Pitney Bowes Imprinter

The Pitney Bowes Imprinter

Isometric view of the Pitney Bowes Imprinter

Many people will write and inquire about the Pitney Bowes imprinter.  We have decided to dedicate a page to the Pitney Bowes imprinter because we want to illustrate why this machine is not ideally suited for the manufacture of dog tags.

The Pitney Bowes imprinter is intended to imprint plastic cards such as credit cards, addressing cards, invoicing cards, club cards, id card and phone cards.  Many of these imprinters are found in medical institutions or large mailing operations.  Look at the photo below to see a sample of the imprinting generated by a Pitney Bowes imprinter.

Photo of Plastic "H" or "Rolodex" card debossed on a Pitney Bowes.

While it would not be impossible to imprint dog tags with a Pitney Bowes machine, the machine itself will require significant alteration and customization.

The hardness of the imprinting dies is unknown but it is suspected that the use of Stainless Steel will wear the dies quickly. 

From examination of the internal super structure of the Pitney Bowes machine it has been determined that the machine does not have a heavy enough frame to consistently imprint stainless steel tags.  Heavy volume utilizing stainless steel plates will more than likely result in damage to the machine in the long term.  This machine was designed to imprint plastic cards.

We have seen Pitney Bowes machines that will deboss (above photo is debossed text) and we have seen machines that emboss like a credit card by raising the text.

Front View of Pitney Bowes Embosser.

The Pitney Bowes machine has a sloped front and small foot print.  The machine is fairly light weight and compact.

Character selection wheel on Pitney Bowes embosser.

To select the text characters to be imprinted you rotate the black ring and align the arrow with the appropriate character.  Once you have aligned the character desired with the arrow you then pull the lever and imprint the character into the plate.

Carriage of Pitney Bowes machine.

The above photo is of the plate carriage that holds the plate to be imprinted.  Notice that on this machine there is no clamp to hold dog tags.  That is because this machine is designed to imprint cards and not dog tags.  While it would be possible to fabricate a clamp to hold dog tags it would more than likely be cost prohibitive.  Also if you did build a clamp we feel the machine is too light weight to hold up to repeated imprinting of stainless steel and would wear out quite rapidly.

Pitney Bowes embosser from the bottom.

Rear view of Pitney Bowes embosser.

You will find these machines on eBay advertised as dog tag imprinters.  Don't be fooled by people posting auctions claiming these machines are dog tag imprinters.  90% of the sellers on eBay don't have a clue as to what exactly the items they sell are or what they are intended for.  Many times I will see people at local auctions purchase items for resale on eBay only to go and look the item up and steal someone else's description to sell the item they just purchased.

The Pitney Bowes imprinter is a victim of false advertising 9 times out of 10.  The Pitney Bowes imprinter was designed for imprinting plastic cards not dog tags.

Side View of Pitney Bowes embosser.

BOTTOM LINE IS THIS - The Pitney Bowes imprinter is NOT a good choice for a dog tag imprinter.  This machine was never intended to imprint dog tags and is not designed to do dog tags.  The Pitney Bowes imprinter IS best at imprinting plastic cards such as credit cards and phone cards.

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