Unsolved tape mysteries.
June 23, 2021 8:04 AM Subscribe
Please ID this weird tape from my youth...the adhesive kind, not the cassette kind.
When I was a kid (early 90s, if tape has seasonal trends) my dad brought some random surplus adhesive tape home from work for me to play with. My dad's work is not in any way relevant to the tape.
The tape was unusual. It was about 3/4 inch wide and pretty heavy duty shiny plastic, think maybe the feel/stiffness of 3-4 layers of good clear packing tape. So: totally flexible but strong. Encased inside the plastic was some kind of fiber looking stuff that was a light purple color. Or perhaps the fiber was white but the plastic itself had a purple tinge. I don't know. But it was definitely purple, which appealed to me. It wasn't like a neat and tidy mesh matrix, the fiber was more like tangled floss, thin enough you could see through. What I found MOST interesting about the tape is that it had an expiration date (and it was past its expiration date), and I thought it was so funny that tape could expire like food. It wasn't super sticky, but maybe that was because it was expired.
My dad didn't know what this tape was for. He thought the expiration date was maybe because the tape was rated for some kind of industrial use, since it would make sense to put an expiry on something they couldn't guarantee for certain types of industrial uses. He also figured that the tape was expensive based on how it was constructed. I suspect it was NOT fiberglass tape, though of course I could be wrong, but my dad raised us with a fear of even looking sideways at fiberglass so I don't think he would have let us kids knowingly play with fiberglass.
I think--and this is where I could be misremembering things--but I think the packaging for the tape might have been thick and opaque to block light from getting on it.
Anyway, this has absolutely zero impact on my life but it's been nearly 30 years and I still wonder about this tape from time to time. Perhaps someone reading today knows what tape this was and can reveal the truth. Perhaps it's you.
When I was a kid (early 90s, if tape has seasonal trends) my dad brought some random surplus adhesive tape home from work for me to play with. My dad's work is not in any way relevant to the tape.
The tape was unusual. It was about 3/4 inch wide and pretty heavy duty shiny plastic, think maybe the feel/stiffness of 3-4 layers of good clear packing tape. So: totally flexible but strong. Encased inside the plastic was some kind of fiber looking stuff that was a light purple color. Or perhaps the fiber was white but the plastic itself had a purple tinge. I don't know. But it was definitely purple, which appealed to me. It wasn't like a neat and tidy mesh matrix, the fiber was more like tangled floss, thin enough you could see through. What I found MOST interesting about the tape is that it had an expiration date (and it was past its expiration date), and I thought it was so funny that tape could expire like food. It wasn't super sticky, but maybe that was because it was expired.
My dad didn't know what this tape was for. He thought the expiration date was maybe because the tape was rated for some kind of industrial use, since it would make sense to put an expiry on something they couldn't guarantee for certain types of industrial uses. He also figured that the tape was expensive based on how it was constructed. I suspect it was NOT fiberglass tape, though of course I could be wrong, but my dad raised us with a fear of even looking sideways at fiberglass so I don't think he would have let us kids knowingly play with fiberglass.
I think--and this is where I could be misremembering things--but I think the packaging for the tape might have been thick and opaque to block light from getting on it.
Anyway, this has absolutely zero impact on my life but it's been nearly 30 years and I still wonder about this tape from time to time. Perhaps someone reading today knows what tape this was and can reveal the truth. Perhaps it's you.
I have a meeting so I can't deep dive, but it could possibly be splicing tape for audio reel-to-reel or maybe even at that width, VCR/digital video tape? Not film, because the purple color would muss it up.
I was a college radio DJ in the early 90s, and was taught to edit with razors and tape and this *seems* familiar.
posted by kimberussell at 8:15 AM on June 23, 2021
I was a college radio DJ in the early 90s, and was taught to edit with razors and tape and this *seems* familiar.
posted by kimberussell at 8:15 AM on June 23, 2021
I wonder if it was for something medical-related -- my husband works with medical supplies and EVERYTHING expires in hospitals.
posted by jabes at 8:26 AM on June 23, 2021
posted by jabes at 8:26 AM on June 23, 2021
Tape that is reinforced with threads is called filament tape.
3M explains why their cloth adhesive tape has an expiration date. (This is not a filament tape, but does support the medical theory.)
posted by Winnie the Proust at 8:35 AM on June 23, 2021
3M explains why their cloth adhesive tape has an expiration date. (This is not a filament tape, but does support the medical theory.)
posted by Winnie the Proust at 8:35 AM on June 23, 2021
Response by poster: The way the fiber inside the tape looked is like if you pulled off a single thin layer of that dacron poly fiber fill stuff.
posted by phunniemee at 8:44 AM on June 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by phunniemee at 8:44 AM on June 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
Reinforced poly tape for veterinarian applications.
Fiber reinforced bag envelope & sealing tapes for food applications.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 8:54 AM on June 23, 2021
Fiber reinforced bag envelope & sealing tapes for food applications.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 8:54 AM on June 23, 2021
The texture you describe sounds like Fibafuse tape, I wonder if it used to come sandwiched in plastic and the top layer removed for the patching process.
posted by Lyn Never at 8:56 AM on June 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by Lyn Never at 8:56 AM on June 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
but it could possibly be splicing tape for audio reel-to-reel or maybe even at that width, VCR/digital video tape?
Definitely not that. Splicing tape for audio or video won't be thick and stiff as that would cause problems with the tape as the splice passes around the guides in the tape path through the recorder. It also has just a minimal amount of stickiness to keep glue from being squeezed out over time as the reel of tape is stored.
posted by Stoneshop at 11:53 AM on June 23, 2021
Definitely not that. Splicing tape for audio or video won't be thick and stiff as that would cause problems with the tape as the splice passes around the guides in the tape path through the recorder. It also has just a minimal amount of stickiness to keep glue from being squeezed out over time as the reel of tape is stored.
posted by Stoneshop at 11:53 AM on June 23, 2021
3M Medipore tape can have a purplish color.
Also, 3M chromic acid anodizing masking tape is purple.
posted by bz at 1:33 PM on June 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
Also, 3M chromic acid anodizing masking tape is purple.
posted by bz at 1:33 PM on June 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Dashy at 8:07 AM on June 23, 2021