Stock material or miscellaneous articles – Structurally defined web or sheet – Discontinuous or differential coating – impregnation or bond
Reexamination Certificate
2000-04-26
2003-08-12
Hess, Bruce H. (Department: 1774)
Stock material or miscellaneous articles
Structurally defined web or sheet
Discontinuous or differential coating, impregnation or bond
C428S206000, C428S332000, C428S480000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06605337
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a recording material suitable for various recording methods. More particularly, the present invention relates to a recording material that permits stable and continuous printing under any environment. Still more particularly, the present invention relates to a recording material suitable for the ink jet recording method, particularly a recording material that permits stable continuous printing even under high temperature and high humidity or low temperature and low humidity, by the ink jet recording method using oily ink, and to a recording material having high surface strength of an ink absorption layer.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Along with the growth of the capability of computers and spreading of the computers in recent years, the hard copy technique has rapidly developed. As the hard copy method, there are known a sublimation transfer recording method, an electronography method, an ink jet method and the like.
In printers by an ink jet method, an ink drop is jet out at a high speed from a nozzle toward a recording material to form images. Printers for this method are rapidly prevailing as peripheral apparatus of personal computers for printing in offices and homes because they permit easy colorizing and minituarization, and they generate lower printing noise. In view of the good quality of recorded products, that is comparable to that of silver salt photographs, and easiness of jumboizing, the application in industrial fields as printers for making large signboards, posters, illumination signboards and the like has been expected. Among others, its use is drawing particular attention for printing of a product to be appreciated in illumination where the light is shot from the back.
The ink to be used for the ink jet method is aqueous dye ink, which is obtained by dissolving various water soluble dyes in water or a mixed solvent of water and hydrophilic solvent and adding various agents where necessary. This is because aqueous ink can afford vivid color recording, permits easy adjustment of the viscosity of ink, is free of solvent smell and is superior in safety.
In the meantime, various methods have been proposed to overcome defects that aqueous dye ink printed on a water soluble resin-containing layer formed on a support has inferior water resistance and weatherability (U.S. Pat. No. 5,561,454). However, none of them shows capability to allow outdoor exhibition, and there arises a need to apply an ultraviolet absorptive laminate film to the surface to prevent discoloration of dye due to ultraviolet rays. This causes an increase of the cost.
To compensate for the defects of the aqueous dye ink, ink obtained by dispersing aqueous pigment ink, i.e., an organic or inorganic pigment, in water or a mixed solvent of water and hydrophilic solvent, and adding various additives, has been proposed. When aqueous pigment ink is used for recording, it is possible to afford complete water resistance if a recorded material after printing is thoroughly dried. This has resulted in a striking increase in use nowadays. Due to the use of water as the main solvent, however, the concentration of pigment cannot be made high, resulting in inferior color development and vividness, and frequent clogging of the head nozzle.
To solve these problems, the ink jet method using oily ink has been proposed. Oily ink is obtained by dissolving or dispersing oil soluble dye, organic pigment, inorganic pigment and the like in solvents such as paraffins, ethers, alcohols and the like. When compared to aqueous dye ink and aqueous pigment ink, it has advantages in that it allows selection of dye and pigment from a wide range of color materials having superior weatherability and water resistance; it can realize high image density because it can be dissolved or dispersed in a solvent at a high concentration; it causes less clogging of the head; it suffers less from cockling due to water absorption by a sheet; it can lower surface tension of ink; it shows higher permeability into a recording material; and the like. The oily ink is promising as a substitute for aqueous ink in the field where high speed printing, high picture quality printing and good weatherability are required, and a recording material suitable for the oily ink has been proposed (JP-A-3-133687).
As the recording material, there have been proposed various materials that can provide a recorded product having superior quality using aqueous dye ink or aqueous pigment ink. For example, there have been proposed a material having a porous layer formed on a support, which contains a pigment and a resin, a back print method in which a non-transparent receiving layer (ink receiving layer) is formed on a transparent support and images are appreciated from the surface opposite from the recorded surface (JP-A-61-35275), and further, various additives to improve property such as water resistance, bleeding and the like.
The recording materials disclosed in the above-mentioned publications are all designed for aqueous dye or aqueous pigment. When these materials are used for recording with oily ink, a fine recorded product cannot be always obtained. This is because the ink receiving layer of a recording material suitable for aqueous ink generally comprises a water soluble resin or water absorptive resin as a constituent material aiming at absorbing water in the ink. These resins show poor solvent absorption capability and the aqueous ink shows different behavior from oily ink; that is, the dye or pigment in the aqueous ink has electric charge and it has a high surface tension because of the main solvent being water. Therefore, a recording material capable of showing the maximum advantage of oily ink does not exist. Moreover, a recording material suitable for aqueous ink, which uses a resin with good water absorption as a material constituting the ink receiving layer, shows markedly different water absorption by water absorptive resin depending on humidity, thus leading to changes in volume of resin itself. As a result, a recording material gets curled up to make handling of the material difficult under high temperature and high humidity or under low temperature and low humidity. This in turn causes frequent occurrence of trouble during transport of paper in a printer when images are continuously printed.
Inasmuch as printing by the ink jet method is greatly influenced not only by the capability of the printers but also by the property of the recording material, various recording materials have been developed. Of these is a recording material for a so-called back print method, which comprises an ink absorption layer and an ink passage layer laminated on a translucent substrate, and which is printed from the ink passage layer side for appreciation from the substrate side (JP-A-61-35275). This method provides uniform gloss and photograph-like images because it is appreciated from the substrate side. However, conventional back print films are defective in that they have poor workability such as adhering of recorded product because the ink absorption layer of the films has low surface strength.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a recording material suitable for the ink jet recording method. Particularly, the present invention provides a recording material suitable for the ink jet recording method using oily ink, which has the following characteristics.
1. Being free of curling under high temperature and high humidity, or under low temperature and low humidity, being able to be handled and carried in a stable manner, and forming sharp images free of bleeding but with fine water resistance.
2. Being capable of providing images having water resistance sufficient for outdoor exhibition, particularly superior color density retention proportion.
3. Being capable of providing, when used as an illumination signboard, high image density, superior color development, high picture quality and fine water resistance, particularly, being capable of providing superior images not only when ill
Ito Katsuya
Kotani Toru
Mori Ken-ichi
Sasaki Yasushi
Tsuchiiwa Kazuyuki
Hess Bruce H.
Leydig , Voit & Mayer, Ltd.
Shewareged B.
Toyo Boseki Kabushiki Kaisha
LandOfFree
Recording material does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.
If you have personal experience with Recording material, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Recording material will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-3109222