Stock material or miscellaneous articles – Structurally defined web or sheet – Including components having same physical characteristic in...
Reexamination Certificate
1998-07-17
2001-04-03
Hess, Bruce H. (Department: 1774)
Stock material or miscellaneous articles
Structurally defined web or sheet
Including components having same physical characteristic in...
C428S175000, C428S500000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06210783
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is directed to transparencies, and more specifically, to high projection efficiency, low haze, lightfast and waterfast ink jet transparencies with improved ink absorption and acceptable ink spreading when used in combination with liquid ink compositions and solid ink hot melt ink compositions, such as those selected for thermal ink jet printing processes, and acoustic ink jet printing processes, reference for example copending application U.S. Ser. No. 09/118,573, the disclosure of which is totally incorporated herein by reference. In embodiments of the present invention, the transparencies are comprised of a supporting substrate, such as MYLAR™, thereover two coatings, a first antistatic heat resistant coating layer which comprises a binder with a melting point of, for example, in the range of from about 100° C. to about 300° C. and preferably from about 150° C. to 260° C., and, for example, a quaternary compound, and a second light resistant, humidity resistant ink receiving coating layer situated so that the first coating layer is between the second light resistant, humidity resistant ink receiving coating layer and the substrate, the second coating layer being comprised of, for example, a polymer such as poly(2-ethyl-2-oxazoline); 1-[N-[poly(3-allyloxy-2-hydroxy propyl)]-2-imidazolidinone], poly(1-vinylpyrrolidone)-graft-(1-triacontene), or poly(1-vinylpyrrolidone)-graft-(1-hexadecene), a lightfast UV compound such as (2,4-dichloro-6-morpholino-1,3,5-triazine), and copolymers thereof of poly[N,N-bis(2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-4-piperidinyl)-1,6-hexane diamine-co-2,4-dichloro-6-morpholino-1,3,5-triazine), and mixtures thereof, a biocide and an ink spreading compound selected, for example, from the group consisting of mono and dialkylated oxazolines, wherein the alkyl chain length varies between about 2 to about 30 carbons (about includes all values in between throughout) and the melting point of these oxazolines is, for example, between about 40° C. to about 80° C. and preferably wherein the two coatings, thus a total of four coatings, are present on each surface of the supporting substrate. These transparencies, for example, enable lightfast transparent colored images when printed with inks comprised, for example, of a vehicle such as mono and di alkylated oxazolines, a colorant, such as an alkylated colorant, like mono, di, tri and tetra alkylated dyes and an alkylated antioxidant, such as didodecyl-3,3′-thiodipropionate.
With the transparencies of the present invention, there are enabled a number of advantages, including the important advantages of high projection efficiency primarily because of improved flow of the oxazoline inks on the ink receiving layer containing low surface energy oxazoline compounds, and more specifically, in view of the low surface tension, for example about 30 to about 35 dynes/centimeter, of the ink receiving layer. Also, with the transparencies of the present invention, there are enabled a number of other advantages, including the important advantage of heat resistant characteristics for the transparencies when used in ink jet printers that employ heat or microwave energy for drying inks, low haze, that is, for example, wherein the transparencies permit greater than about 95 percent of the light to be transmitted therethrough in embodiments, and which transparencies possess excellent lightfast and waterfast characteristics. The transparencies of the present invention can also be selected for ink jet methods and apparatus, which employ aqueous inks.
PRIOR ART
Ink jet printing systems generally are of two types, continuous stream and a more common drop-on-demand. In drop-on-demand systems, a droplet is expelled from an orifice directly to a position on a recording medium in accordance with digital data signals. A droplet is not formed or expelled unless it is to be placed on the recording medium. Since drop-on-demand systems require no ink recovery, charging, or deflection, they are much simpler than the continuous stream type. There are three types of drop-on-demand ink jet systems.
One type of drop-on-demand system has as its major components an ink filled channel or passageway having a nozzle on one end and a piezoelectric transducer near the other end to produce pressure pulses. The relatively large size of the transducer prevents close spacing of the nozzles, and physical limitations of the transducer result in low ink drop velocity. Low drop velocity seriously diminishes tolerances for drop velocity variation and directionality, thus impacting the system's ability to produce high quality copies. Drop-on-demand systems, which use piezoelectric devices to expel the droplets also suffer the disadvantage of a slow printing speed.
The second type of drop-on-demand system is known as thermal ink jet, or bubble jet, and produces high velocity droplets and allows very close spacing of nozzles. The major components of this type of drop-on-demand system are an ink-filled channel having a nozzle on one end and a heat-generating resistor near the nozzle. Printing signals representing digital information originate an electric current pulse in a resistive layer within each ink passageway near the orifice or nozzle causing the ink in the immediate vicinity to evaporate almost instantaneously and create a bubble. The ink at the orifice is forced out as a propelled droplet as the bubble expands. When the hydrodynamic motion of the ink stops, the process is ready to start all over again. With the introduction of a droplet ejection system based upon thermally generated bubbles, commonly referred to as the “bubble jet” system, the drop-on-demand ink jet printers provide simpler, lower cost devices than their continuous stream counterparts, and yet have substantially the same high speed printing capability. Thermal ink jet processes are well known and are described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,601,777, U.S. Pat. No. 4,251,824, U.S. Pat. No. 4,410,899, U.S. Pat. No. 4,412,224, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,532,530, the disclosures of each of which are totally incorporated herein by reference.
The third type of drop-on-demand system is known as acoustic ink printing. In acoustic ink jet printing, an acoustic beam exerts a radiation pressure against features upon which it impinges. Thus, when an acoustic beam impinges on a free surface of the ink of a pool of liquid from beneath, the radiation pressure which it exerts against the surface of the pool may reach a sufficiently high level to release individual droplets of liquid from the pool, despite the restraining force of surface tension. Focusing the beam on or near the surface of the pool intensifies the radiation pressure it exerts for a given amount of input power, reference, for example,
IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin,
Vol. 16, No. 4, September 1973, pages 1168 to 1170, the disclosure of which is totally incorporated herein by reference. Acoustic ink printers typically comprise one or more acoustic radiators for illuminating the free surface of a pool of liquid ink with respective acoustic beams. Each of these beams usually is brought to focus at or near the surface of the reservoir (i.e., the liquid/air interface). Furthermore, printing conventionally is accomplished by independently modulating the excitation of the acoustic radiators in accordance with the input data samples for the image that is to be printed. This modulation enables the radiation pressure, which each of the beams exerts against the free ink surface, to make brief, controlled excursions to a sufficiently high pressure level for overcoming the restraining force of surface tension. That, in turn, causes individual droplets of ink to be ejected from the free ink surface on demand at an adequate velocity to cause them to deposit in an image configuration on a nearby recording medium. The acoustic beam may be intensity modulated or focused/defocused to control the ejection timing or an external source may be used to extract droplets from the acoustically excited liq
Foucher Daniel A.
Malhotra Shadi L.
Mychajlowskij Walter
Wong Raymond W.
Grendzynski Michael
Hess Bruce H.
Palazzo E. O.
Xerox Corporation
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