quick question: what kind of printing technology is Brother TZ / TZE tape?

[ZippyDan]

I need to know for importing purposes. Customs is asking me what kind of printing technology it uses.

They gave me a ridiculous list of possible printing technologies to choose from, which would be used for like large-format industrial printers.

This is just bureaucratic red-tape, because these are tiny hand-held printers, but I still need to provide an answer.

 

[corkyg]

It uses P-Touch which is a laminated tape technology. Electronic heat pulls out the characters from laminated tape. The special tape is required.

https://www.google.com/search?sourc...=1T4GGLG_enUS329&q=Brother+P-touch+technology

 

[Mike64]

I need to know for importing purposes. Customs is asking me what kind of printing technology it uses

I don't know exactly what you (or rather Customs) mean by "printing technology" but if they're looking for a description along the lines of "direct thermal dot matrix", that's it... If that's not what they seem to want, can you be a little more specific about what the options are? Is the Customs declaration available online, for example?

It electronically pulls out the characters from laminated tape.

Strictly speaking, the TZ-type printers use heat rather than any sort of direct "electrical" or "electronic" process to cause the transfer of ink from one layer of the laminated tape to the other, but obviously the application of the heat to the precise locations necessary to do the printing is controlled electronically...