Hewlett-packard Development Company, L.p.

Raymond G Schuder

Steven W Trovinger

John Phillip Ertel

Ross R Allen

Robert L Cobene

Robert L Cobene, Ii

Christopher A Schantz

Systems and methods for attaching a cover to a text body to create bound documents with floating and attached spines are described. In some embodiments, a solid pressure sensitive adhesive film is applied between a cover and the side hinge areas of a text body, and a cover is bound to the side hinge areas of the text body with pressure. A solid pressure sensitive adhesive tape may be dispensed from an adhesive dispenser that includes a plug-in cartridge housing, a supply spool, and a take-up spool. In other embodiments, an adhesive sheet that includes a hot melt adhesive film and a backing is applied to the text body, with the hot melt adhesive film in contact with the side hinge areas and the spine of the text body. The hot melt adhesive is exposed in areas corresponding to the side hinge areas of the text body for attaching the cover to the text body. In one embodiment, an adhesive sheet includes a hot melt adhesive film and a backing layer that is attached to the hot melt adhesive film and has one or more slits extending in a substantially longitudinal direction. The slitted backing layer is configured to expose the hot melt adhesive upon stretching of the backing layer in a direction substantially orthogonal to the longitudinal direction.

Systems and methods of attaching a cover to a text body

Systems and methods for binding a text body are described. A multi-function sheet binder is configured to heat a preformed solid hot melt adhesive to a melting temperature, form the melted adhesive by pressing the melted adhesive into a spine of a text body and folding down edges of the melted adhesive into contact with the text body, and actively cool the formed adhesive. A spot heater is configured to heat one or more localized areas of a solid hot melt adhesive to a temperature sufficient to tack the hot melt adhesive to a text body spine. An adhesive former is configured to press a localized region of a preformed heated solid hot melt adhesive into a spine of a text body and to fold down edge regions of the preformed solid hot melt adhesive into contact with the text body.

Systems and methods of binding a text body

Systems and methods for registering a cover with respect to a text body to create bound documents with floating and attached spines are described. In one embodiment, a text body having a front end, two opposed side ends, and a spine end that is located opposite to the front end is formed from two or more sheets, and a single-piece cover is registered with respect to at least one end of the text body.

Systems and methods of registering a cover with respect to a text body

Systems and methods are described for increasing the binding strength of a bound text body by increasing the spinal surface area exposed for adhesive penetration greater than an area corresponding to the product of the sheet height dimension, the sheet thickness dimension and the number of sheets. In one aspect, sheet-wise conditioning of the binding area is performed prior to the application of adhesive to increase the bond area between sheets of the text body. In another aspect, the spinal surface area exposed for adhesive penetration is increased as adhesive is applied.

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Menlo Park, CA, United States of America

Raymond G Schuder