Remember when you were a kid (if you aren't still) you used to try to burn paper with a magnifying glass. it would finally start becoming this brown color and then finally ignite. I'm sure a small amount of heat wouldn't cause the paper to catch on fire, and there could be ways to prevent one, if one actually starts for some reason (paper caught).

Think of all the ink that would save.
-- pashute, Oct 18 2002

Excellent idea. 'Document Burner.' Very dependent on the type of paper used.

Would save ink, but blow power?
-- General Washington, Oct 18 2002


Flintstones, meet the Flintstones
They're a modern stone-age family...
From the - town of Bedrock
They're a page right out of history

I'm a singing fool tonight!
-- thumbwax, Oct 18 2002


Let's ride, to the bakery down the um, splinter
Through the - courtesy of Rod's printer
When you're, with the Flintstones
Have a yabba, dabba, doo time
A dabba doo time
We'll have a gay* - old time!

*Not that there's anything wrong with that
-- thumbwax, Oct 18 2002


"Agh - I've got a *really* important document to print and the sun's just gone behind a cloud!"
-- hippo, Oct 18 2002


Many cash register receipt printers already do this. They don't burn the paper, but they use a special paper coated with very thermally sensitive ink.
-- Freefall, Nov 09 2004


The IR-printer is not a solar one. I just brought that as an example of how simple non-coated paper behaves.

So the IR-printer will look just like a regular printer, and will work with regular paper. (Of course it can only print black and white)
-- pashute, Mar 10 2006


//not a solar one// I think [hippo] relises that, and is just messin' widja.

I imagine it would use a laser. Wouldn't necessarily have to be infra-red - just whatever wavelength is cheap to produce and is absorbed well enough by paper. You could consider a CO2 or N2 atmosphere to reduce fire risk; even a post-hoc one where gas is released when fire is detected.
-- spidermother, Mar 10 2006


//Of course it can only print black and white// Or shades of brown, more likely.
-- coprocephalous, Mar 10 2006


@Steve deGroof - :)
-- rubyminky, Mar 10 2006


As you see in the Wikipedia: "...selectively heating coated thermochromic paper..."

There's NO reason this shouldnt work on regular paper.
-- pashute, Mar 21 2006


I knew someone had to have had this scheme. I am glad it was pashute. So a bun for pashute and my 2 cents.

Cheap things: air, water, electricity. Not ink or toner.

The risk of this scheme is that the paper catches fire. It is likely to make some smoke. Also I worry that heat adequate to make a black spot would be enough to make adjacent spots tan and that means blurry letters.

The printer could be hooked to the water supply and dampen paper, to reduce kindling and confine spread of heat / charring. Focal charring should be just fine. One could also have a hookah-like water filter to purge smoke from the exhaust.
-- bungston, Aug 16 2016


Lazers, schmazers. The way to do this up is an LED screen so bright that on powering it up it could burn the reverse of the image onto the adjacent paper.
-- bungston, Aug 16 2016


Err. use lemon juice as an ink, then just heat documents up when you want to read them?
-- not_morrison_rm, Aug 16 2016


This is how I used to think laser printers worked, when I was little.
-- notexactly, Aug 18 2016



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