a burster is a machine that separates one-part continuous form paper into separate, individual, sheets along the transverse perforations. a burster was typically used with printed continuous form paper applications such as mass-mail advertising, invoices, and account statements. bursting is done by firmly gripping the second-to-last sheet while feed rollers grip the last sheet firmly and pull it away to burst the perforation. the continuous form paper then advances into the feed rollers to burst the next sheet. bursting is often a high-speed process that allows the continuous form paper to feed in at a steady rate, with burst pages either stacked or fed into a single-sheet conveyance to the next paper processing stage. burster equipment and paper manufactures had to generate perforation specifications so that the paper perforations reliably separated under the force of pulling the sheets apart and not tear down into the printed part of the sheet.