On Wednesday, June 25th, 2025 at 23:44, [email protected] steven--- via cctalk <[email protected]> wrote:
> Sure, by all means go for it. If you can make some sort of robust > circumferential clamp > to prevent axial sliding of the roll (think of a rolled up poster with one > conical (convex) > end and the other concave) due to imperfect rolling, and a resulting tape > that doesn't > exceed the nominal 1" width so it doesn't jam between the punch channel > walls, then you'd > be well on your way to possible success. It's funny you mention that, I do have a couple of things that fit that particular bill. However, I was thinking about it some more, and there's another potential problem. Earlier in the thread the topic of tractor feeding came up. While investigating my collection of drill bits (because, I figured, I could mount a properly sized drill bit in a drill press and drill clear through the roll of paper tape multiple times to make holes for this), I realized that as you go deeper in the roll of paper toward the core, the spacing of the tractor feed holes would change. They might be just far enough apart at the outset and the right size, but after about a quarter of the tape is gone from the roll the holes are going to be closer together, in all likelihood not spaced correctly anymore (they'll be too close together), and the tractor feed pins will mangle the tape. So, it's a non-starter. If a paper tape reader was the kind that used fan fold paper tape instead of rolls of it, that might be a workable technique but I don't know where to get fanfold paper anymore and haven't seen such a tape reader face to face in I don't know how long. So I'll pin that one for later if it ever becomes relevant. The Doctor [412/724/301/703/415/510] WWW: https://drwho.virtadpt.net/ Get thee down. Be thou funky.
