JP2002113846A - Ink jet recorder - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To enhance positioning accuracy of a nozzle face with respect to a carriage without increasing the head case. SOLUTION: Two protrusions 45 and 46 becoming first and second abutting parts 41 and 42 are provided at the left and right end parts of flange section 51b of a head case 51 and one protrusion 44 becoming a third abutting part 43 is provided on a cartridge holder 6. A nozzle face 52 is positioned with respect to a carriage 4 while abutting against the bottom part 4a of the carriage 4 at three points, i.e., two protrusions of the head case and one protrusion of the cartridge holder.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] 1. Field of the Invention [0002] The present invention relates to an ink jet recording apparatus such as a printer and a plotter, and more particularly to mounting a recording head having a nozzle surface.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In an ink jet recording apparatus which records characters and images on recording paper by discharging ink droplets from nozzle openings of recording nozzles attached to a carriage, a nozzle surface is always parallel to the recording paper. Is important in improving the printing quality. This is because if the distance from the nozzle opening for ejecting the ink droplet to the recording paper differs depending on the nozzle opening and the right and left positions of the recording head, an error occurs in the landing position of the ink droplet, and the arrival time of the ink droplet also increases. This is because the change becomes large. For this reason, in the conventional ink jet recording apparatus, one projection for contacting the carriage is provided at each of the left and right ends of the front part of the flange of the head case of the recording head, and one at the center of the rear of the flange. The nozzle surface is positioned with respect to the carriage by contacting a total of three protrusions with the bottom of the carriage. It has also been proposed to provide three projections on the lower surface of the bottom of the cartridge holder to which the recording head is attached. In any case, it is necessary to increase the distance between the projections in order to prevent a manufacturing error during molding of the projections from affecting the parallelism of the nozzle surface.

[0003]

However, in order to increase the distance between the projections provided on the head case, it is necessary to increase the size of the head case itself. And the cost increases greatly. That is, a mold for molding a thermosetting resin has a special structure, and a large amount of labor is required to manufacture a mold that can simultaneously mold a plurality of enlarged head cases. In the case of molding a thermosetting resin, the molding time is longer than that of a thermoplastic resin, so that the efficiency of a mold that is molded one by one decreases. Under these circumstances, it is difficult to increase the distance between protrusions, which leads to an increase in the size of the head case.

Further, if a projection is provided on the cartridge holder, a mounting error between the recording head and the cartridge holder is further added, so that it is difficult to easily obtain high accuracy.

The present invention has been proposed in view of the above circumstances, and an object of the present invention is to provide an ink jet recording apparatus capable of easily obtaining high parallelism of the nozzle surface with respect to the carriage without increasing the size of the head case. It is intended to provide a device.

[0006]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to achieve the above object.
A carriage that is guided by a long guide member and moves in the main scanning direction, a cartridge holder that is attached to the carriage and holds an ink cartridge, and that is attached to the outside of the cartridge holder and is opposite to a surface on the attachment side And a recording head that discharges ink supplied from the ink cartridge from a nozzle opening formed in a nozzle surface located at a position above the head case of the recording head and the bottom of the carriage overlap with each other. In the first area, a first contact portion and a second contact portion, which are in contact with each other by a protrusion formed on the head case side or the carriage side to regulate the positional relationship therebetween, are provided.
The two contact portions are arranged at an interval in the main scanning direction, and are formed on the cartridge holder side or the carriage side in a second region which is outside the first region and overlaps the cartridge holder and the bottom of the carriage. A third abutment portion that abuts against the other side by the protruding portion and regulates a positional relationship between the two, and positions the cartridge holder and the head case with respect to the carriage by the three abutment portions. This is an ink jet recording apparatus. The term “overlap” in the present invention means a state in which there is no contact, but they are opposed to each other with a slight gap.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, there is provided an elastic pressing member for pressing the cartridge holder and the head case toward the carriage, and an elastic pressing member is provided inside a triangular region formed by the three contact portions. 2. An ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein said pressing portion is disposed.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, a through hole is formed in the left and right side walls of the carriage, and a plate-like elastic pressing member is inserted into both through holes, and the cartridge holder is pressed by the plate-like elastic pressing member. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the receiving section is pressed.

According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, at least a flange portion extending in the main scanning direction is integrally formed on the base end side of the head case, and the flange portion is provided on both ends in the left-right direction.
The ink jet recording apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein projections serving as a first contact portion and a second contact portion are raised.

[0010]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an ink jet printer (hereinafter, simply referred to as a printer 1) which is a typical ink jet recording apparatus.

As shown in FIG. 1, the printer 1 includes a carriage 4 supported by a guide shaft 3 provided as a guide member in a left and right direction within a housing 2 and moved in a left and right direction, that is, guided in a main scanning direction. A cartridge holder 6 mounted on the carriage 4 for accommodating and holding the ink cartridge 5; a recording head 7 mounted on the carriage 4 for discharging ink introduced from the ink cartridge 5; a pulse motor 10 and a timing belt 11; A head scanning mechanism, which includes a pulley 12 and a free-wheel pulley 13 and moves the carriage 4, and a paper feed roller is rotated by driving a motor 14 to move a recording paper 15 which is a kind of print recording medium in a main scanning direction. A printer controller (not shown) including a paper feed mechanism for feeding in the orthogonal direction (sub-scanning direction) By driving the pulse motor 10 by the control recording paper 15 by sending the recording paper 15 while ejecting ink droplets from the nozzle openings of the recording head 7 while reciprocating the carriage 4 in the main scanning direction in the sub-scanning direction
It is configured to record characters, figures, etc.

The carriage 4 is a box-shaped member made of thermoplastic resin and having an open top, and has a lid 16 for opening and closing the top opening. Then, as shown in FIGS. 2 to 5, an opening 20 is formed in the bottom 4a for attaching the recording head 7 so as to penetrate the recording head 7 downward, and an outer surface of a rear side wall 4b rising from a rear edge of the bottom 4a is formed on the bottom 4a. A bearing 21 is provided to be fitted to the guide shaft 3, and a stopper 22 of the lid 16 is protruded from an outer surface of the front side wall 4c standing at a position facing the wall 4b.
At the front side of the left and right walls 4d, 4e, that is, near the front side wall 4c, a through hole 25 for inserting a plate-like elastic pressing member, which will be described later, is opened, and a tongue-shaped fastening is provided at the lower edge of the opening of the through hole 25. The receiving portion 26 projects outward and the cartridge holder 6 is mounted inside.

The cartridge holder 6 is a box-shaped member having an open top for mounting the ink cartridges 5, and in this embodiment, two ink cartridges 5 for black ink and for color ink are mounted. The interior is divided into two chambers 31 and 3 by the partition wall 30 inclined downward toward
2, the ink supply needle 33 for black ink is provided at the front of the bottom of the small chamber 31, and the ink supply needle 34 for color ink is provided at each corner of the bottom 6 a of the large chamber 32. As shown in FIGS. 6 and 7, an ink flow path 35 for guiding ink introduced from each of the ink supply needles 33 and 34 to the recording head 7 is formed on the lower surface of the bottom 6a. A plate member 36 having a groove formed therein is attached to the rear side, and a recording head fixing boss 37 having a fixing hole is provided downward at a position slightly away from the left and right ends of the plate member 36. An arm-shaped extension portion 40 projects further forward from the side edge located on the side, and functions as a contact portion (third contact portion 43) with respect to the carriage 4 at the tip of the lower surface of the extension portion 40. The third protrusion 44 is raised.

The third projection 44 is brought into contact with
If the other parts of the cartridge holder 6 can be prevented from contacting the carriage 4, the function can be sufficiently performed. The same applies to the first and second protrusions described later.

The recording head 7 has a head case 51 in which a piezoelectric vibrator unit (not shown) is housed, and a flow path unit 50 is joined to a front end face (lower end face). The surface opposite to the joining surface is formed of a stainless steel nozzle plate as the nozzle surface 52,
A plurality of nozzle rows 53 having a plurality of nozzle openings formed in the nozzle plate are arranged in parallel (FIGS. 3, 6, and 7). Then, the ink supplied from the ink flow path 35 through the ink supply path 54 formed in the head case 51 is introduced into each pressure chamber in the flow path unit 50,
The piezoelectric vibrator is configured to be ejected as an ink droplet from a nozzle opening by the operation of the piezoelectric vibrator.

The head case 51 has a substantially rectangular parallelepiped case body 51a in which a storage space for accommodating the piezoelectric vibrator and an ink supply path 54 are formed, and is attached to a base end (upper end) of the case body 51a. It is a block-shaped member integrally formed with a flange portion 51b extending left, right and rear as a portion, and is formed of, for example, a thermosetting resin such as an epoxy resin. In this embodiment, screw holes are formed in the flange portion 51b extending left and right and rearward, and the lower surface (the surface on the side of the carriage 4) of the tip of the flange portion 51b extending left and right is applied to the carriage 4. A first protrusion 45 and a second protrusion 46 functioning as contact portions (a first contact portion 41 and a second contact portion 42) are raised.

In order to attach the head case 51 to the cartridge holder 6, that is, to attach the recording head 7 to the cartridge holder 6, the ink flow path 35 opened on the lower surface of the cartridge holder 6 and the upper surface of the head case 51 A screw 56 is inserted into a screw hole of the flange portion 51b of the head case 51 in a state where the elastic seal member 55 such as an elastomer is interposed between the ink supply passage 54 and the ink supply passage 54 which is open, and the screw is inserted into the head. The case 51 is fixed by being screwed into a fixing hole of the fixing boss 37 of the case 51. In this case, the upper surface of the flange portion 51b of the head case 51,
Specifically, the positional relationship between the opening edge of the screw hole abutting on the cartridge holder 6 and the nozzle surface 52 is manufactured with a predetermined dimensional accuracy, and the flange portion 5 of the head case 51 is formed.
The fixing boss 3 of the cartridge holder 6 with which the cartridge 1b directly contacts.
Since the tip surface of the nozzle 7 is also manufactured with a predetermined dimensional accuracy, if the screw 56 is sufficiently tightened, the parallelism of the nozzle surface 52 with respect to the cartridge holder 6 can be adjusted with high accuracy.

After the recording head 7 has been attached to the cartridge holder 6 and integrated, the carriage
Attach to This mounting is performed by lowering the cartridge holder 6 and the recording head 7 from the opening on the upper surface of the carriage 4 and housing the recording head 7 therein, and attaching the recording head 7 to the bottom 4
a into the opening 20 to protrude the nozzle surface 52,
As shown in FIGS. 6 and 7, first and second protrusions 45 and 46, which are protruded downward at the left and right ends of the flange portion 51 b of the head case 51, come into contact with the bottom 4 a of the carriage 4 and the cartridge holder. The third protruding portion 44 protruding downward from the extension portion 40 of the carriage 6 contacts the bottom portion 4 a of the carriage 4. Note that the third protrusion 44 is provided with first and second protrusions 45 and 46.
As shown in FIG. 6, the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 is partially raised.

The left and right side walls 4d of the carriage 4
4e, a plate-like elastic member, for example, a leaf spring 60 is inserted into the through hole 25, and the middle of the leaf spring 60 is brought into contact with the extension 40 of the cartridge holder 6, and both ends of the leaf spring 60 are moved to the carriage. 4 and the left and right ends of the leaf spring 60 are screwed to the fastening receiving portion 26 in this state.
The cartridge holder 6 is pressed against the carriage 4 and stopped by the elastic restoring force of the leaf spring 60 due to the fastening.

The pressing portion 62 of the leaf spring 60 against the extending portion 40 is formed by the extending portion 40 functioning as the third contact portion 43.
The protrusion 44 is also on the first and second contact portions 41 and 42 and is located inside the three contact portions 41, 42 and 43.
Therefore, since the pressing portion 62 of the leaf spring 60 elastically presses the inside of the triangular region where the three contact portions 41, 42, and 43 become vertices, the three protrusions 44,
45 and 46 can be pressed in a stable state, and there is no inconvenience such as the end of the head case 51 floating.

When the cartridge holder 6 and the recording head 7 are mounted on the carriage 4 in this manner, as shown in FIG. 3, the head case 51 of the recording head 7 and the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 overlap each other in the first area A. The carriage 4 is formed by protrusions 45 and 46 formed on the head case 51 side.
The first contact portion 41 and the second contact portion 42 that contact the bottom 4a of the first region and regulate the positional relationship between them are arranged at intervals in the main scanning direction, and the first region A in a second area B where the carriage 4 overlaps the bottom 6a of the cartridge holder 6 and the cartridge holder 6
The third contact portion 43 that contacts the carriage 4 by the protrusion 44 formed on the side thereof and regulates the positional relationship between the two is disposed. The cartridge holder 6 is formed by the three contact portions 41, 42, and 43. Then, the positioning of the head case 51 with respect to the carriage 4 is performed. That is, the nozzle surface 52 of the recording head 7 is mounted with high parallelism with respect to the carriage 4, whereby the nozzle surface 52 of the recording head 7 faces the recording paper 15 with high parallelism.

This will be described in detail.
Is provided in a state in which a high degree of parallelism with respect to the recording paper 15 is secured. Therefore, the recording head 7 is attached to the carriage 4 guided by the guide shaft 3 while maintaining a high degree of parallelism. If this is the case, the parallelism between the nozzle surface 52 of the recording head 7 and the recording paper 15 will be opposed with high accuracy, and the printing accuracy can be improved.

In this embodiment, the first contact portions 41 are provided at both ends of a flange portion 51b extending right and left of the head case 51.
And the protrusions 45 and 46 of the second contact portion 42 abut on the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 to guide the nozzle surface 52 in the direction of the guide shaft 3 with respect to the carriage 4 (the width direction of the recording paper 15; Direction) is determined, and the projections 45 and 46 are formed as separated from each other as much as possible.
If the accuracy of 5, 46 is secured, the guide shaft 3
Parallelism with respect to the direction (X-axis direction) can be ensured. The accuracy of the projections 45 and 46 serving as the first and second contact portions 41 and 42 depends on the accuracy of integrally molding the head case 51, and a plurality of members are manufactured. Since the members are not assembled, accumulation of errors can be eliminated, and high accuracy can be easily secured. For this reason, the parallel adjustment mechanism of the nozzle surface 52 in the Z-axis direction may not be provided.

The degree of parallelism of the nozzle surface 52 with respect to the longitudinal direction of the carriage 4 (the longitudinal direction of the recording paper 15, which is referred to as the Y-axis direction) is determined by the first and second contact portions 41 and 4.
2 (the left and right protrusions 45, 4 of the head case 51).
6 depends on the accuracy of the positional relationship (particularly the positional relationship in the height direction) of the projections 44 of the third contact portion 43 with respect to the straight line connecting the projections 6 to the projection 44 of the third contact portion 43. Is greatly affected by the distance. The accuracy of the protrusion 44 of the third contact portion 43 is determined by the sum of the molding accuracy (error) of the cartridge holder 6 and the mounting error between the head case 51 and the cartridge holder 6. By setting the distance to the protrusion 44 of the holder 6 large, the influence on the parallelism of the nozzle surface 52 can be reduced. In the present embodiment, the projection 44
Can be set large regardless of the size of the head case 51. This is because the protrusion 44 is attached to the cartridge holder 6.
This is because the distance can be set long without increasing the size of the head case 51. Therefore, in the present embodiment, even if there is some sum of the molding accuracy (error) of the cartridge holder 6 and the mounting error between the head case 51 and the cartridge holder 6, the nozzle surface 5
2 has little effect on the parallelism, and can be set to a level that requires almost no correction.

In order to eliminate this error, the carriage 4 may be rotated around the X axis to perform correction (so-called "bow correction"). For example, a correction mechanism using a cam mechanism in the carriage 4 may be used. (Not shown) may be provided.

As described above, in this embodiment, the head case 5
The first and second protrusions (first contact portion 41 and second contact portion 42) 45, 46 provided on the left and right of the first flange portion 51b are arranged on the left and right of the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 in the X-axis direction. The third protrusion 44 provided on the extension portion 40 of the cartridge holder 6, that is, the third contact portion 43, is disposed in front of the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 to regulate the parallelism in the Y-axis direction. This determines the degree of parallelism of the nozzle surface 52 with the carriage 4. Therefore, high parallel accuracy can be easily ensured.

In the above-described embodiment, the projections 44, 45 and 46 functioning as contact portions are provided on the head case 51 and the cartridge holder 6, and the contact portion of the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 to be contacted is flattened. However, the protrusion in the present invention may be formed on the opposite side since the protrusion may be in contact with the other party to restrict the positional relationship between them. That is, on the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 that is within the first area A,
A protrusion functioning as the first contact portion 41 and the second contact portion 42 may be provided, and a protrusion functioning as the third contact portion 43 may be provided on the bottom 4a of the carriage 4 in the second area B. .

Further, in the above embodiment, two ink cartridges 5 are mounted and ink supply needles 33 and 34 are provided at a total of five places, so that the pressing portion 6 of the elastic pressing member (leaf spring 60) is provided.
2 is arranged in the vicinity of the third contact portion 43, but the present invention is not limited to this, and the pressing portion 62 is arranged near the center of the triangle formed by the three contact portions, thereby You may comprise so that the same pressing force may act on a contact part.

Further, the recording head 7 is not limited to one using a piezoelectric vibrator as a pressure generating element, but may be one using a heating element, a magnetostrictive element, or the like. The guide member for guiding the carriage is not limited to the guide shaft, and may be, for example, a rail.

[0030]

According to the present invention as described above, the following effects can be obtained. According to the first aspect of the present invention, the contact portion for positioning with respect to the carriage is provided on the head case by two.
Since it is arranged in one place, the cartridge holder, it is easy to take a long distance (span) between the contact part on the head case side and the contact part on the cartridge holder side. Accordingly, the parallelism of the nozzle surface with respect to the carriage can be made high without increasing the size of the head case. In addition, since the left and right contact portions that greatly affect the parallelism with respect to the guide member are arranged in the cartridge,
The degree of parallelism with respect to the guide member can easily be made high.

According to the second aspect of the present invention, the pressing portion of the elastic pressing member for pressing the cartridge holder and the head case toward the carriage is disposed inside the triangular region formed by the three contact portions. With a simple configuration, the cartridge holder and the head case can be stably pressed toward the carriage side, and no inconvenience such as floating occurs.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, through holes are formed in the left and right side walls of the carriage, and a plate-like elastic pressing member is inserted into both of the through-holes. Since the receiving portion is pressed, the cartridge holder and the head case can be reliably pressed toward the carriage with a simple configuration.

According to the fourth aspect of the present invention, at least a flange portion extending in the main scanning direction is integrally formed on the base end side of the head case, and the flange portion is provided at both ends in the left-right direction.
Since the first and second projections are raised,
This is because the number of nozzle rows is increasing, and the span of the contact portion of the head case can be made large without waste.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an ink jet recording apparatus (printer).

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the carriage and the cartridge holder as viewed from above.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of the carriage and the cartridge holder as viewed from below.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of the carriage and the cartridge holder as viewed from the upper right side.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view of the carriage and the cartridge holder as viewed from the upper left.

FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional view showing a contact portion between a cartridge holder and a carriage.

FIG. 7 is a sectional view showing a contact portion between the head case and the carriage.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Ink-jet recording apparatus (printer) 2 Housing 3 Guide shaft 4 Carriage 4a Bottom part 4b Rear side wall part 4c Front side wall part 4d Left side wall part 4e Right side wall part 5 Ink cartridge 6 Cartridge holder 7 Recording head 10 Pulse motor 11 Timing belt 12 Drive Pulley 13 Idler pulley 14 Motor 15 Recording paper 16 Lid 20 Opening 21 Bearing 22 Stopper 25 Through hole 26 Fastening receiving part 30 Partition wall 31 Small chamber 32 Large chamber 33 Ink supply needle for black ink 34 Ink for color ink Ink supply needle 35 Ink flow path 36 Plate 37 Locking boss 40 Extending part 41 First contact part 42 Second contact part 43 Third contact part 44 Third protrusion 45 First protrusion 46 Second protrusion Reference Signs List 50 flow path unit 51 head case 52 nozzle surface 53 nozzle row 54 ink supply path 55 Sex sealant 56 screw 60 the leaf spring 61 screw 62 pressing portion A first region B second region

Claims (4)

[Claims] A carriage that is guided by a long guide member and moves in the main scanning direction; a cartridge holder that is attached to the carriage and holds an ink cartridge; and a cartridge that is attached to the outside of the cartridge holder, A recording head for discharging ink supplied from the ink cartridge from a nozzle opening formed on a nozzle surface located on the side opposite to the surface, a head case of the recording head and a carriage. A first contact portion and a second contact portion, which abut on a mating side by a protrusion formed on the head case side or the carriage side to regulate a positional relationship between the two in a first region where the bottom portion of the first contact portion overlaps. Two contact portions are arranged at an interval in the main scanning direction, and are separated from the first region, and In a second area where the bottom of the carriage overlaps, a third contact portion that contacts a partner by a protrusion formed on the cartridge holder side or the carriage side and regulates a positional relationship between them is arranged,
An ink jet recording apparatus characterized in that positioning of a cartridge holder and a head case with respect to a carriage is performed by two contact portions. 2. An elastic pressing member for pressing the cartridge holder and the head case toward the carriage, and a pressing portion of the elastic pressing member is arranged inside a triangular region formed by the three contact portions. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein: 3. A through-hole is formed in the left and right side walls of the carriage, and a plate-like elastic pressing member is inserted into both through-holes, and the plate-like elastic pressing member presses the pressing receiving portion of the cartridge holder. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein: 4. A flange portion extending at least in the main scanning direction is integrally formed on a base end side of the head case, and a first contact portion and a second contact portion are formed on both left and right end portions of the flange portion. 4. An ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a protrusion is formed.