CN1346324A - Closure for container - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention is directed to a closure for a container, comprising a closure member having at least one surface (10), having provided at said surface an image provided by an ink only label, said image at least consisting of an adhesive layer (30, 40) and an image layer (20).

Description

container cover

The present invention relates to a container closure having a pattern on one of its surfaces.

Container closures such as crown corks, screw-on caps and flip-on caps are known to often have various printed designs on them. For example, crown corks typically have a mark that distinguishes the manufacturer's trademark, or other unique markings. Metal lids also usually have some imprint on them, such as opening instructions or an indication of the contents of the container. Due to the nature of the material itself, plastic covers rarely have high quality imprints because it would be very expensive to provide a high quality pattern on the plastic surface.

The painted pattern is printed onto the surface of the metal sheet, typically by offset printing, and the cover is then made from the sheet, usually by cutting and stamping, so that the metal cover has the pattern. Due to technical characteristics, it is often necessary to produce a large number of covers with the same marking. Changing patterns is laborious and time-consuming because each color of the printing plate needs to be cleaned. In addition, for multi-color (greater than 2 colors) spraying, another production cycle is required, because usually up to two printing plates can be used per cycle.

Therefore, metal covers with the same pattern and a limited variety of colors are usually mass-produced at the same time.

The pattern is painted on the plastic cover, usually by some kind of screen printing. Screen printing is a laborious technique, slow and expensive, so it is not usually used for multi-color painting (greater than 2 colors). Even the highest quality screen printing produces at most a relatively good quality pattern on the plastic surface of the cover.

For metal covers, production methods such as cutting, rolling and/or stamping create additional problems, since the machining of the metal can destroy the pattern or parts of it. This problem can be overcome by applying high quality spray paint, but it increases the cost of the product. There are many advantages if the pattern is sprayed onto the finished cover rather than the raw material.

It would be very desirable if the production costs were relatively low, and the production cycle time was short, ie the patterns changed frequently, and it would be possible to produce covers with different patterns. It enables the lid to have a graphic that not only identifies the contents of the container, but also optionally has short-term promotional indicia.

Also, it would be highly desirable to be able to produce high quality, durable patterns at relatively low cost using simple techniques.

In summary, there is also a need for a method of spraying high quality graphics onto plastic covers, since low quality graphics on plastic covers have heretofore only been available at relatively high cost.

The present invention provides a solution to the above-mentioned desired objects, which is based on the application of pattern transfer technology on said cover.

Accordingly, the present invention relates to a container closure comprising a closure member having at least one surface having a pattern formed solely of ink markings, said pattern comprising at least one adhesive layer and a pattern layer. Optionally, a protective layer is provided on the pattern layer. The pattern can be applied to one or both surfaces of the cover.

In describing the present invention, the term "pattern transfer" is used in one embodiment as a marking device in which a removable backing layer is reverse-printed with appropriate ink, which is subsequently coated with an adhesive. mixture. The importance of the pattern transfer technique is that once the pattern is transferred onto the surface of the container closure, there is no transparent or opaque support film over the pattern. At this stage, the pattern (indicia) consists only of adhesive, ink material, and optionally a transparent protective layer. A general description of this technology can be found, for example, in WO-A 9005088 and WO-A 9005353. Other types of pattern transfer devices are referred to WO-A 9734810, WO-A 0735292, WO-A 9735291 and WO-A 9735290, and the contents of all the above six patents are hereby referenced.

According to the invention, the pattern may be transferred to the cover at any suitable stage of production of the cover. Generally, for metal covers, it is preferred to apply the pattern to the metal plate with an optional pre-coat prior to cutting and stamping into the cover. It has been found that by selecting the appropriate adhesive and pattern material, the cover can be cut and punched from the sheet metal without destroying the pattern material. In general, the flexibility of the pattern material, ink and adhesive, optionally combined with the protective layer, makes it possible to apply the pattern even to the skirt of a crown cork, or to the edge of a lid, without destroying its quality . For plastic lids, the most suitable time to apply the pattern to the lid is determined by the nature of the lid production process. In the case of deformation of the cover, eg for the lid of a bread spray cup, the pattern can be applied by pulling the plastic sheet before it is processed. In other cases, the pattern is usually applied to the finished product.

In summary, this pattern transfer process comes from various publications. However, so far, no pattern transfer process for container lids having the above-mentioned advantages has been disclosed.

In short, the cover of the present invention is a cover for a container, and a pattern is coated on the cover by the pattern transfer technology described here. Cap styles include: pry-off crown cork, metal or plastic screw cap, metal or plastic flip cap, metal or plastic tear-off cap and cork, metal or plastic twist cap, metal or plastic foil or membrane caps, and ceramic or plastic stoppers. The material of the cover can be chosen arbitrarily, but is preferably metal and plastic, but also ceramics, glass, wood, cork and rubber.

            Detailed Description of the Invention

A preferred embodiment of the marking according to the invention and its application will first be described with reference to the accompanying drawing, which shows the surface (1) of the cover and the marking to be applied. The indicia are printed on a film substrate (10), which can be any film, preferably oriented polypropylene or polyester. (14) is a protective coating, whether it is used or not depends on the type and source of the existing film. (12) is a release material coated on the film. It can be silicon and is usually coated after thin film processing. (20) represents any printable ink material, which may be fixed or removable. Depending on the marking pattern and opacity requirements, the ink material can be in up to five (5) different colors in one or more layers, and some layers of material can be overlaid on others. (30) and (40) represent two (2) adhesive layers which are related to the uniformity of the surface to be labeled and the hardness of the cover. An adhesive layer may also be applied.

Upon coating, all printed material is transferred from the film substrate coated with the release material. Printing ink materials may be vinyl, acrylic or urethane resin based and pigmented. The adhesive to be printed may be a urethane-added acrylic and heat-activatable, or any other suitable heat-activatable adhesive. In order for the heat-activatable adhesive to quickly achieve and maintain tack, the cap must be heated before the marking adhesive comes into contact with the cap. Pressure sensitive adhesives can also be used.

There are many heating options to choose from. Hot air, additional flame heaters, infrared gas heating pans, and electrically heated ceramic pans are available.

With this marking application method, the printed ink material is transferred from the film substrate to the cover surface and the tactile properties of the adhesive are used to overcome the adhesion of the ink layer 14 to the coating layer 12 .

A variety of silicon-coated polymer films can be used as printing substrates.

An optical scanning device is touched by a printed mark, and traditional nip rollers and stepper motors are used to push the film to the next mark and position the film precisely.

Apply a coating, such as an acrylic-based wax-water emulsifier, to protect the ink from being scratched by accidental handling while maintaining its weather resistance during outdoor storage. A quantity of the above coating is applied by a roller applicator on a wet roller. The coating extends across the edge of the ink pattern and insulates the edge from intruding moisture. It is also possible to provide a protective coating on the transfer marking beforehand.

Claims (5)

1. A container closure comprising a closure member having at least one surface having a pattern formed solely of ink markings, said pattern comprising at least one adhesive layer and A pattern layer. 2. The cover of claim 1, wherein said indicia further comprises a protective layer on top of said pattern layer. 3. A cover as claimed in claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the adhesive is selected from pressure sensitive adhesives and heat activatable adhesives. 4. The cover according to claims 1-3, characterized in that the cover is selected from metal covers, plastic covers and ceramic covers. 5. The closure of claim 4, wherein said closure is selected from the group consisting of: crown cork, metal or plastic screw-on cap, metal or plastic flip-top cap, tear-off Caps and corks, twist caps, and ceramic stoppers.

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