Printers these days have become a
basic necessity of almost every household. From school going to college students,
a printer is an essential equipment to finish their homework and project work.
However, have you ever wondered how
a printer actually works? How does this equipment transform a plain sheet of
paper into a colourful picture or precisely printed words? A printer can print
everything from a single line of alphabet to complex multi-hued designs. These
instruments are not only very fast, but are highly precise as well.
If only you could peek into the
instrument while it’s working, you could see how it actually works to create
these magical prints. However, that could be quite dangerous. Instead, you must
know about the different parts of the machine and how these parts work together
and create these prints within seconds.
Different
Parts of the Laser Toner Printer: The basic parts of a printer are:
- The data input controller
- The drum
- The laser device
- The toner
- The fuser
All these parts come together in
harmony to transport the images from the screen to the paper.
The Working: Now let’s try and
understand how these parts work. When you give a command on your computer, the
data to be printed is transferred to data input controller of the printer. This
controller then deciphers the given data into the language that the printer can
understand.
The controller also prepares the
drum. The drum is an aluminium cylinder that is coated with photosynthetic
material. First, the drum gets set for printing, so that the data can be transferred
on the paper.
The drum then cleans itself of the
previous print, so that no traces are left. A wiper blade does this. The wiper
blade scrapes off any residual toner that might have been left behind from the
previous print.
In some of the newer versions of
toner printers, this cleaning job is done by neutralizing the residual
electrostatic charges. Once the drum is completely cleaned up, it is then
negatively charged at -600v.
Now it’s the job of the laser device,
which draws the entire image to be printed on the drum. For this, the laser will
hit the drum at precise places and change the charge at those points to -100v.
The toner will be stuck to these precise spots.
The laser device comes in different
range from 300 dpi up to 1200 dpi (dots per inch). Higher the dpi value better
will be the print quality. Toners also come in a huge variety. Some of the
bestselling toner cartridges these days are Buy
HP CE400X and HP 950 XL.
The toner cartridge is basically
made of iron oxide. The iron oxide of the toner is stuck on the drum because of
the electrostatic charges. While this is happening, the paper is pulled into
the printer. The paper being positively charged attracts the toner particles
that are stuck on the paper.
Next, the paper passes through the
fuser. The fuser comprises of two rollers. While the paper is passing through
these rollers, they melt the toner at 355°F and fix it onto the paper. The hot
freshly printed-paper comes out of the printer.
The most amazing thing to note is
that the laser toner printer carries out all these complicated steps within
seconds. As soon as the print instruction is given, the paper is fed into the
printer and comes out with the exact print.