Tube Marker, for printing directly on the surface of 0.2 to 50 ml tubes

Tube Marker

Clear – Flexible – Durable

Designed to directly print text, linear barcodes, 2D codes and graphics on plastic laboratory tubes using patent pending Thermal Pixel Printing technology

• Prints directly on the surface of tubes from 0.2 ml to 50 ml – Labels or stickers are not required
• Clearer and more durable marking compared to marker pen – Consistently legible text and barcodes at high resolutions
• Resistant to alcohol, water, liquid nitrogen, DMSO and mechanical abrasion – Long lasting sample identification at competitive “per mark” cost

The TubeMarker™ 2 allows printing directly onto the surface of plastic laboratory tubes between 6 mm – 30 mm indiameter.

There is no need for using labels or marker pens. Marking is resistant to ethanol, isopropanol, water, DMSO*, liquidnitrogen and mechanical abrasion. The prints are also stable over a wide temperature range (-196 °C to 100 °C). Markings do not transfer when touching the tubes.

Several lines of text can be printed, for example: sample name, sampling site, your name, date and time etc. All TrueTypefonts available on the connected computer can be printed in a range of different sizes, which determines the maximumprintable content. Bold and italic type is also available.

The instrument can also print linear barcodes, datamatrix (2D) codes and graphic files (monochrome .bmp, .gif or .tiff)such as logos. Print orientation can be vertical or horizontal (except for barcodes which print vertically only).

The TubeMarker™ 2 includes an Automatic Printing Delay feature, where the instrument is able to detect the presenceof a tube and automatically prints the next label entry in the software. This feature makes printing to the tube surfacemuch easier and faster than marking by hand.

* The blue ribbon is resistant to 70% DMSO, the black and white ribbons are 100% DMSO resistant.** Marking is not resistant to Xylene and moderately resistant to Acetone. *** Depending on horizontal dimensions of the print. E.g. when printing a 6 x 6 mm 2D code, one ribbon is sufficient for 50,000 prints.

The maximum number of prints per ribbon depends on the width of the print.
There is a 3 mm gap generated after every print, no matter the size of label or the orientation of the text. This is to ensure fresh ribbon is available for the next print.

1. When printing text in vertical orientation, the width of print varies according to the number of lines, the font size and the font type. Reducing the font size and number of lines to be printed, increases the number of prints achievable from one ribbon.
To calculate the number of tubes that can be printed from one ribbon (assuming the label size/data remains constant), the following parameters need to be considered:

• A. Number of lines (the width of the print will be the same with each line, the number of characters in one line doesn’t affect the number of prints achievable)
• B. Font type
• C. Font size

2. When printing text in horizontal orientation, the dimensions vary with the font size, the font type and most importantly, with the number of characters in each line. Reducing the font size and number of characters to be printed in one line, increases the number of prints achievable from one ribbon.
To calculate the number of tubes that can be printed from one ribbon (assuming the label size/data remains constant), the following parameters need to be considered:

• A. Number of characters (the width of the print will vary with the length of the text and thus affects the number of prints achievable. The number of lines doesn’t affect the number of prints achievable)
• B. Font type
• C. Font size

Metallic blue, white and black ink ribbons are available to print on all kind of tube colours and tubes with dark coloured content. Choose the ribbon colour that gives the best contrast to the tube colour and the colour of the tube content respectively.