| You have used it millions of times in your daily life, | | | | United States; these rubber adhesives penetrate |
| because of it you have been able to keep not only | | | | porous surfaces and after extended periods of time, |
| your food fresh and maintain a longer shelf life, but | | | | become brittle, losing their adhesive quality. |
| maintain your family safety. What is it, pressure | | | | There may be some limitations in the way that |
| sensitive tape! | | | | pressure sensitive tape is applied to printed products. |
| Pressure Sensitive (PS) or pressure sensitive adhesive | | | | Some examples include: |
| (PSA) tape is used in the home, office, industry, and | | | | • PS tape cannot be applied perpendicular to the |
| institutions for a wide variety of purposes and | | | | direction that the paper travels through a web press or |
| occasionally applied to various printed products to | | | | collating machine. It may be possible for the |
| allow part or all of a document to be attached to | | | | manufacturer to apply the tape in a perpendicular |
| another document, folder, carton, package, plastic | | | | direction with an offline process, but this may |
| container, or a variety of objects. Pressure sensitive | | | | substantially increase the price of the product. |
| adhesives are designed for either permanent or | | | | • It may not be possible to apply tape to the |
| removable applications. Examples of permanent | | | | backside of a sheet that also has numbering on the |
| applications include safety labels for power equipment, | | | | front if the tape and numbering are applied in one |
| foil tape for HVAC duct work, automotive interior trim | | | | operation while the document is being printed. The tape |
| assembly, and sound/vibration damping films. Some | | | | or the numbering could be applied offline, but this would |
| high performance permanent PSAs exhibit high | | | | increase the cost of the finished piece. |
| adhesion values and can support kilograms of weight | | | | • Pressure sensitive tape cannot be applied |
| per square centimeter of contact area, even at | | | | diagonally. |
| elevated temperature. Single sheets, multiple part | | | | Pressure sensitive tapes can be applied to the front or |
| business forms, labels, and mailers are among the | | | | back of printed products. The adhesive side of the |
| printed products onto which pressure sensitive tape is | | | | tape is applied to the document with the liner facing |
| often applied. Permanent PSAs may be initially | | | | out. When the customer is ready to use the document, |
| removable (for example to recover mislabeled goods) | | | | the liner material is removed from the tape to expose |
| and build adhesion to a permanent bond after several | | | | the adhesive, allowing the product to be attached to |
| hours or days. | | | | another object. |
| Pressure-sensitive tape—so-called because light | | | | Consisting of a liner covering a double-sided adhesive, |
| pressure causes it to stick readily to most | | | | the pressure sensitive tape is wound into large rolls. |
| surfaces—typically consists of four component | | | | Some types of printing equipment are able to dispense |
| layers. Pressure sensitive tape will stick with application | | | | the tape from the roll so that it can be applied to the |
| pressure without the need for solvent, heat, or water | | | | printed products as they are being printed. In addition, |
| for activation. | | | | some collating machines are capable of applying the |
| Fundamentally, there are two types of | | | | tape to multiple-part printed products as the various |
| pressure-sensitive adhesives used on the various | | | | parts are being collated and attached by the |
| assortments of tape - rubber-based and acrylic. | | | | equipment. |
| Rubber-based adhesives were first patented in the | | | | |