[Nhcoll-l] Thermal Transfer Printing with a Zebra

[Zhuang, Mingna]

Hi Rod,
We use Datamax and have used Zebra ribbons although have moved to Electronic Imaging Material media and ribbon. The coated side has to face the media labels or it won’t melt onto the media. We had the same issue where our printer is mainly meant to be threaded one way, but you can reverse the way the roll faces and thread it the other way to adjust the coated side. Attached is a photo of how we thread our ribbon – it looks different than what the diagram states, but works fine. Most printers should be able to handle both. We’ve printed 81,000 barcodes so far and haven’t had a problem yet.[Open photo]

I think there are ribbons that are coated on both sides, but just reversing the ribbon would be the easy solution. You may have to fiddle with the heat settings until you find the right one and I’ve found that our zebra ribbon doesn’t work with our EIM media no matter what or I haven’t figured out the setting (wasn’t worth it on our end, because we had the compatible ribbon).
EIM has been great if you end up needing something different and will send samples. They’ve worked with several museums (i.e. MVZ, MSB) and I think are just a little more expensive or about the same price as Zebra.
https://barcode-labels.com/solutions/asset-labels/library/
For finding compatible ribbon, mainly, you’ll need to pay attention to the core size of the ribbon and match that up to your printer specs.
Hope that helps!

Vicky (Mingna) Zhuang PhD.
Biodiversity Collections Manager
UTEP Biodiversity Collections
B209 Biology Building
University of Texas at El Paso
500 W University Avenue
El Paso, TX 79968
phone: 915-747-5479
email: mzhuang at utep.edu<mailto:mzhuang at utep.edu>
website: https://www.utep.edu/biodiversity/
facebook<https://www.facebook.com/utepbc>, twitter<https://twitter.com/utepbc>, Instagram<https://www.instagram.com/utepbc/>: @utepbc


From: Nhcoll-l <nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> On Behalf Of Pellegrini, Rodrigo [DOS]
Sent: Wednesday, April 20, 2022 10:53 AM
To: nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu
Subject: [Nhcoll-l] Thermal Transfer Printing with a Zebra

We recently replaced our aging Datamax/O’Neill I-Class thermal transfer printer with a Zebra ZT411, and we have ran into a problem while setting it up.
With our IT dept.’s help we installed the drivers, assembled the cuter kit and connected the printer. We could not get the printer to actually print after loading it though. The media is loaded correctly and advances fine, but the labels come out blank. Turns out the SDR3 ribbon we got from Alpha Systems for our old Datamax is coated on the side of the ribbon that faces the print head, rather than the polyester print media--or maybe it’s the opposite, I’m not quite sure, but it’s on the “wrong” side for the new printer. Bottom line,  the printer we bought cannot use this ribbon—the coating has to be on the other side. The IT guy that was helping me set it up had to google for a while to find it, but apparently the manufacturer is very specific the ribbon has to be coated on the other side or it won’t work. So, here I am with a brand new printer, and no way of using the ribbon we ordered. The questions I’m hoping someone here can answer are:

  1.  Could this have as simple a solution as re-spooling the ribbon so the coated surface is on the other side? Or will this affect the printer or the finished product/printed label adversely?
  2.  Zebra makes thermal transfer ribbons, too. How do I find a directly comparable ribbon to the Datamax SDR3 or 5? What is it I need to look for? Is the coating on the label side of the ribbon important for preservation issues, or is this of no consequence?
I’m hoping someone already using a Zebra may have some of the answers. Thanks for any input.
Regards,
Rod Pellegrini
New Jersey State Museum
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