There are numerous card printer manufactures which produce a line of products that at the end of the day will produce a Photo ID, loyalty, membership or other types of ID cards. These manufactures have products which cover from a wide range of ID card printers, to printers that service a specific niche market. As an example they all carry a line of card printers which will print a CR80 card, the list lessens when you move to a CR90 card and lessen further when you consider a CR100 card. The same principles hold true for encoding all carry magnetic stripe encoders, the field again lessens when you look at encoding proximity cards, reduces further with RFID and smart card encoding.
Fundamentally it is a small market and there is not a lot of technology differentiation between one printer manufacture to the next. There are of course differences in how you use the printer within your specific application, the distribution philosophies and warranties associated with each printer manufacture.
The basic card printers have these features:
Single or dual sided printing Edge-to-Edge printing (300dpi) MS Windows capable
Color/monochrome capabilities Various forms of security features Good print quality
Print speeds around 100 cards per hour Diagnostics Factory Warranty
The basic technology remains the same also across the card printer manufactures, these are:
- Dye Sublimation printing
- Resin Transfer printing
- Transfer film printing
- Ink Jet printing
Before we explore the details of how these printers operate, we need to discuss the final end product you will get with your ID card.
- With Dye Sublimation printing the Dyes on the ribbons is similar to a vegetable oil. When super-heated (around 700°F), the color of the dye will vaporize and congeal with the ID card surface, thus penetrating the surface of the plastic card. This process virtually leaves a color image embedded into the ID card.
- Thermal transfer printing requires less heat and in turn bonds like glue the color to the ID card surface.
- Film transfer is a process where a reverse image is printed onto a film and then the film is bonded onto the surface of the ID card.
- Ink jet printing is fundamentally heated bubbles of colored ink that are shot onto the surface of the ID card through a series of nozzles.
All of these ID card printing technologies are deigned for specific applications and all have their own idiosyncrasies, before you commit to a specific technology a conversation with the sales staff at Lexington Technology or the card printer manufacture will insure you get the ID card printer that is right for your application.
Dye Sublimation printing
The dye-sublimation process for printer ribbons take place within an ID card printer. The dye-sublimation printer requires the following, Pressure, Heat, and Film. The film needs a release gel, color dye and direct contact with a clear plastic card vinylized surface. If any of these elements are missing or faulty, the dye-sublimation process will not take place or the finished ID card will look odd.
To keep things simple the dye-sublimation printing overview will be brief. There are many technical publications and manuals on the topic of dye-sublimation, if you are studying chemical engineering or attempting to build a dye-sublimation thermal printer, the knowledge base is out there for you. But for our interests, Dye-sublimation printing
works and that is all we care about.
So in the simplest of terms when heat and pressure are combined, these elements press the color film onto a PVC card. A release gel at that point will boil and begin to vaporize, thus forcing the color dye to penetrate the surface of the card. Depending on the quantity of heat and the surface of the card will affect how much color dye is released and absorbed.
The more heat the more depth of color.
A interesting fact you should understand about color dye-sublimation, they never actually dry. This should not be of any concern, however, provided the conditions are just right, you can cause the dyes to migrate or move, from one vinyl surface to another. You can also cause color dyes to evaporate or fade with ultraviolet (sun) light. That is one of the
reasons for Laminating an ID card, to keep your images permanent .
Resin Transfer printing
The process of resin transfer ribbon is almost the same as Dye-Sublimation, with a few exceptions. The resin ribbon requires less heat to transfer the colors onto the ID card. With resin printing the print head pixels are either turned “on” or “off” as opposed to the Dye-sublimation process which varies the degree of temperature.
Resin ribbon is also like a wax which melts and bonds, with the surface of the ID card, it doesn’t penetrate like dye sublimation colors do.
Transfer film printing
Transfer film printing is a process where you are transferring printed images from a dye sublimation ribbon onto a transfer film. The image which has been transferred (to film) is then laminated (bonded) to the ID card.
The transferring of an image to the film is very similar to the dye sublimation printing process shown the dye sublimation overview. At the area where the dye sublimation ribbon and transfer film touch there is a heated print head. The combination of heat and pressure transfers the CYMK ribbon color onto the transfer film. A release gel at that point will boil and begin to vaporize, thus forcing the CYMK color dye to penetrate the surface of the transfer film. Depending on the quantity of heat and the surface pressure of the dye sublimation ribbon to the transfer film will affect how much CYMK color dye is released and absorbed onto the transfer film. The more heat the more depth of color.
For those who are interested at the time the dye sublimation ribbon is vaporized onto the transfer film the image is reversed. The transfer film travels through a series of rollers to the laminator station where the image is then transferred to the ID Card. The ID card is then moved to the flattener where a series of heat sinks and cooling fan reduces the temperature of the ID card. This process is the same for PVC Cards, plastic cards or composite cards.
You should also understand that if the ID card were not cooled after the transfer film process takes place your ID card would come out of the card printer looking like a potato chip. So the cooling and flatting stage of the transfer film ID card printing process is important in producing quality photo ID cards.
Ink Jet printing
Thermal Inkjet Printing technology is an emerging, fast-growing method for ID card production. This method is sometimes referred to as bubble jet. In a thermal inkjet printer, tiny heating elements create heat, and this heat vaporizes ink to create a small bubble (drops). As the bubbles expand, some of the ink is pushed out of a nozzle onto the ID Card . When the bubble "pops" or collapses, a vacuum is created. This vacuum pulls more ink into the nozzle from the cartridge. A typical bubble jet print head has 300 or 600 tiny nozzles, and all of them can fire a droplet simultaneously.
Using a highly specialized inkjet-based print engine, thermal Inkjet printers vaporizes color (CYM) or (K) Black inks to specially formulated Plastic Cards . The color bubbles are precisely placed on specially coated plastic cards , PVC cards , or composite cards to form text and images. The Ink bonds to the coated ID card surface, drying instantly, and producing photo-quality, full-color images. Unlike dye-sublimation ribbons or risen ribbons , the Inkjet printer can run ink over the edge of cards. The printers use 600 dpi processing which produces razor sharp graphics, text and barcodes. Printed cards are at an acceptable level for scratching, abrasion, dye-migration and UV fading. The Inkjet printing process itself is quiet and reliable.
