Facts about Thermal Transfer Printing

Thermal transfer printing is a digital printing process that uses heat to register an impression on paper. In 1981, SATO Corporation discovered it, which had made by melting a coating of ribbon so that it stays glued to the material on which the print is applied. A microprocessor recognizes which individual heating pins is heat to form the printed image. Thermal transfer printers are popular for barcode labels, making clothing labels, printing plastic labels for chemical containers, price tags, and other specialty print jobs.

The other thermal transfer printing technology used to form color images by adhering a wax-based ink onto paper.  When the paper and ribbon move to unison beneath the thermal print head, the wax- based ink travel from ribbon melts onto the paper. When cooled, the wax has permanently adhered to the paper. The thermal transfer printing technology is Xerox solid –ink printers, which is rectangular solid – state ink block that is loaded into a system similar to a stapler magazine in the top of the printer.