JPH0732483A - Method and device for overcoating plastic card and the like - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the resistance to peeling of an overcoat, permit the forming of a partial and freely configured overcoat easily on the base material of a plastic card and the like without bringing any strain, bending and the like, permit to provide the base material with high-class feeling and facilitate to see a printed surface since the overcoated surface is delustered. CONSTITUTION:An overcoat film 3 is interposed between a thermal head 1, having a multitude of thermal head elements, and the base material 2 of the object of coating and the ON/OFF of the thermal element is controlled while pushing the overcoat film 3 against the base material 2 to move the base material 2 and the thermal head 1 relatively. The overcoat film 3 is bonded to the base material 2 through fusion welding by a dot unit by the thermal head elements, which are put ON.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention protects the surfaces of plastic cards such as ID cards, prepaid cards and deposit cards, and relatively hard plastic sheets.
The present invention relates to an overcoat method and apparatus for applying an overcoat (protective film) with a plastic film or the like.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In order to protect a printed surface of a plastic card as described above, a soft plastic film is thermally fused and overcoated on the surface. In the conventional overcoat method, generally, the overcoat film is solidly heat-sealed (whole surface adhesion) on the entire surface of the card with a heat roller or the like.

[0003]

Therefore, there are the following problems. Since the main purpose is to maintain the average adhesiveness of the entire film, the overcoat is easily peeled off due to the deformation (distortion, bending, etc.) of the card. Since heat is applied to the entire surface of the card to heat-bond the film solidly, when returning to room temperature due to heat dissipation, the card warps toward the film due to the difference in shrinkage rate between the card and the film. Since heat is applied to the entire surface of the film with a heat roller or the like to cause the film to be fused, it is not possible to partially fuse the film or form an overcoat having a free shape. The overcoat surface becomes a glossy surface, and its reflection adversely affects the printed surface of the card visually.

Incidentally, there has been a method of pasting an overcoat film with an adhesive, but this method is used only in a limited case because of problems in workability and the like.

Therefore, in view of the above-mentioned conventional problems, the object of the present invention is to improve the peel resistance of the overcoat,
And without causing distortion or bending to the base material such as a plastic card, moreover, it is possible to easily form a partial and free-form overcoat, and the overcoat surface becomes a matte surface, It is an object of the present invention to provide an overcoating method and an apparatus thereof that can give a high-grade feeling to a base material and make the printed surface easy to see.

[0006]

FIG. 1 shows an outline of an overcoating method according to the present invention. In this method, the thermal head 1 having a large number of thermal dot elements is used. Then, an overcoat film 3 is interposed between the thermal head 1 and a base material (plastic card or the like) 2 to be coated, and the overcoat film 3 is pressed against the base material 2 and the thermal head 1 and the thermal head 1. The thermal dot element is controlled to be turned on and off while the and are relatively moved, and the overcoat film 3 is thermally fused to the base material 2 in dot units by the turned on thermal dot element.

The overcoat film 3 is preferably moved with respect to the thermal head 1 while being wound up. Further, the base material 2 can be electrostatically adsorbed on the moving table 4, and the base material 2 can be moved together with the moving table 4 with respect to the thermal head 1 in a fixed position.

The overcoat device according to the present invention is shown in FIG.
In the following description, the thermal head 19 having a large number of thermal dot elements, and a head controller for controlling the on / off of the thermal dot elements,
Moving table 20 for electrostatically attracting a base material to be coated
And a film winding mechanism 21 that detachably holds the wound overcoat film 38, guides the overcoat film 38 between the thermal head 19 and the moving table 20, and transfers the overcoat film 38 while winding, and the overcoat film. Moving table 38 by thermal head 19
The thermal head 19
Head pressurizing mechanism 22 for pressurizing the moving table 20 side
And a table moving mechanism 24 for moving the moving table 20 along the guide rails 23.

This overcoat device includes an image reading section, a storage section for storing image data read by the image reading section, and a thermal dot element of a thermal head based on the image data stored in the storage section. And a head control unit for controlling.

[0010]

According to the present invention, the overcoat film is
As shown in FIG. 2, a thermal head having a large number of thermal dot elements is thermally fused to a base material such as a plastic card as shown in FIG. Therefore, the overcoated film is macroscopically attached to the surface of the base material by a planar assembly of a large number of dot-shaped fused portions, but microscopically Since they are separated and independent of each other, even if some of the spot-like fused parts are separated due to the deformation of the base material, they do not spread to other spot-like fused parts, and as a whole Has high peel resistance. In addition, since shrinkage also occurs by dividing each point-like fused part,
Does not cause distortion or bending of the base material.

Further, since the overcoat film is heat-fused to the base material only when the thermal dot element of the thermal head is turned on, an overcoat having a free shape can be formed on an arbitrary portion. It is also easy to apply an overcoat only to the characters on the printing surface of the material. Since the fusion-bonded portion of the overcoat film is a planar collection of many points, the overcoat surface has a matte surface-like aspect.

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. This apparatus is roughly composed of a printing / overcoat section A shown in FIG. 3 and an image reading section B shown in FIG. 4, and after reading an image of a document by the image reading section B and storing it in a storage section, the stored image Is printed on the card surface in the printing / overcoat portion A, and the printed surface can be freely overcoated in the printing / overcoat portion A.

The image reading section B has a structure similar to an image scanner. An original is placed on a transparent glass table (original table) 10 and is pressed by an original pressing member 11 from above, and a reading button (not shown) is pressed. When pushed, the moving base 12 slides along the horizontal rail 13. When this slides, the moving table 12
The light from the upper fluorescent lamp 14 is irradiated onto the original surface from below while moving, and is reflected by the reflection mirror 15 to enter the CCD image sensor 16 to scan and read the original surface. The read image data is stored in the storage unit, and is read out at appropriate time according to the operation of the printing / overcoat unit A. It should be noted that this storage unit can also store image data from the outside by a personal computer or the like.

In the printing / overcoat portion A, a card case 18 capable of accommodating and stacking a large number of plastic cards, a thermal head 19, and a plastic card pulled out from the card case 18 are arranged. Moving table 20 that electrostatically attracts to and horizontally moves
A film winding mechanism 21 for guiding and transporting an overcoat film or an ink film between the thermal head 19 and the moving table 20, and a head pressing mechanism for pressing the thermal head 19 toward the moving table 20. 22 and a table moving mechanism 24 that horizontally moves the moving table 20 along a guide rail (shaft) 23.

The card case 18 is provided on the front side of this device, and the opening of the lower surface is opened and closed by the shutter 25. A card presence / absence sensor 26 is provided below the card case 18, and this sensor 26 detects whether or not there is a card in the card case 18.

The thermal head 19 has a large number of thermal dot elements arranged in the front-rear direction toward the paper surface of FIG. 3, and the head controller (not shown) controls ON / OFF of each thermal dot element. . The head pressing mechanism 22 presses the film strongly against the upper surface of the moving table 20 by the thermal head 19, so that the thermal head 19 is pressed downward and the thermal head up / down cam 27 rotated by a rotary solenoid or the like (not shown) is used. Thus, the thermal head 19 can be moved between two upper and lower positions, that is, a lower pressing position where the film can be pressed against the moving table 20 and an upper retracted position. The pressure applied to the thermal head 19 can be adjusted by the head pressure adjusting screw 28.

The table moving mechanism 24 horizontally supports a plurality of guide rails 23 and a screw shaft 29, and a slider 30 is slidably mounted on the guide rails 23. The moving table 20 is fixed to the screw shaft 29.
The table moving motor 31 can be rotated forward and backward. The slider 30 reciprocally slides left and right in FIG. 3 between the start position detected by a start position sensor (not shown) and the end position detected by an end position sensor by the forward / reverse rotation of the table moving motor 31. When the slider 30 is at the start position, the moving table 20 is located below the card case 18. A high voltage is applied to the moving table 20 from the converter 32 so that the plastic card can be electrostatically attracted to the upper surface of the moving table 20.

The film take-up mechanism 21 has a film support shaft 33 capable of exchanging an overcoat film and an ink film and detachably supporting the film, a film guide roller 34, a film feeding roller 35, and a film take-up bobbin. 36 and 36, respectively, and transmits the rotation from the film driving motor 37 to the film winding bobbin 34 and the film feeding roller 35 via a belt (not shown) or the like. The wound overcoat film or ink film 38 is the film support shaft 3
The film take-up bobbin 3 is guided by the film guide roller 34 from the No. 3, and is taken out by the film take-out roller 35.
Take up to 6.

In the printing / overcoat portion A, a printing mode and an overcoat mode can be selected, and the film support shaft 33 is colored or monochrome (black).
When the ink film of No. 1 is loaded and the print mode is set, the images stored in the storage unit (the image read by the image reading unit B or the image input from the outside) are automatically printed one by one on the surface of the plastic film as follows. Printed.

That is, when the shutter 25 is opened, the lowermost one plastic card in the card case 18 is electrostatically attracted to the moving table 20 at the start position, and the moving table 20 keeps the thermal head 19 at the fixed position. Moved horizontally downward. The ink film is wound onto the film winding bobbin 36 while being strongly pressed against the surface of the plastic card by the thermal head 19. At the same time, the image data stored in the storage unit is read out, a large number of thermal dot elements of the thermal head 19 are turned on / off by the head control unit according to the read image data, and an ink film is formed on the surface of the plastic card. An image that is thermally fused in dot units is printed. When the moving table 20 moves to the end position and the electrostatic adsorption caused by the moving table 20 is released, the printed plastic film falls into the card collecting box 39 and is collected.

The plastic card printed as described above is again placed in the card case 18, and the film support shaft 33 is loaded with an overcoat film (for example, a PET film base coated with an overcoat agent). When the printing / overcoat portion A is set to the overcoat mode, printed plastic cards are adsorbed one by one on the moving table 20 and horizontally moved to the lower side of the thermal head 19 as described above. Similarly to the above, the overcoat film is wound around the film winding bobbin 36 while being strongly pressed against the surface of the plastic card by the thermal head 19, and at the same time, many thermal dot elements of the thermal head 19 are controlled by the head controller. It is turned on and off. As a result, the overcoat film is thermally fused (peeled and transferred by heat) to the surface of the plastic card in dot units as shown in FIG. 2, and the overcoat is formed on the printed surface of the plastic card.

In this case, if the thermal dot element is turned on / off by the head controller in accordance with the image data stored in the storage unit while reading the image data stored in the storage unit, the overcoat film can be produced in exactly the same manner as when the image is printed with the ink film. Since heat fusion is performed according to the image data, it is possible to apply an overcoat so that only the printed portion is overlapped. Also, connect to a personal computer etc. and input the graphic data and character data etc. created by this,
By controlling the thermal dot element to be turned on / off by the head control unit in accordance with the graphic data and character data, it is possible to apply an overcoat only to a portion of an arbitrary shape or characters / symbols. (A) of FIG.
In each of (B) and (C), the left side shows an input figure from a personal computer or the like, and the right side shows an overcoat mode according to the figure.

According to one experimental example, it was as follows. As the plastic card, a vinyl chloride card having a thickness of 0.70 to 0.80 mm according to JIS standard was used, and as the overcoat film, a PET film having a thickness of 9 microns coated with an overcoat agent was used. The thermal head 19 has a dot density of 8 dots / mm in the main scanning direction and 8 lines / mm in the sub-scanning direction.
The thing of mm was used. The applied pressure of the thermal head 19 is 5 kg, and the temperature of the thermal dot element is 180.
When the overcoat film was pressed against the plastic card (vinyl chloride card) by the thermal head 19 under the condition of ℃ to 220 ℃, this plastic card was moved while being electrostatically adsorbed on the moving table 20, In the case of an overcoat of 86 mm in the main scanning direction and 44 mm in the sub scanning direction, it could be formed in about 6 seconds.

The overcoat thus formed had the following differences from the case of solid overcoating with a heat roller. (1) When the entire surface is overcoated with a heat roller, the plastic card may be distorted or bent due to the difference in shrinkage rate between the plastic film and the overcoat film during heat dissipation, and the overcoat film may peel off. Many, but not according to the present invention. This is because the thermal fusion of the overcoat film is divided into a number of dots and is divided into innumerable pieces. (2) In the case of solid overcoating with a heat roller, it was difficult to partially overcoat or overcoat in a free shape. However, according to the present invention, there are no restrictions on the shape and size of the overcoat. No, the overcoat could be formed freely. (3) In case of overcoating with heat roller,
The overcoat surface became a glossy surface, and the printed surface of the plastic card had a feeling of being difficult to see due to the reflection of light, but in the case of the present invention, it becomes a matte surface and it is possible to suppress the reflection of light,
The printed surface was easy to see, and it had a high-class feel.

The embodiment in which the present invention is applied to an apparatus having both an image reading function and a printing function has been described above, but the present invention is not limited to this, and various modifications and applications are possible. is there. For example, an overcoat-dedicated device may be used, or a plastic card may be fixed in place and the thermal head may be moved to form an overcoat. Further, the base material to be overcoated is not limited to the plastic card, and a relatively hard plastic sheet larger than the card can be used.

[0026]

According to the present invention, the overcoat film can be heat-fused to the base material such as the plastic card in dot units of the thermal head, so that the following effects can be obtained. High peel resistance of the overcoat. Does not cause distortion or bending of the base material such as plastic cards. A partial and free-form overcoat can be easily formed. Since the overcoat surface becomes a matte surface, the base material can be given a high-class feeling and the printed surface can be easily seen.

Further, the following effects can be expected. When the overcoat film is moved while being wound, the overcoat can be easily formed. According to the third and fourth aspects, the base material is electrostatically adsorbed on the moving table and moved together with the moving table, so that the base material can be reliably held on the moving table and the overcoat can be formed without unevenness. If the overcoat film and the ink film can be exchanged and loaded into the film winding mechanism as in claim 5,
Printing and overcoating can be performed simply by exchanging them and using the same device, which is economical and convenient. When the image data read by the image reading unit is stored in the storage unit and the thermal dot element of the thermal head is controlled by the head control unit according to the stored data, the image read by the image reading unit is used as a base. In addition to being able to print on the material, an overcoat can be automatically formed accordingly.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic configuration diagram of an overcoat method according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a plan view showing that the overcoat film is thermally fused in dot units of the thermal head.

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view of a printing / overcoat portion of the device according to the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a cross-sectional view of an image reading unit of the apparatus.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of forming an overcoat according to an input graphic from a personal computer or the like.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1.19 thermal head 2 plastic card 3 overcoat film 4/20 moving table A printing / overcoat part B image reading part 21 film winding mechanism 22 head pressing mechanism 23 guide rail 24 table moving mechanism 38 overcoat film or ink film

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. An overcoat film is interposed between a thermal head having a large number of thermal dot elements and a base material to be coated, and the overcoat film is pressed against the base material so that the base material and the thermal head are opposed to each other. An overcoat method for a plastic card or the like, wherein the thermal dot element is controlled to be turned on and off while being moved, and the overcoat film is thermally fused to the base material in dot units by the turned on thermal dot element. 2. The method for overcoating a plastic card or the like according to claim 1, wherein the overcoat film is moved with respect to the thermal head while being wound up. 3. The base material is electrostatically attracted onto a moving table, and the base material is moved together with the moving table with respect to the thermal head in a fixed position.
An overcoat method for the plastic card or the like according to claim 1 or 2. 4. A thermal head having a large number of thermal dot elements, a head control section for controlling on / off of the thermal dot elements, a moving table for electrostatically attracting a base material to be coated, and a wound overcoat. A film take-up mechanism that holds the film detachably and transfers it while guiding and winding the overcoat film between the thermal head and the moving table, and the overcoat film is used as a base material on the moving table by the thermal head. An overcoat device for a plastic card or the like, comprising: a head pressing mechanism that presses the thermal head toward the moving table for pressing, and a table moving mechanism that moves the moving table along a guide rail. 5. The overcoat device for a plastic card or the like according to claim 4, wherein the film winding mechanism can be loaded by exchanging an overcoat film and an ink film. 6. An image reading section, a storage section for storing image data read by the image reading section, and a head control for controlling a thermal dot element of the thermal head based on the image data stored in the storage section. An overcoat device for a plastic card or the like according to claim 4 or 5, further comprising: