Properties and Printer Performance of Wax-containing Polyester Toners Prepared by Chemical Milling

Abstract

Recently oiless color laser printing and wax-containing color toner are gaining popularity in the market for reasons of a simpler fuser design and a small number of consumables. We developed polyester color toner containing a wax inside the toner particles using proprietary Chemical Milling Process.The CM toner® particles were substantially spherical in shape, their mean diameters in the range of 3-15 μm and the size distribution was uniform with the 80% span in the range of 0.5-1.0. A wax-content in the particles as high as 15 wt.% was achieved. The wax-incorporation significantly broadened the fusing latitude of CM toner® in comparison with the toner with no wax component, especially by increasing the hot offset temperature up to 190°C in a high speed (24ppm) oiless fusing unit.The DPI-proprietary CM toner® process utilizes the surface chemical interaction between a partially-polar polyester resin and a non-polar dispersion medium as well as mechanical agitation to produce toner particles with a small diameter. However, to achieve the wax incorporation in the toner particles, we modified the process to be conducted in a highly polar dispersion medium so that non-polar wax is encapsulated in the particles. In the presentation, we will describe the details of the physical properties and printer performance of the wax-containing CM toner®.