied onto the security paper at the same size. Duh.
Which is why he had to scale them to make them match.
(Gosh, I could swear I am going in circles.)
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Make 3 assumptions:
1. Despite the passage of time (1998-2011), the scale of the basketweave pattern has not changed.
2. When Alan scanned his BC, he simply laid the paper on a scanner, scanned, possibly cropped after scanning, and posted, no further scaling, etc.
3. When the WH scanned the LFBC, they simply placed on Xerox, scanned, and posted, no further scaling.
Alright, open the WH LFBC PDF, and place the Alan BC image on top of it. Move it around a bit and you’ll find that the security pattern in both images aligns quite nicely, no scaling needed. Being the products of two completely separate workflows, and requiring no manipulation on the part of the viewer, I’d say that pretty much nails that they are on the same paper (or the forger was spot on his scaling, hardehar).
Now, anything and everything I measure about the WH LFBC PDF puts it right about 3% larger than the image in the Alan BC. What does that prove? …. umm … nothing, other than consistency between the two.
You suggested that the Alan BC had been reduced, and I agree. I’d suggest it’s at 75% of its original size. The typewritten characters measured out to 9pt, which is 75% of 12; the smaller preprinted text is 6pt, which is 75% of 8. I’ve never seen a manual typewriter fitted out with 9pt type! Not to say they didn’t exist, but why assume these forms were being completed on unusual equipment? rather than common general purpose machines?
As for why Obama’s is slightly larger … slightly different workflow, of course, details of which are impossible to know. I would note however, that a common preset on modern copier is 78%, intended for copier legal pages to letter.
He was likely trying to play Catch-22.
If he finds one LFBC that the Obama LFBC does not match in size, he declares that LFBC legit and “therefore” Obama’s a forgery.
If he finds one LFBC that Obama’s LFBC matches in size, he declares that LFBC a forgery and “therefore” Obama’s a forgery.
I fondly remember Irey making both the “different … means forgery” and the “identical … means forgery” claims about different aspects of the LFBC, so yeah, Catch-22 is his favourite game.
This is the almost inevitable result of failing to use a scientific methodology—you have no way to objectively assess the significance of the relationships you discover.
I miss John Woodman.
It still comes back to the fact that you can’t compare a multi-generational copy to another copy and prove anything.
He never actually says, but I may have managed to reverse engineer it here. Basic calculation to find the scale factor: count the number of pixels between form lines, and divide by 1/3rd the resolution. For the Obama LFBC, this was ~44 pixels on the 150 ppi background image, or 44/(150/3) = 44/50 = 88%. A similar measurement could be done to the Alan LFBC to find out its scale factor.
It is of no concern
Neither really. Just pointing out the absurdity of Irey’s assumptions.
I understand that a good attorney would always look at how his arguments might be countered and abandon an argument that can be easily countered. That he assumes the workflow to produce the document can’t include an enlargement or reduction is just absurd in advancing his argument. Or that the HDOH was purely using a machine in copy mode can’t really be assumed. He should have abandoned this exercise rather than make himself look silly. I’ve noted that I’ve had a vital record where the info was like a shrunken head. I have three different versions of my kid’s BC that are of different sizes. Being able to adjust the proportion is basic to modern copier/printing workflow.
Of course I prefer that a document fill up as much of the page as possible, but my printer has margins where it just can’t print. So when the result trims the info on the margins, I make it “fit to page”. And if I were at the HDOH doing this, I probably would have used a scanner, trimmed the confidential info, and then fit the remaining info onto the page. That’s how a lot of people assumed happened.
Don’t confuse me with the facts.
But it ties in with the absurd standard that Zullo set some time ago, that Obots should prove that a “single press of a button” could generate the LFBC PDF.
I assume that he implied the involved machine must run on factory settings since anything else would allow one to relay all other button pushes to the preparation stage.
So setting the copy size to 87.5% (or whatever) would not be allowed in Birtherverse because that can’t possibly have happened.
A simple bit of work and a common sense assumption. Excepting the first row (the one for name), all of the rows completed by type are the same height. Simply measuring in a vector app, they are .292″ – .294″. Right around 88% of 2 picas … not 87.5%. There’s only so much accuracy possible in a pixelated image. The measurement is based on an assumption, but all the type does seem to be consistently aligned (except for the ‘x’s in various checkboxes) and it would be nice to think the typist had an easy time of things … but typewriters also had a lot of spacing options.
But Irey makes no reference to any of that. He simply states, “Me and Doug Vogt figured out the line was really 7”. No proof, no demonstration, nothing, just a claim.
I’d like to know because they always do things in the most ridiculous way possible, and I’m missing out on a good laugh here 😀
this reminds me of Hermitian who claimed to have worked in a modern work environment but claimed they couldn’t scan to email. come to find out the last time he worked in an office was in the early 1990s
I think the county of my birth still does that. The last time I got a copy it looked like a photocopy off a quarter of a page document.
Exactly, they are three peas in a pod. They are close-minded know-it-all Obama haters who are not open to rational discussion. Their delusions over Obama has led them to make embarrassingly preposterous claims.
They are guilty of the the logical fallacy of assuming the conclusion. In this case the conclusion they assumed was ridiculous.
To be fair, he also detailed his kickass, suh-weet home office, which is built around a poorly-reviewed $400 Canon all-in-one. How dare you question whether he has relevant experience.
I’ve got one of those. However, I got it on sale for $150. On top of that it prints crooked and scans kind of crooked. Also – a few pieces have fallen off. Still – it works pretty reliably otherwise, and for the most part has no issues with aftermarket refilled cartridges.
I’ve got a $200 Brother MFC – works beautifully in all regards. This one is my third. The first one I destroyed with after-market cartridges – I refuse to use them anymore. The second one is looking for a good home after I replaced it with one that does duplex and handles A3 paper.
I also have a $500 HP Color LaserJet which works great in all regards. After market toner cartridges INVARIABLY leak toner all over the inside which requires an extensive cleanup. Again, I refuse to use after market toner cartridges, which is very unfortunate because the printer is now about 6 years old and genuine cartridges are getting harder to find. It may soon have to go to the print shop in the sky for no good reason other than the cartridges are too expensive.
I bought a Brother MFC years ago, but never quite figured out how to use the scanner. That one had a two-part cartridge. There was the drum unit and a toner-only refill. That was supposed to save money with a toner replacement about $25 and the original drum unit was supposed to last about 10,000 pages. It was a full-fledged drum unit, but the starter toner was maybe rated for a quarter the capacity of a full unit.
I ended up having to replace the drum unit early when it started streaking. Cost about $125, but that was on sale via Toshiba Direct.
Still better than the Epson color inkjet printer my wife wanted because it was on sale for $50. Yeah it’s $50, but then you need to price the cartridges that only print maybe 300 pages tops. Also – the cartridges dry out if you don’t use them. Also – there needs to be three expensive and active color cartridge installed or it doesn’t work – even printing B&W. You can’t install black only. The design is all part of their marketing.
I use a Brother MFC too! I love the sheet-fed double-sided scanner, and the included PDF software does MRC compression. Who knew?
I never figured out how to use all that software. It was easy to get the printing up and running.
I haven’t bothered to learn how to use any other scanning software other than OS X Image Capture. It’s the same tool that I use to backup photos from an iPad or iPhone. The scanner software is simple and not terribly powerful, but perfectly adequate for our needs. And our needs including my nagging me to scan a document because she can’t figure out how to do it.
However, having used Image Capture and Preview to scan an manipulate documents, that did come in handy when discussing the LFBC PDF from the White House.
Well, I did, for one – but I kinda doubted the White House used an old MFC-5460CN to make the PDF so I kept out of that discussion for the most part. 😉
The only problem I had with it is that the FAX function didn’t play nice with my Phone Answering System. My new one isn’t parked near a phone line anyway.
When I got the new one, I looked all over Melbourne for the model with the duplex scanner. They were more rare than Unobtanium – so I settled for the single sided scanner but duplex printing. Its got an A3 size scanning bed though, so I can finally scan in LP album covers to my collection database.
EDIT: Oh yeah, I forgot to add, the one week after I bought the single sided scanner model, every shop in town had the double-sided scanner models. Razzacraps.
Yep. I think our pal Herms got swindled at a Staples.
Since we’re all detailing on home printing presses, I’ve been using a Xerox Phaser 6130 for … uh … a long time now. 7yrs? Color laser printer for only $240! Unfortunately only letter tho. Aftermarket toner works like a charm, for less than $20/pop for cartridges rated at 5000pgs. I rarely print at home, but when I need to, it never lets me down. I actually had to replace a cartridge last month, and had to blow dust off the box and remind myself how to go about it!
And for a scanner … I keep a decrepit Epson Stylus around. Yanked its printer guts long ago. Home inkjet printers are disposable, single use items, IMO. If they weren’t meant to be disposable, they wouldn’t suck so bad, right?
For another angle that endorses 88% … a rectangle .88″ wide nicely encapsulates 12 typewritten characters on the WH LFBC, and the typewritten characters strongly resemble Smith-Corona Elite type, which was 12 characters / inch.
Smith-Corona’s Elite faces had very distinctive punctuations marks and symbols … unfortunately non of which were needed on the WH LFBC. Other than the ‘8’s, all the other characters are spot-on matches. The ‘8’s on the LFBC are very symmetrical, the ‘8’s from the Smith-Corona samples I have are slightly bottom-heavy ‘snowmen’.
That’s why they’re usually cheaper than a new set of ink cartridges (which my gf is going through like crazy, I affectionately call her “my little Internet printer”).
I just got a heavy-duty laser printer my company had written off, a $2,000 device that had only printed about 3,000 pages and which I got for about $100. Hopefully this will ease costs a bit. 🙂
Unfortunately, it’s not a Xerox WorkCentre. 😉
This is just not correct. It is understandable and a common enough misunderstanding, but wrong none-the-less.
All printers (laser or inkjet) come with starter cartridges that are loaded to perhaps 30% of capacity.
The cheapest printer on one Australian site is the HP OfficeJet 6100 for $125. A complete set of high capacity cartridges cost less than $60. You would be throwing your money away if you treated that printer as disposable. You would essentially be paying $125 for a set of low capacity toner cartridges.
Another site has a Canon PIXMA iP7260 for $114. A complete set of high capacity cartridges is a bit dearer than the HP at $90 – but you get two black cartridges in the set. Again the cost ratio for the second set makes the cynical ‘disposable’ myth a failure.
Having said that, it is absolutely clear that manufacturers are into making lots of money off the consumables. Printer manufacturers are hardly the first to conceive of this; are you old enough to remember those quaint little boxy things they used to call a ‘camera’? Consumer grade cameras were certainly cheap, but then you had to pay for the film and then pay again to have it developed. The original consumer grade cameras all used similar film rolls – different sizes maybe, but every camera whether Kodak or Canon or Minolta or whatever that used the same size used the same roll. After a while it was only 35mm cameras (and larger) that used standard film cans. The consumer machines all used different proprietary cartridges.
People never thought it reasonable to throw out a Box Brownie when they had finished the starter roll, why is this idea of a disposable printer got such long legs?
And another thing.
Those inkjet prices I quoted above were for genuine OEM cartridges. Obviously aftermarket refills and remanufactured cartridges would be cheaper.
Most manufacturers try to warn you off the after market stuff and most people would agree that that is mostly to protect their own revenue stream.
However, my experience has been that I have not found a reliable after market supply for either my Brother cartridges or my HP toner cartridges.
My first Brother printer was ruined by the after market cartridges and the supplier naturally rejected any responsibility. I am not willing to experiment to see if they are any better now.
I used to use after market toner cartridges for my old HP 4+ laser printer. They worked great ( and that was a great printer – albeit slow and not duplex). On the other hand I cannot use after market toner in my new HP Color printer – every single cartridge I have tried has leaked all over the inside of the printer requiring hours of clean up. Again the supplier won’t take responsibility to even replace the faulty cartridge even when confronted by the obviously leaking but undamaged cartridge.
A lot of people have lots of luck with third party consumables; I haven’t. If they work for you, great; but there is definately something to the warnings about using OEM consumables.
I don’t consider my printer to be disposable, but I was in for a surprise when I had to replace it. I’ve used a Brother laser printer for several years. Earlier this year, it started to malfunction. I was able to get Brother technical support on the phone and we tried to reboot it, but it became apparent that the motherboard was fried, probably during a thunderstorm. So I went looking for a replacement with which I could use the stock of laser cartridges that I had on hand. I came to find out that none of Brother’s current printers can use those cartridges. When they come out with a new line of printers, they all require new sizes of cartridges.
When I get around it, I am going to try to sell the unopened cartridges on eBay.
Yes. All manufacturers do that. For exactly the same reason that Kodak changed film cartridge design constantly.
And have you ever used razor blades? Once upon a time, after we stopped using cut-throat razors, everybody used single edged injector blades. Then Wilkinson Steel invented the double edged safety razor and everybody used those for decades. Then BIC (I think it was) developed the disposable razor cartridge with an attached handle. Other manufacturers adopted the razor cartridge to fit their own handle and for a while the click on cartridge was relatively industry standard, so you could keep the handle that you liked and just buy the best value cartridge. Now every manufacturer has a proprietary click on mechanism and they replace that click on mechanism every few months so you have to buy a new handle too.
The most egregious example of the razor substitution trick was when BIC started making their disposable razors using pink plastic, advertised them as being ‘especially designed for Women’ and charged 3 times (or more) what they charged for yellow plastic ones (‘for Men’). The only difference was the plastic color.
About a year ago I went back to using a double edged safety razor. I hadn’t even been aware of the fact that they were still being made. No only are they far less expensive than double and triple blade cartridges, they give me a closer shave. I use Wilkinson blades. You can buy a package of 100 blades for $20.00.
My handle cost like $200 and I’ve been using it for 10 years now. I’m using Gillette Mach 3. They tried to get everyone to buy quintuple blade cartridges but it must’ve been such a failure that they even made specific ads to tell people how much their own triple cartridges suck in comparison. Still no success, now they’re back to promoting the Mach 3 again. 🙂
Couple years ago I owned HP’s entry model which cost about 50 EUR here. A full set of colour+black cartridges cost about 60 EUR back then.
Of course I was exaggerating a bit (my current printer costs about 130 EUR and a full set of colour+black cartridges about 50 EUR), but still it makes the printer pretty disposable, given you can always cheaply replace your 1 year old model with a fresh new one for little money.
Whoa, Keith! I didn’t mean to contribute to the onset of a tirade! My disrespect of consumer inkjets wasn’t a reference to the cost of ink, but the stability and reliability of the technology, and the overall cost of ownership. The low-end of the inkjet market is an extortionate business model. Low cost of entry, with higher and frequent follow-on costs that encourage consumers to throw more good money after bad. I say this based on 20 years of experience with inkjets, and it’s gotten worse over time.
Our first inkjet was relatively robust, lasted 5 years, before suffering a mechanical failure, repair not cost-effective. After that, I suffered through a string of inkjets, various makes. The reason I say they are basically single use is because of my habits. I don’t print often, but then I do occasionally have a need to print a LOT in a short time. With each of these inkjets, I would discover that while they’ve sat unneeded for a while, their ink has hardened, their nozzles have clogged, the head has misaligned, or some gear, belt, or pulley has disintegrated. Being a good consumer, I expect a printed page when I click ‘print’, not a technological PITA. When they are working, their ink is rated in mere hundreds of pages.
Now, there are good inkjets, but they’re costly. I’ve had the privilege of using Epson hexachromes, and dye-subs … they produce beautiful results, but are very costly to operate.
The cost of laser printers has come way down over the past several years. Their cost of operation is a tenth of an inkjet. They’re shifting over to the same model, seeing each printer sold as a new income stream. So long as the printers are less prone to breakdown, and the toner is rated in 1000s of pages, it’s very much with the higher costs … higher costs which are less frequently paid.
Yesterday, I saw a new Canon Pixma inkjet going to $39. Buyer beware. It’s a great single-use deal. Print and flush!
I got my hands on a dimensioned type sample from a Smith-Corona 12. I scaled it to 100%, and scaled the WH LFBC to 100% (that is, blowing it up to 113.64%, on the assumption it is at 88%).
The typewritten characters matched beautifully. 88% it is.
I think someone showed that the typewriter used for the LFBC was an Underwood standard.
They based in on the fact that the Underwood was the only typewriter to produce an “8” with a little serif on the top. Looks like a cocked hat. Both of the “8”s on the LFBC have the same serif.
http://typewriterdatabase.com/img/tUnderwood%20_2469_1398740477.jpg
http://typewriterdatabase.com/img/tUnderwood%20_2589_1402449711.jpg
Yes, you can always replace your printer. It is still not cost effective to replace it after running down the starter cartridges, even at that $50 to $60 cost. The starter cartridges are only filled to about 30%.
We certainly have no argument there.
Yes, cartridges have a shelf life.
I can certainly understand your frustration with them if you don’t use the printer for years at a time. Even just sitting around ‘doing nothing’ the ink runs out during due to its cleaning cycle though. That should keep them operational as long as you don’t leave it forever till it runs dry – unless you unplug them, of course.
It occurs to me that paint brushes are even more ‘disposable’ but most people I know clean them carefully and put them away for future use. That way they don’t complain that they are full of dried paint next time they try to use them.
Laser cartridges don’t have that problem, but toner cartridges are not cheap. My HP 2605 cartridges are currently in the $120 per color range and climbing. They even changed the code number a couple of years ago from something apparently complicated like ‘Q6000’ to something apparently easy like ‘124A’ – what could possibly be the point of that – makes no sense.
Thanks, Gorefan! That does ring a faint bell. Those are the distinctive ‘8’s. Unfortunately, the source I was getting dimensioned type samples from doesn’t have any Underwood Elite models, only Picas.