Reposted from Hackerspace member Ross’s blog
So the other day I was walking home from school and as I was walking by the dumpster I saw an old printer in there. I don’t know why someone was throwing it away but I didn’t care as I had more nefarious plans for it than simply spraying tree skin with black blood. For a long time I’ve been reading about electronics, about hardware hackers and I thought it was time for some hacking of my own. As someone who doesn’t have that much spare cash to throw at buying the components I want I’ve been seriously interested in what other people are throwing away and how I can use it. To that end this printer became my first victim.
Tearing off the plastic case didn’t take too much and it exposed the electronics underneath.
![Printer 1](https://lh4.ggpht.com/_qqQzr2siXz0/TOnixUKBwiI/AAAAAAAABFY/U2AB1_gJC1s/2010-11-01%2017.59.29.jpg)
The control board has lots of interesting pieces that I can salvage
![Printer 2](https://lh6.ggpht.com/_qqQzr2siXz0/TOnixuxm_zI/AAAAAAAABFc/l-bc-ftwJMs/2010-11-01%2017.59.41.jpg)
Finally I pulled out what I wanted
![Printer 3](https://lh3.ggpht.com/_qqQzr2siXz0/TOnix5X283I/AAAAAAAABFg/TTN7_fer89c/2010-11-01%2018.49.45.jpg)
From just this old printer I pulled out two controller boards of questionable value but fun to see how the circuits workd and two prizes, a stepper motor and two DC motors. Not a bad haul since buying just those motors could have cost up to 30 bucks separately (new of course). After I pulled this stuff out and threw away the rest I realized that the next time I do this I am going to have even more fun trying to build a CNC using the actual physical hardware thought the steppers are usually too weak but it should be fun.
Wow, is that a Centronics parallel port on that printer?! I haven’t seen one of those in a long while!
Nice find! Inkjets usually have a linear scale in them to measure the position of the printhead. This might be good for measuring position in a CNC if you’ve got a lot of backlash; otherwise if just controlling the steppers will probably provide better resolution.