JP2005100202A - Ic card and core sheet base material for it - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an IC card having a good appearance preventing a colored bottom face of an IC module from being observed through the IC card back face and to provide a core sheet base material for the IC card showing a good mechanical adhesion property during production. <P>SOLUTION: In this IC card having a thickness specified by JIS X6301 and an IC module 3 attached inside an IC module attaching recess part 5 formed by digging the card from the card surface, a three-layer co-extrusion PET-G sheet, in which a titanium oxide contents of an intermediate layer 12C of a core sheet is lower than that of the front and back layers, is used for each of white core sheets 11 and 12 in the central layer of the card. The white core sheet has three-layer structure with a thickness of about 0.30 mm, and two white core sheets may be layered together to be used. This core sheet base material for the IC card is formed by three-layer co-extrusion and has the titanium oxide composition described above. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to an IC card and a core sheet base material for an IC card. Specifically, it is an IC card having a card thickness that satisfies a predetermined card thickness condition stipulated in JIS and having an IC module mounted in a recess for mounting an IC module formed by excavating from the card surface. The present invention relates to an IC card that does not appear colored on the back side of a white card and is excellent in mass productivity, and a core sheet base material for an IC card used for the IC card.

  The thickness of the wallet-sized card is defined in JIS X6301 regardless of whether it is a magnetic card or an IC card, and is 0.76 ± 0.08 mm.

  In the IC card, since the depth of the recess for embedding the IC module (the recess for mounting the IC module) needs to be formed in a recess of about 0.62 to 0.64 mm, the thickness is 0.1 mm on the front and back. In general, an oversheet is used, and a white core sheet having a thickness of 0.62 mm is used for the center layer.

  However, in this normal card configuration, the bottom surface of the IC module, which is normally black, can be seen through from the back side of the card, causing a problem that the appearance is impaired.

  If the thickness of the IC module can be reduced, the IC module mounting recess can be made shallower, but at present, it is approaching the limit. Further, when the molding resin is colored, there may be a variation in coloring. Moreover, although there is also an idea of making it white, it is considered that there is a problem in terms of cost, and a white mold resin has not been realized conventionally.

  FIG. 4 is a cross-sectional view showing an IC module mounting portion of the IC card according to the conventional configuration. As shown in FIG. 4, the layer structure of the card substrate 10 uses two white core sheets 11 and 12 having a thickness of 0.31 mm for the center layer, and a transparent overcoat having a thickness of 0.1 mm on the front and back of the core sheet. The sheets 13 and 14 are laminated.

  When the IC module mounting recess 5 is excavated to a depth of 0.62 to 0.64 mm from the surface of the card base 10, the card base remaining portion Δt on the bottom surface of the IC module mounting recess 5 has a thickness of 0.18. ˜0.16 mm (after pressing). In particular, the remaining thickness of the white core sheet 12 is about 60 to 80 μm, which is insufficient to conceal the coloring of the mold resin portion 3 m on the bottom surface of the IC module 3.

  In order to solve this, in the IC card, the center value of the total card thickness is generally set to about 0.80 mm, and the bottom of the IC module mounting recess 5 and the back surface of the IC module 3 are formed. In order to prevent see-through, a layer structure is used in which a transparent oversheet having a thickness of 0.05 mm is used on the front and back, and a white core sheet having a thickness of 0.72 mm is used for the center layer. In this case, the total thickness of the material is 0.82 mm, but is 0.80 mm by pressing.

  However, since the 0.05 mm-thick oversheet is thin and flexible (so-called “no stiffness” state), it cannot be attached to the machine, so it is hand-attached, resulting in poor mass production suitability for card manufacturing. .

  Further, a configuration in which the center value of the total card thickness is 0.82 mm, the oversheets are each 0.10 mm, and the core layer core sheet is 0.31 mm thick is also being studied.

In this case, in order to improve the concealability of the core sheet and to completely prevent “the transparency of the back side of the card of the IC module”, the addition amount of titanium oxide (TiO ₂ ) as a white pigment is increased to 15% by weight or more. It was confirmed that it was necessary to increase. However, it has also been found that increasing the amount of titanium oxide to an amount exceeding 15% by weight does not satisfy the physical strength necessary for an IC card, specifically, the problem of “cracking”. In particular, cracking often occurs as a phenomenon of cracking from the bottom corner of the IC module mounting recess.

  On the other hand, Patent Document 1 is detected as a prior document for concealing the coloration of the bottom surface of the IC module. However, this technique is obtained by laminating a metallic luster concealment layer and a white concealment layer on a white core sheet. It is a requirement to have a configuration. However, printing a metallic luster layer or the like has a problem of increasing the number of processes and increasing the cost.

In addition, a card colored in silver or gold on the back side of the card can be provided with a concealing layer as in Patent Document 1, but an IC card that is required to have a white back side can be used as described above. Cannot be resolved.
JP 2002-259933 A

  Therefore, the inventor of the present application has a card layer that can prevent “seen on the back side of the card” on the bottom surface of the IC module in the white back side IC card that is mounted in the recess for mounting the IC module formed by excavating the IC module from the card surface. The present invention has been completed by studying to achieve the configuration without increasing the number of special manufacturing steps and without damaging mass productivity (applicability to machine attachment).

  One of the gist of the present invention for solving the above-mentioned problems is a card thickness satisfying a thickness of 0.76 ± 0.08 mm defined by JISX6301, and in an IC module mounting recess formed by excavating from the card surface. In an IC card equipped with an IC module, the core sheet of the center layer of the card is a three-layer coextruded PET-G sheet, where the titanium oxide content in the middle layer of the core sheet is the titanium oxide content in the front and back layers. The IC card is characterized by using a core sheet having a low content.

  The second aspect of the present invention for solving the above problems is a core sheet base material for an IC card used for an IC card mounted in an IC module mounting recess formed by excavating an IC module from the card surface. The core sheet base material for an IC card, wherein the three-layer coextruded PET-G sheet has a lower content of titanium oxide in the middle layer than the titanium oxide content in the front and back layers. .

  Since the IC card of the present invention has a sufficient concealing property, even when the back surface is a white card, the coloring of the bottom surface of the IC module does not show through the back surface of the card, and the appearance is excellent.

  With the layer configuration of the IC card of the present invention, a 0.1 mm thick sheet can be used as the oversheet, so that there is sufficient “stiffness”, suitability for machine bonding, and excellent mass productivity.

  Since the core sheet base material for IC cards of the present invention has high concealability and also has crack durability, it can be suitably used as a base material for white IC cards.

  Hereinafter, an IC card and a core sheet base material for an IC card according to the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of a cross-sectional configuration of the IC card of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a stacked state of the card base material in the case of FIG. 1, and FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional configuration of the IC card of the present invention It is a figure which shows another example. For ease of understanding, the scale in the thickness direction is enlarged in the width direction in each figure.

  As shown in FIG. 1, the card base 10 of the IC card 1 of the present invention uses, for example, two white core sheets 11 and 12 as the center layer, and laminates transparent oversheets 13 and 14 on both front and back surfaces. It consists of a configuration.

  The thickness of the card is defined as 0.76 ± 0.08 mm in JISX6301 conforming to ISO / IEC7810, but in order to improve the concealment property, the total thickness of the white core sheets 11 and 12 is set. It is necessary to make it about 0.60 to 0.62 mm.

  Moreover, in order to make the mechanical suitability in the IC card manufacturing process good, it is preferable that the thickness of the transparent oversheets 13 and 14 is close to 0.1 mm.

The core sheets 11 and 12 of the IC card 1 used in the present invention are made of PET-G resin in which three layers are coextruded, and in the middle layer and the front and back layers of the three layers, titanium oxide (TiO2) which is a white pigment is used. ₂ ) is different from the addition amount of filler (filler), impact modifier, and intrinsic viscosity (IV) retention agent.

  Other characteristics of the card base material will be described in detail later, but here, the amount of titanium oxide added will be described with a focus. In the core sheets 11 and 12 shown in FIG. 1, the hatched portions 11u, 11d, 12u, and 12d are high concealment layers with a large amount of added titanium oxide, and the portions 11c and 11c that are subjected to the pop-like hatching. 12c is a low hiding layer with a small amount of titanium oxide added. The IC card substrate 10 of FIG. 1 uses two white core sheets having such a three-layer structure.

  The feature of the IC card 1 of the present invention is that the bottom part (deepest part) of the IC module mounting recess 5 is excavated so as to cover the portion of the high concealment layer 12d, and between the transparent oversheet 14, The reason is that a high hiding layer 12d having a thickness of several tens of μm is left.

  Conventionally, if the entire core sheet 12 is made a highly concealing layer with an addition amount of titanium oxide exceeding 15% by weight, the card substrate becomes brittle, and there is a problem that cracks are generated from the corners of the mounting recess 5 as described above. there were. However, the middle layer 12c has a low concealment layer configuration of 7 to 8% by weight, and the front and back layers 12u and 12d have a high concealment layer configuration of 14 to 15% by weight, thereby preventing cracking and the IC module 3. This produces an effect of preventing the coloring of the mold resin portion 3m from being seen through.

  In addition, the white core sheet may be a single layer, but it is possible to reduce the loss of the printing process by manufacturing by the process of hot pressing and integrating after printing the front side printing and the back side printing on different sheets. Two core sheets are stacked and used.

  In the case of one core sheet, the thickness is about 0.60 mm. However, when two core sheets are used, the thickness of one core sheet is about 0.30 mm.

  FIG. 3 shows another example of the cross-sectional configuration of the IC card of the present invention, in which the core sheet is a single layer. Also in this case, the bottom portion (deepest portion) of the concave portion 5 for mounting the IC module reaches the high concealment layer 11d of the white core sheet 11, and the thickness of the remaining excavation portion of the high concealment layer 11d is the same as that in FIG. To be. The thickness of the middle layer 11c can be set arbitrarily.

  The IC card shown in FIG. 1 is manufactured after pattern printing is performed on the two white core sheets 11 and 12 as shown in FIG. 2 (back surface printing may be performed after cutting into individual card sizes. ), Two core sheets 11 and 12 are used as a central layer, and transparent oversheets 13 and 14 are laminated on both sides thereof. The assembly of sheets is introduced into a press machine and hot-pressed to produce an integrated card substrate 10.

  The steps up to here are performed in a state where 10 to 30 cards are applied in many ways. Further, in recent years, it is often performed not by manually stacking cut sheets, but by an automated process (meaning so-called “mechanical bonding”) in which sheets are mechanically pulled out, cut, stacked, and pressed. ing.

  After the card is cut into individual sizes, the IC module mounting recess 5 is excavated from the card surface and the IC module 3 is mounted. The concave portion 5 for mounting the IC module has a depth and size in which the first concave portion having a size and a depth for accommodating the terminal substrate 4 of the IC module 3 and a mold resin portion 3m for protecting the IC chip 2 and the wire portion of the IC module 3 are accommodated. And a second recess. Usually, the depth of the first recess is about 150 μm from the card surface, and the size is the size of the contact terminal plate of the IC module, which is often about 13.0 × 12.0 mm.

  Since the second recess is made deeper by about 470 to 490 μm than the first recess, the depth from the surface of the card base is about 620 to 640 μm. When excavating to this depth, the bottom surface of the second recess reaches the middle of the high hiding layer 12 d of the core sheet 12. At this depth, the top of the mold resin portion 3m of the IC module 3 is substantially in contact with the bottom surface of the second recess.

  However, since an error of about ± 20 μm may occur in the excavation depth, it is necessary to consider that the concealment is not affected even if the deepest part is about 640 to 660 μm.

  The IC module is loaded by placing a heater block having a heating surface of the same size as the metal terminal substrate on the surface of the metal terminal substrate 4 on the surface side of the IC module 3 and heating it with a heat source in the heater block. A method is adopted in which the hot-melt adhesive film is melted by pressurization and then cooled to room temperature and fixed. Thereby, the IC module 3 can be physically fixed to the surface of the first recess.

  Next, the core sheet base material for IC card of this invention is demonstrated.

  The core sheet base material for IC card of the present invention has the layer structure of the white core sheets 11 and 12 illustrated in FIG. Moreover, Table 1 is a table | surface which shows compounding quantities, such as a titanium oxide at the time of producing a core sheet base material with a thickness of 0.31 mm as an example.

  As shown in FIG. 2, the core sheet base material for IC card of the present invention is composed of front and back layers 12u, 12d made of a high hiding layer and an intermediate layer 12c made of a low hiding layer. When the white core sheet is a single layer, the entire thickness of the core sheet base material can be around 0.6 mm, but when the core sheet is two layers, the thickness of one sheet is around 0.3 mm. .

  In the case of Table 1, since the middle layer is 0.11 mm and the front and back layers (both are shown as surface layers in Table 1) are each 0.10 mm, the total thickness is 0.31 mm.

  The reason why the middle layer is 0.01 mm thicker than the front and back layers is that the bottom surface of the IC module mounting recess 5 is the front layer (in FIG. This is because it reaches the middle of the layer. However, the object can be achieved even if the middle layer is 0.10 mm and the front and back layers are 0.1 mm + 0.005 to 0.01 mm.

  The bottom surface position of the recess 5 varies in the vertical direction (card thickness direction) due to the variation in counterboring. Therefore, even if it fluctuates somewhat, it is necessary to set so that the bottom surface of the recess is always located in the same surface layer of the composition.

表１のように、中層と、表層には、酸化チタン（ＴｉＯ₂ ）の他、フィラー、衝撃改良剤、ＩＶ（固有粘度；Ｉｎｔｒｉｎｓｉｃ Ｖｉｓｃｏｓｉｔｙ）保持剤、が添加されている。ただし、双方の表層は、同一の配合量となっている。表裏を取り違えて基材を使用しても対称性が維持できるからである。
（１）酸化チタン（ＴｉＯ₂ ）配合量は、凹部底面が位置する表層に多く配合するのが好ましい。逆に中層は配合量を減らし、割れ対策とする。ただし、前記のように、酸化チタン量が、１５重量％を超えると基材が脆くなり、ＩＣカードとして必要な物理強度を満足できないことが確認されている。従って、表層の酸化チタン配合量は、１４〜１５重量％が適当となる。酸化チタンは一般的に親水性があり、水分はＰＥＴ−Ｇ樹脂の加水分解による強度低下を招くおそれがあるため、疎水性のルチル型酸化チタンが好ましい。
（２）フィラーは、エンボスカールを低減させるために添加が必要である。添加量が「多すぎるとシート間の融着を阻害する」ことから、中層に多く配合し、表裏層は少なめの配合とする。
（３）衝撃改良剤は割れの対策として、ゴム系成分を添加する。前記のように、凹部の底が割れのきっかけとなりやすいことから、表裏層に多く（８重量％程度）配合するのが好ましい。ただし、「エンボスカールを大きくする」弊害もあるから、中層は少な目（６重量％程度）とするのが好ましい。

As shown in Table 1, in addition to titanium oxide (TiO ₂ ), a filler, an impact modifier, and an IV (intrinsic viscosity) retaining agent are added to the middle layer and the surface layer. However, both surface layers have the same blending amount. This is because the symmetry can be maintained even if the base material is used with the front and back reversed.
(1) It is preferable to add a large amount of titanium oxide (TiO ₂ ) in the surface layer where the bottom surface of the recess is located. On the other hand, the middle layer reduces the blending amount to prevent cracking. However, as described above, it has been confirmed that when the amount of titanium oxide exceeds 15% by weight, the base material becomes brittle and physical strength necessary for an IC card cannot be satisfied. Accordingly, the appropriate amount of titanium oxide in the surface layer is 14 to 15% by weight. Titanium oxide is generally hydrophilic, and water may cause a decrease in strength due to hydrolysis of the PET-G resin. Therefore, hydrophobic rutile titanium oxide is preferable.
(2) The filler needs to be added to reduce emboss curl. Since the addition amount is “inhibiting fusion between the sheets if too much”, it is added in a large amount in the middle layer and the front and back layers are set in a smaller amount.
(3) A rubber component is added to the impact modifier as a countermeasure against cracking. As described above, since the bottom of the recess tends to cause cracking, it is preferable to add a large amount (about 8% by weight) to the front and back layers. However, since there is an adverse effect of “enlarging the embossed curl”, it is preferable that the middle layer has a small size (about 6% by weight).

For this reason, if the bottom surface of the mounting recess 5 is in the middle layer, cracking tends to occur. Therefore, it is preferable to excavate until reaching the surface layer (back surface layer 12d).
(4) In the IV retaining agent, as described above, titanium oxide is hydrophilic, and moisture combined with titanium oxide causes a decrease in strength due to hydrolysis of the PET-G resin. The middle layer is added. In addition, IV means an intrinsic viscosity, but is also a value used as a measure of molecular weight.

An embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS.
<Preparation of core sheet substrate>
The white core sheet base materials 11 and 12 were manufactured by coextruding three layers of a PET-G resin base sheet having a layer configuration of [Table 1] and having a thickness of 310 μm.
<Preparation of IC module>
A COT (glass epoxy substrate, 100 μm thick) IC chip with a contact terminal board formed on the front side and a black epoxy resin that surrounds the wire bonding area is dropped onto the resin mold. did.

  The size of the IC module terminal substrate 4 is 13.0 mm × 11.8 mm, the mold resin portion 3 m is 8.0 mm × 8.0 mm, and the height of the mold resin portion 3 m not including the substrate thickness is 480 μm. It was.

The polyester hot melt adhesive sheet 8 having a thickness of 50 μm was laminated on the back surface of the COT (opposite surface of the terminal substrate) so that the entire portion in contact with the first concave portion of the IC module was covered by peeling the paper separator. . The pressing conditions were 130 ° C. and time 5 seconds.
<Preparation of Card Substrate> The core sheet base materials 11 and 12 prepared in advance are overlapped to form a center layer, and a PET-G resin transparent oversheet 13 and 14 having a thickness of 100 μm are stacked and stacked on the both sides. After temporarily fixing the sheet, it was introduced into a press machine and subjected to hot pressing.

The hot pressing conditions were 110 ° C., 2.0 MPa, and 20 minutes. Then, it was made into individual pieces of each card size by a punching machine.
<Excavation of IC module mounting recess> The IC module mounting recess 5 was formed by drilling by NC cutting of a counterbore machine.

  First, the first recess was excavated to a depth corresponding to the total thickness of the IC module substrate (contact terminal plate) 4 and the adhesive sheet 8.

  The size of the first recess at this stage was 13.1 × 11.9 mm (corner radius of curvature 2.5 mm), and the depth was 150 μm. This size is an opening that is about 0.1 mm larger than the actual terminal board, but the compatibility in that case is good.

Next, a second concave portion for accommodating the mold resin portion 3m of the IC module was excavated so that the size was 8.2 mm × 8.2 mm, the depth was 640 μm from the card surface, and 490 μm deep from the first concave surface. At this depth, the white core sheet 12 remains 80 μm in calculation. However, after pressing, the thickness is about 60 to 70 μm.
<Installation of IC module>
On the surface of the first concave portion of the concave portion for embedding, the IC module 3 on which the previously prepared adhesive sheet 8 is laminated is punched out from the COT and mounted, and the adhesive sheet 8 is melted by applying heat pressure with a heater block. Fixed. The conditions of the heater block were 170 ° C, time; 1 second.
(Comparative example)
Except for using a white core sheet having a thickness of 310 μm (titanium oxide 15%), the card base 10 was manufactured under the same conditions as in the example, and the IC module 3 was mounted under the same conditions.

The results of measuring the physical properties of the IC cards prototyped according to the above examples and comparative examples are as follows. The examples satisfied the standard value or in-house standard value specified by JIS, but in the comparative example, it was recognized that the concealability and cracking durability were inferior.
(1) Embossed curl (warping of card) [JISX6301 8.1.12.]
When the 4-side embossed card before distribution is placed on a surface plate with the convex side up, the maximum value from the surface of the surface plate to any unembossed portion of the surface on the convex side is the card's maximum value. Do not exceed 2.5mm including the thickness.

Measured value Example 1.98 mm Comparative example 1.7 mm
(2) The substrate thickness remaining at the bottom of the IC module mounting recess is 0.14 mm (of which 0.10 mm is the thickness of the transparent oversheet), and the transmission density when using a red filter is 0.75. That's it.

Measured value Example 0.80 mm Comparative example 0.73 mm
(3) Cracking durability (IC bending test)
Test method JISX6303-1988
Measured value Example 1000 times No abnormality Comparative example Crack generation within 1000 times (4) Crack durability (ATM transport test)
Test method: Test that repeatedly passes ATM 1000 times Actual value Example 1000 times No abnormality Comparative example Crack generation at 750 times or more From the above test results, the prototype IC card (Example) has the predetermined quality characteristics and appearance Was also confirmed to be good. In addition, the machine sticking aptitude of the examples was also good.

It is a figure which shows the example of the cross-sectional structure of the IC card of this invention. It is a figure which shows the lamination | stacking state of the card | curd base material in the case of FIG. It is a figure which shows the other example of a cross-sectional structure of the IC card of this invention. It is sectional drawing which shows the IC module mounting part of the IC card by a conventional structure.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 IC card 3 IC module 4 Terminal board 5 IC module mounting recessed part 8 Adhesive sheet 10 Card base 11, 12 Core sheet 13, 14 Oversheet

Claims (8)

The core of the center layer of the card in an IC card having a thickness of 0.76 ± 0.08 mm as defined by JISX6301 and having an IC module mounted in an IC module mounting recess formed by excavation from the card surface The sheet used was a three-layer coextruded PET-G sheet, in which the core sheet had a titanium oxide content in the middle layer that was lower than the titanium oxide content in the front and back layers. Characteristic IC card. 2. The IC card according to claim 1, wherein two core-extruded PET-G sheets are laminated on a core sheet. The IC card according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the content of titanium oxide in the middle layer is 7 to 8% by weight, and the content of titanium oxide in the front and back layers is 14 to 15% by weight. The middle layer and the front and back layers each have a thickness of 0.10 ± 0.01 mm, the titanium oxide content of the middle layer is 7 to 8% by weight, and the titanium oxide content of the front and back layers is 14 to 15% by weight. The IC card according to claim 2, wherein: 3. The IC card according to claim 1, wherein a transparent PET-G sheet having a thickness of 0.1 mm is laminated on the front and back of the core sheet. A core sheet base material for an IC card used for an IC card to be mounted in an IC module mounting recess formed by excavating an IC module from the card surface, and a three-layer coextruded PET-G sheet of middle layer titanium oxide The core sheet base material for IC cards, wherein the content is lower than the titanium oxide content of the front and back layers. The core sheet base material for an IC card according to claim 6, wherein the content of titanium oxide in the middle layer is 7 to 8% by weight, and the content of titanium oxide in the front and back layers is 14 to 15% by weight. The middle layer and the front and back layers each have a thickness of 0.10 ± 0.01 mm, the titanium oxide content of the middle layer is 7 to 8% by weight, and the titanium oxide content of the front and back layers is 14 to 15% by weight. The core sheet base material for IC cards according to claim 6, wherein

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