Industry/University Cooperative Projects Center
| Agilent | COBE Cardiovascular | Ford Motor Company | Lockheed-Martin |
| Ball Aerospace | Coors | IBM | Micro Motion |
| Ball Packaging | CTD | ICAST | Nastic Actuator Development |
| Boeing | CONMED | Intel | Sikorsky |
IBM
The Printing Systems Division in IBM is a multi-billion dollar business, which develops, distributes, sells and services electronic printers ranging in speed from l0ppm to 400ppm. Most of the printers that they sell are electro-photographic (laser) printers. In electro-photographic printers the image to be printed is first imaged on to an electrophotographic drum by positively charging (discharging) the drum with a light source such as a laser. Toner particles which are charged negatively are attracted to those areas of the drum that are positively charged. Paper that is charged more positively than the drum then comes in contact with the drum causing the toner to be attracted to the paper. The toner is then fused to the paper via heat and pressure. Many of the projects listed below relate directly or indirectly to this printing process.
Paper Analysis Station
In many IBM high speed/ high throughput printers, the paper is a continuous web of paper from a roll and not cut sheets found in lower speed printers. High speed printers are usually two discrete printers with a single paper web serially passing through the printers. The properties of the paper change as the paper is fed through the printers and heated to fix toner to paper. The objective of this project is to create a portable station to dynamically analyze the properties of the paper and collect and display this information in a computer system running Labview.
This project requires investigation, design, building and evaluation of a dynamic paper shrinkage measurement system which measures the width of the web to determine changes which occur over time. This results from the shrinkage measurement system must be integrated together with other existing measurement systems (paper moisture content, etc.) to create a complete paper analysis system implemented as a Labview VI.
Alternative Preheating Method
In the Electrophotographic (laser) printing process toner is electrostatically deposited on a photoconductive drum, transferred electrostatically to paper, and then fused to the paper via heat and pressure. Part of the heating process in the fusing step is a preheater which heats the paper prior to hot roll fusing. The hot roll fuser consists of two rolls; the upper roll which is heated internally via radiation, and a bottom roll which applies pressure to the top roll. The paper is continuously transported between these rolls with the toner on the paper surface coming into direct contact with the hot roll.
The fusing process controls how well the toner adheres to the paper. Sufficient heat must be transferred from the preheater and hot roll to the toner in order for the toner to fuse into/onto the paper. Improvements are required to the preheating method to improve the fusing process. The project consists of investigating methods to improve the preheater and designing and testing a prototype of a new preheater.