Abstract: A method and apparatus for wrapping a tape around an article, such as a bundle of elongate items (e.g., wires), tightening the tape, bonding layers of the tightened tape together and cutting the tape is disclosed. The apparatus or tool includes a clamshell assembly having a movable jaw that closes about the article to be strapped. Thereafter, tape, drawn from a reserve loop by a motor, is guided by a channel formed in the inner periphery of an aperture defined by the clamshell. The moving tape is spirally wrapped about the bundle of items and a latched backup foot located in the clamshell aperture. After the bundle and backup foot are encircled, by a suitable number of layers, a rack moves a plunger against the tape, causing the tape to tighten around the bundle and the backup foot. As the plunger tightens the tape, a new reserve loop is formed. Any additional tape needed to form a complete reserve loop is withdrawn from a tape supply spool.

Abstract: Electrical wires and other continuous, elongate, flexible members having a three-dimensional exterior printing surface are marked with alpha-numeric characters by longitudinally feeding the wire past an electronically controlled ink jet printing head assembly that forms the characters by directing a positionable jet of ink onto the exterior surface of the wire. A wire feed transport receives the electrical wire from a storage reel and longitudinally feeds it through aligned guides establishing a wire guide path. The guide path carries the wire past a printing station at which the printing head assembly ejects a jet of electrostatically charged ink drops which are selectively deflected in a dimension transverse to the wire and in synchronism with the rate of longitudinal travel of the wire as established by the transport so that the ink drops impinge on the exterior three-dimensional wire surface in patterns which form the desired characters.