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Office Copy Machines: How They Do What They Do

Author: Smart Copierlease
by Smart Copierlease
Posted: Feb 02, 2016

The officer copier is perhaps the most ignored (but important) equipment you will ever come across in an office. The poor machine just sits there, lonely and forgotten, until someone with a great urgency runs to it to get a paper photocopied or scanned or printed. This scene could probably be witnessed in an office which does not remain very busy all the time. On the other hand, if you walked into a corporate office (in New York City, maybe?) you would find the same copier being treated worse than the way the Egyptian Pharaohs treated their slaves. These machines, for good or bad, came to be treated for granted. Whether in use or not in use, their only job is to be ready when someone approaches them with papers. Commercial copy machines are actually more than just what meets the eye. For you, it may be just three steps: open the lid, place the paper and hit "start" button. Inside the machine, the story is completely different.

The copier machine has a different story to tell. Since you cannot directly ask the machine how it works, read on to know the basics of what actually happens inside the machine. Much to your surprise, the whole activity of "photocopying" relies heavily on the principles of semiconductor physics. The copiers consist of a metal drum, which is coated with a semiconductor material. This material is special, because it is a "conditional" semiconductor. More specifically, the material is photoconductive. This material allows the electrons to pass through atoms only when it is hit by light. When these electrons are freed, they neutralize the positive charge on the drum, which forms an impression of the paper being copied. One would now think about how this "impression" is transferred onto paper. The drum keeps rolling as the photoconductor is working, and whatever strips of impression are formed on the drum roll into contact with a toner, which then prints them onto a blank paper. This way, the impression gets a physical form as the "photocopied" paper.

In the previous paragraph, something was mentioned about "positive charges" on the drum. Where does this positive charge come from? For the copier to be able to form an impression of a paper, the freed electrons need something to neutralize. This positive charge is provided by corona wires. They transfer a stream of high voltage to the drum and the paper as static electricity.

So now, we have a photoconductive drum and crazy voltage to make up a copier. There is a third element here without which all this is bound to fail: a source of light! For the photoconductor to work, light is needed to excite the electrons into escaping their orbits and start travelling. The light used inside a copier is usually incandescent or fluorescent. These lights contain enough energy to get copiers working.

Now that you know the basics of how copiers work, you may start appreciating science and technology a bit more. The next time you hunt for a copy machine lease, at least you will make sure to see if the discussed three components work well.

To know about Toshiba copiers, visit Smartcopierlease.com

About The Author

Logan Grey is an expert in office asset management who also loves to write many interesting articles and blogs, helping entrepreneurs in making the best acquisition choices. He recommends Smartcopierlease.com as the best name to trust for office copier leasing services.

About the Author

Smartcopierlease provides a wide range of Xerox copy machines on lease for 36, 39, 48, 60 and 63 months.

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Author: Smart Copierlease

Smart Copierlease

Member since: May 04, 2015
Published articles: 16

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