How+do+erasers+erase?


 * __HOW DO ERASERS ERASE?__**

Answer the question below, append new answers to the top of this page. _ __Response 1:__
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 * __By: Heidi December. 9 2011__**

Question: How Do Erasers erase?

Though lead is what comes from a pencil, when you use an eraser you are erasing graphite not lead.

You may be wondering what exactly is an eraser? An eraser is an item used to remove the marks left by pencils. Erasers come in all colors, and can be made of either rubber, vinyl, plastic, gum, and similar materials.

Eraser History

Before the eraser were invented small pieces of white bread were used as erasers.

Personally i find erasers are really nice to have. For many reasons, first they make our work neater so we don't have to just scribble things out. Also they are used world wide. Though erasers may seem like a small luxury there are sure nice to have in our schools today. Well thanks to Edward Naime an english engineer the inventor of the eraser in 1770, we might not have the same quality work we have today. :) How he invented this simple but well know invention, was he picked up rubber instead of a piece of bread and discovered its abilities to erase pencil marks.

How exactly erasers work! When you rub an eraser on your paper it removes the graphite particles from your paper. The eraser has molecules that are "stickier" than the papers so it picks up the graphite particles from the paper. Think about it this way, if i get a long strip of tape and stick it to my dirty crumb covered counter then take the tape off the crumbs would have stuck to the tape and they would be removed from the table when i removed the tape, this is because the tape is stickier than the crumbs so they stuck to the tape, that is similar to how a eraser works.

__Resources:__

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eraser

http://www.pencils.com/great-eraser-caper

http://thevirtualinstructor.com/blog/different-types-of-erasers

http://www.whyzz.com/how-do-pencil-erasers-work

http://www.erasersworld.com/eng/vid.htm

http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/aug97/872027430.Ot.r.html

__Response 2:__
 * How Do Erasers Erase?**

Karen Tang 8.3 February 20, 12

Before pencils, Roman scribes wrote with a thin rod, which was made of lead and called a stylus. Lead, which is what is often in pencils, is a soft metal and leaves a mark on paper. When a pencil tip is moved across paper, graphite particles from the pencil stick to the paper fibers. An eraser, which is called a ‘rubber’ in some places, is an item that is able to remove marks from a pencil and certain pens left. Erasers come in all sorts of different colours, and can be made of rubber, vinyl, gum, or similar materials. How an erasers works is it picks up graphite materials, thus removing from the surface of paper. When you rub an eraser on the pencil mark, the graphite particles are released from the paper fibers and stick to the eraser rather then the paper. Certain erasers damage the top layer of paper while taking the graphite particles and leave a residue that needs to be brushed away. Soft vinyl erasers are softer, but work a similar way. Art erasers are made of soft, coarse rubber and are used to remove large areas of pencil marks, but without damaging paper. This usually leaves lots of residue. But where did it all start? Who invented the commonly owned stationary know today as erasers? Well, before erasers were ever invented, you could roll up pieces of white bread, without the crust, to remove pencil marks. Edward Naime, an English engineer, was credited in 1770 for inventing the eraser. It was said that he accidently picked up a piece of rubber rather than the usual piece of bread to remove pencil marks, and discovered its properties. Rubber and bread alike are perishable, so Charles Goodyear’s invention of the process of vulcanization later on in 1839 soon led to a widespread use of rubber, which now everybody commonly owns. In 1858, Hymen Lipman patent for attaching erasers to the end of pencils for maximum convenience, though the patent was later taken away since combining two already invented objects did not count as inventing a new object.

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