CARD LAMINATOR AND METHOD OF CARD LAMINATION

摘要

The invention is a laminator and a method of lamination of a plastic card (14). A laminator (10, 100) in accordance with the invention includes an infeed (12) which supplies plastic cards which are to be laminated with a plastic laminating material on a first side (18) of each card; a laminating station (20) having a heated roller (22, 114) and a card support (24, 112), opposed to the heated roller, which supports a second side of each card and is separated from the heated roller to define a card opening (28, 116) through which each plastic card passes when being laminated; a laminate source (32) which feeds plastic laminating material into the card opening between the heated roller and the first side of each plastic card with heat from the heated roller heating the plastic laminating material and each plastic card in the card opening to fuse the plastic laminating material to the first surface of each plastic card; and a card bowing the station (40), which bows each card sufficiently in a portion thereof to cause each card when cooled to be substantially flat.