Lamination Study of Ink Jet Media, 1999 Polymers, Laminations & Coatings Conference Proceedings

Tom Graczyk and Boping Xie--The lamination of modern wide format ink jet media is a challenge today. Many commercially available ink jet media have excellent print qualities, but are difficult to laminate. The development of ink jet media requires a detailed understanding of the interactions of laminating film and its adhesive layer, the ink receiving layer and inks absorbed by the printing media. Generally, unprinted areas have better adhesion to laminating films than printed areas. The lamination of secondary colors is often more difficult than primary colors. Images printed with pigmented inks are often much harder to laminate well than images printed with dye based inks. It is shown that depending on the composition of the coating, unprinted areas can have lower adhesion than printed ones. It was found that the type of polyvinyl alcohol in the ink jet receiving layer could have significant influence on the adhesion of the laminating film. Partially hydrolyzed polyvinyl alcohol has better adhesion to unprinted areas than fully hydrolyzed. On the other hand, fully hydrolyzed polyvinyl alcohol provides better adhesion with primary and secondary colors. A mechanism to describe the migration of high boiling ink solvents, and influence on laminate adhesion, is provided.