Printing with ink
AssigneeInca Digital Printers Limited
InventorJindrich Vosahlo
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method is disclosed of printing an area of a substrate in a plurality of passes using curable ink, the method comprising depositing a first pass of ink on the area, partially curing ink deposited in the first pass, depositing a second pass of ink on the area, and fully curing the ink on the area. The method finds particular application in the field of inkjet printing, and can afford the advantage of better wetting of ink on the substrate deposited by a previous pass and reducing the problem of ink spreading.
Claims23
A method, for use with an inkjet device, of printing an area of a substrate in a plurality of passes using radiation curable ink, the method comprising
- a.) depositing with the inkjet device a plurality of spaced apart droplets of radiation curable ink onto the substrate in a first pass on the area;
- b.) partially curing the ink deposited in the first pass such that an exposed surface of the partially cured ink is in non-solidified form, wherein the ink is partially cured with a first dose of radiation from a radiation source carried by the inkjet device;
- c.) depositing with the inkjet device a second plurality of spaced apart droplets of radiation curable ink onto the substrate in a second pass on the area with the ink of the first pass being substantially wetted by the ink of the second pass;
- wherein a.) and c.) are performed with the inkjet device in which discrete droplets of ink are deposited from at least one nozzle onto the substrate, the deposition of adjacent droplets of ink are separately controlled to permit mutually different adjacent droplets to be deposited on the substrate;
- and
- d.) fully curing the ink on the area with a further dose of radiation after all desired passes of ink have been deposited.
A method, for use with an inkjet device, of printing an area of a substrate in a plurality of passes using radiation curable ink, the method comprising:
- depositing a first pass of ink on a first sub-area of the area by using radiation curable ink;
- and
- substantially immobilising the ink of the first pass on the area in a first partial-curing step so that a layer of ink adjacent the substrate has a viscosity greater than the viscosity of an exposed surface of the ink, wherein the ink is partially cured with a first dose of radiation from a source carried by the inkjet device,
- wherein the immobilised ink is such that it is substantially wettable by ink of a subsequent pass, and
- depositing a second pass of ink on a second sub-area adjacent to the first sub-area by using radiation-curable ink, wherein only a minor part of the second pass of ink is deposited on top of partially cured ink deposited on the substrate including the first pass of ink.
Apparatus for an inkjet device, for use in printing an area of a substrate in a plurality of passes using radiation curable ink, comprising:
- a printhead arranged to deposit a first pass of ink using radiation curable ink on a first sub-area of the area;
- a radiation source carried by the printhead for partially curing the ink deposited on the area wherein the radiation source for partially curing the ink is adapted to partially cure the ink such that an exposed surface of the partially cured ink is in non-solidified form and that a layer of the partially cured ink adjacent the substrate has a viscosity greater than the exposed surface of the partially cured ink;
- and
- a printhead arranged to deposit a second pass of ink on a second sub-area adjacent to the first sub-area, wherein only a minor part of the second pass of ink is deposited on top of partially cured ink deposited on the substrate including the first pass of ink;
- and means for substantially fully curing the ink on the area.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.