What was the purpose of those plastic rolls once used by fax machines?

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I used to have one made by Sharps Electronics in 2006, but it was missing a plastic thing that acted as a gear to move the rolls in the machine. This was because I had purchased it at a Goodwill, and I didn’t know how to get missing parts for it… I was just becoming a teenager at that time!
I also remembered seeing them at Office Depot in 2007, so I called my local store last week, but the guy said that those fax machines were no longer in existence.
I’m wondering if that’s still the case, because I still want to learn how to use that kind of fax machine, how the rolls that felt like rubbish bags played a key role in printing out any faxes received.
Thanks for any help; it’s very much appreciated!

In: Technology

Anonymous 0 Comments

It was a thermal transfer

Basically the rolls were ink on a plastic sheet the fax machine heats up the area to be printed on the paper as the paper and the roll moved though the machine at the same rate if you unrolled a used roll you could see the negatives of previous faxes.

Iirc the way that fax machines word it was cheaper early on to not build any memory in and have the machine print the data in real time as it was received