Xerox Corporation

Ming-Hong Fu

Daniel A Foucher

David M Skinner

Hiep Ly

Process for producing a corrosion-resistant liquid level control plate for the printhead of an aqueous ink jet printing machine. A corrosion-resistant metal alloy base is used, having an undersurface and an upper surface and having closely-spaced ink jet nozzles therethrough. Each of the nozzles has a micro-orifice at the undersurface surrounded by a lip area at the bottom of upwardly and outwardly tapered walls opening at the upper surface. The present process comprises forming the lip areas of metallic gold, encapsulating the upper surface of the metal alloy base including the gold lip areas and the tapered walls with metallic gold to form a corrosion-resistant, hydrophobic surface layer thereover. Thereafter the undersurface is coated with metallic chromium to render it hydrophilic. The gold coating preferably is reacted with a self assembled monolayer (SAM) of an organic sulfur compound such as hexadecylthiol or, more preferably, a cross-linkable SAM which is then cross-linked in situ to form a rub-resistant layer having strong hydrophobic properties. The chrome coating on the undersurface may be coated with a hydrophilic silane to increase its hydrophilic properties.

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Webster, NY, United States of America

Ming-Hong Fu