Eastman-kodak Company

David J Reed

Feraydoon S Jamzadeh

James Raymond Flick

Timothy John Young

Fereidoon S Jamzadeh

A method and apparatus for producing high quality folded greeting cards or the like is described as is a package of receiver sheet stock used for making such cards. A toned image is formed on an image supporting member using preferably an electrostatographic recording apparatus. A discrete receiver sheet is fed into engagement with the image supporting member to transfer the image to the receiver sheet. The receiver sheet is of a card stock of the type having a weight of no less than 28# bond. The grain of the sheet is in the grain short direction and the receiver sheet is fed into transfer relationship with the image supporting member by movement of the sheet in a direction coincident with the direction of the longer edges of the sheet. The receiver sheet is further characterized by one or more scoring lines which extend generally parallel to and intermediate the shorter edges of the sheet to facilitate folding of the receiver sheet after formation of an image thereon. The image on the image supporting member is transferred to the receiver sheet and then fused. A quality fold is provided to the card by folding the card with a fold line being along the scoring line(s). A further finishing of the card may be made by trimming of border areas.

Method and apparatus for producing high quality greeting cards or the

An image forming apparatus is particularly usable with a relatively stiff receiving sheet. In one embodiment, it includes a transfer member around which the receiving sheet is attached. To maintain good contact between the receiving sheet and the transfer member, a pair of rollers are positioned to engage the receiving sheet in non-imaged margins to hold it intimately to the transfer member. The sheet may also be engaged at other positions in its path in the non-imaged margins to control its movement. In another embodiment, corona applied to the sheet before separation from the transfer member is specially biased to discourage premature or excessive separation because of the stiffness of the sheet. The bias can be then changed to encourage separation if a more flexible receiving sheet is used.

Image forming apparatus including relatively stiff receiving sheet

A method of forming duplex color images on a receiving sheet passes the receiving sheet through a fuser twice for the first image and once for the second image. The process includes the step of determining which of the toner images should have a higher gloss and forming that toner image first so that it receives the greatest fusing energy. Preferably, the determining step is accomplished by determining which image receives more photographic content.

Method of forming duplex toner images

A toner image carried by a receiving sheet is fused by heat and pressure applied by first and second fusing members. To compensate for heat lost from the pressure member to the receiving sheet, the fuser has at least two speeds, a first fast speed, which is utilized for the first revolution of the fusing member contacting the toner image and a second slower speed to which the fuser is changed at the end of such first revolution.

Image forming apparatus having a multispeed heated pressure fuser and

Image frame length control apparatus and methods are disclosed which have particular utility in a printing or reproduction apparatus that writes one or more images on a transported photosensitive media such as a photoconducting drum or continuous-loop web. When an electronic writing system or optical exposure system is used to expose a driven media on a line-by-line basis, a variation in media thickness causes the latent image frame to be written with an inaccurate frame length. Consequently, a degraded print is produced. The latent image frame length is corrected during exposure, by adding or omitting one or more lines in the image frame. Alternatively, the exposure of an image is offet by an interval corresponding to one-half of the total length discrepancy between the uncorrected image frame length and the image frame length that would be written if the media surface speed was at a median level. The overall image length error is thereby reduced by half and distributed to the upper and lower extremities of the image frame. In another embodiment, the rotation rate of the media is increased or decreased when a respectively thin or thick portion of the media passes over the driving apparatus. The corrected image fames are written with greater fidelity to the original and, after development and transfer to a receiver, are particularly well-suited for use in forming an accurate multicolor reproduction.

Method and apparatus for image frame length control

A reproduction apparatus has an endless web with perforations or other indicia triggering image formation and receiving sheet presentation. To correct for error in perforation location the distance between perforations is measured and a delay after sensing one or both perforations is adjusted accordingly. Preferably, the distance between perforations is measured by an encoder temporarily connected to the apparatus when a new web is installed by a serviceperson.

Growing community of inventors

Rochester, NY, United States of America

David J Reed