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DOG TAG CUSTOMIZATION METHODS: Embossing

An embossing or stamping machine is used to produce authentic military dog tags. The machine is limited to producing uppercase letters, numbers and some special characters. The character style is similar to the letters and numbers on a standard credit card. Embossing produces raised letters from the surface of the metal. It is the most durable of all the marking methods, but also the most limited in terms of how much and what can be applied. Embossed tags are limited to 15 characters including spaces per line and up to 5 lines.

The machine has three main components:
1. hopper
2. grabber
3. character drum.

The hopper is a place where the tags are stacked waiting to be embossed. Hoppers can typically hold around 100 dog tags. The grabber is a jaws like mechanism which grabs the next tag from the hopper and moves it into the drum for embossing. The character drum contains male/female dye set of the available letters, numbers and special characters for embossing. The grabber adjusts the position of the tag in the drum so the correct character is stamped. The drum spins to put the next character in place for stamping the tag. At the end of the run, when all the information is on the tag, the grabber moves the tag off to the side of the machine where it is ejected into bin. The cycle repeats until either all the tags in the hopper are gone or you have reached the desired number of tags for the job.

Many styles of dog tag making machines are available. From manual to automated computer controlled units. The more expensive machines will typically be automated producing as many as 300 dog tags per hour.

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