JP2002307703A - Ink tank and initial conduction apparatus for ink - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an ink tank in which a recording head can perform printing regardless of the orientation of the ink ejection plane. SOLUTION: An ink tank 45 comprises an ink absorber 51 disposed in the vicinity of the supply opening 48 of an ink chamber 46, and high viscosity fluid 52 disposed oppositely to the ink absorber 51 while holding ink 47 between. Air 53 touches the high viscosity fluid 52 on the side opposite to the ink 47 wherein the air 53 is supplied by means of a pump, or the like, through an air supply pipe 54, an air supply opening 55, and an air conduction passage 56. The high viscosity fluid 52 is moved to the supply opening 48 side by an amount of ink 47 decreased by print operation of an ink jet head.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an ink tank for supplying ink so that an ink jet head normally discharges ink regardless of the direction of an ink discharge surface.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, thermal ink jet printers have been widely used. This thermal type ink jet printer includes a recording head having a plurality of heating elements arranged in an array on a substrate, and selectively causes the heating elements of the recording head to generate heat according to print information. By heating the supplied ink and using the film boiling phenomenon that instantaneously generates bubbles at the interface between the ink and the heating element, ink droplets are ejected from the fine ink ejection nozzles arranged corresponding to each heating element. The printing is performed on the recording paper by discharging.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view schematically showing such an ink jet printer. As shown in FIG. 1, in the inkjet printer 1, a recording head 2 is held by a carriage 3 and faces a platen roller 4. The carriage 3 is slidably held by a guide shaft 5 and is engaged with a toothed belt 6. Toothed belt 6
Are engaged with the rotary drive shaft of the motor 7 via a gear (not shown). The platen roller 4 sandwiches the paper 8 with the auxiliary roller 9 and is driven by a motor 11 to intermittently convey the paper 8 in the sub-scanning direction.

When the motor 7 rotates in both forward and reverse directions, the toothed belt 6 is also driven to rotate in both forward and reverse directions, whereby the recording head 2 is held by the carriage 3 and moves along the platen 4 so that a double-headed arrow A in FIG. The characters and images are printed on the paper 8 while reciprocating in the main scanning direction indicated by.

[0005] A head cleaning device 12 is disposed at the right end of the platen 4 (in the diagonally upper right direction in the figure). When the print head 2 is at the home position at the right end, the head cleaning device 12 faces the ink discharge surface of the print head 2 and engages the ink discharge surface of the print head 2 as necessary or periodically. Accordingly, the ink ejection surface of the print head 2 is cleaned, and clogging of the ink ejection nozzle is eliminated or prevented.

The carriage 3 is provided with two types of ink cartridges, a black ink cartridge 13 and a color ink cartridge 14, and the ink consumed by the printing is supplied from the ink cartridges 13 or 14. The recording head 2 is supplied (supplied).

Generally, in a serial type ink jet printer in which the recording head 2 and the ink cartridges 13 and 14 reciprocate with the carriage as described above,
Ink cartridges include those that are integral with the recording head and those that are separate from each other, but each has a structure described below so that more ink than necessary does not leak outside.

FIG. 4A is an exploded perspective view schematically showing a color ink cartridge (hereinafter, simply referred to as a cartridge) 14 integrated with such a recording head, and FIG. A bottom view (a front view of the recording head 2 as viewed from the arrow B in FIG. 4A) and FIG. 4C are enlarged views of the recording head 2 shown in FIG. is there.

As shown in FIG. 1 (a), one of the integrally formed cartridges 14 is partitioned into three ink chambers 15 (15a, 15b, 15c). In each of the ink chambers 15, as a negative pressure generating member for holding the ink in an appropriate state such that the ink does not needlessly flow outside due to gravity, for example, a porous material such as a sponge such as urethane foam is used. Ink absorbing member 1
6 are provided. And these three ink chambers 1
5 is filled with three color inks of magenta, cyan, and yellow, which are three subtractive primary colors.

In an ink supply section 17 located below the three partitioned ink chambers 15, ink supply holes 18 for supplying ink to the recording head 2 are formed corresponding to the respective ink chambers 15. I have. The three colors of ink in the ink chambers 15 are supplied to the nozzle rows of the recording head 2 corresponding to each color from the ink supply holes 18 through ink channels described later.

An inner lid 19 is fixed on the ink chamber 15 of the cartridge 14, and a conduction hole 21 is formed in the inner lid 19 at a position corresponding to each ink chamber 15. At the time of assembling, ink is injected into the ink absorbing member in the ink chamber 15 through the conduction hole 21 to be filled with ink.

After the ink is filled, an upper lid member 22 having a further folded down shape is fixed on the inner lid 19, and an air chamber 23 is formed between the upper lid member 22 and the inner lid 19. One small air communication hole 24 is formed in the upper surface of the upper lid member 22, and the air flows into and stays in the air chamber 23 from the air communication hole 24. The staying air is conducted to the respective ink chambers 15 through the three conduction holes 21.
Due to the conduction of the atmosphere, the sealing of the ink chamber 15 is released, and the ink sucked and held by the ink suction member 16 inside flows smoothly and is supplied to the recording head 2.

Further, as shown in FIGS. 1B and 1C, the other recording head 2 formed integrally is formed on one surface of a chip substrate 25 made of silicon or glass (see FIG. 1C). (A lower surface), a driving circuit 26 formed by an LSI formation processing technique, and a heating section 2 formed by a thin film formation processing technique.
7, an individual wiring electrode 28 for connecting one end of the heating section 27 to the drive circuit 26, a common electrode 29 for connecting the other end of the heating section 27 to an external power supply terminal (not shown), A partition 31 is laminated on the individual wiring electrode 28 (the lower surface in FIG. 3C, the same applies hereinafter), and an orifice plate 32 is laminated on the partition 31. A large number of ink discharge nozzles 33 each having a diameter of 20 to 40 μm, which are usually called orifices, are formed.

The plurality of ink discharge nozzles 33 are formed at positions facing the heat generating portion 27, respectively, and form a nozzle row 34 in a line. The nozzle row 34 includes nozzle rows 34a, 34b, and 34, as shown in FIG.
c, and three rows are formed, and the above-described three colors of ink of magenta, cyan, and yellow are ejected from each nozzle row 34, respectively.

An ink supply groove 35 having a depth of about 1/2 of the thickness of the substrate is formed to be elongated in parallel with the ink discharge nozzle 33, and communicates with the ink supply groove 35 at a plurality of locations. An ink supply hole 36 is formed to penetrate the opposite side surface (the upper surface in FIG. 3C) of the chip substrate 25. Further, between the chip substrate 25 and the orifice plate 32, an ink flow path 37 communicating from the ink supply groove 35 to the heat generating portion 27 is formed. Cartridge 14
Is supplied to the heat generating section 27 through the ink supply groove 35 and the ink flow path 37.

At the time of printing (printing), the heat generating portion 27 is selectively driven to generate heat in accordance with print information by the individual wiring electrodes 28 to generate film bubbles due to a film boiling phenomenon at the interface with the ink. Due to the pressure of the bubbles, the ink ejection nozzle 33
Ejects ink droplets toward the recording paper (not shown).

In the case of an ink cartridge integrated with a recording head as described above, an ink absorbing sponge is disposed in the ink chamber of the ink cartridge as a negative pressure generating member for holding unnecessary ink from leaking outside. However, the method of generating the negative pressure is different from that of a configuration in which the recording head and the ink cartridge are arranged separately and the recording head and the ink cartridge are connected via a tube.

The arrangement in which the recording head and the ink cartridge are arranged separately and the recording head and the ink cartridge are connected via a tube has the advantage that the printer can be downsized because the ink cartridge can be fixed. On the other hand, there is also an advantage that the load is light because the moving part is only the recording head, and therefore the printer can be made larger. Further, there is an advantage that it is easy to correspond to a long recording head for a line printer.

As described above, the method of generating a negative pressure in the case where the recording head and the ink cartridge are separated from each other is not particularly shown, but a small sub-tank holding the ink supplied from the ink cartridge is provided on the recording head side. A proposal has been made to obtain a negative pressure by a difference in potential energy between the ink liquid level in the sub tank and the ink ejection surface of the recording head.

By the way, the mechanism of the negative pressure generation described above is as follows.
This configuration is based on the premise that the printer for business use or personal use is of a stationary type. That is, it is assumed that the entire printer is assembled with the ink ejection surface of the recording head facing downward. In general, in the case of a stationary printer, the vertical position during use is uniquely determined. Therefore, if the ink ejection surface of the recording head is configured to face downward, the ink ejection surface of the recording head always faces downward. Used in posture.

However, even though it is assumed that the ink ejection surface is oriented downward, it is evident from experiments that the printing is not completely impossible with the ink ejection surface facing upward. However, it is also found that this usage is a very wasteful usage. The results of the experiment will be described below.

FIG. 5 shows the case where the ink ejection surface of the recording head is oriented upward, that is, the ink supply port of the ink cartridge is arranged upward, and the case where the ink ejection surface of the recording head is oriented downward, that is, the ink supply port of the ink cartridge is oriented downward. FIG. 9 is a characteristic diagram illustrating ink ejection characteristics of a recording head when the recording heads are arranged in the same manner. In the figure, the horizontal axis shows the ink content (%) in the ink cartridge, and the vertical axis shows the negative pressure amount (mmAq). The coordinate axis shown in the figure is the upper right, ie, the point of 100% ink content on the horizontal axis and the negative pressure amount of 0 mmAq on the vertical axis is the origin of measurement.

A characteristic curve A indicated by a white square “□” in FIG.
When the ink cartridge is fixed in a position where the ink supply port used for normal printing is facing downward, the change in the remaining amount of ink and the negative pressure It shows the result of measuring the change. As shown by the characteristic curve A, in a normal printing posture, ejection can be performed until the remaining amount of ink becomes 10%. In this observation, the range in which the negative pressure was almost stable and did not adversely affect the printing was within the range of 80% to 20% of the remaining ink amount.

On the other hand, a characteristic curve B indicated by a black circle "●" in FIG.
Changes the remaining amount of ink when the print head ejects ink at a fixed amount while fixing the ink cartridge in a position where the ink supply port, which is opposite to the normal use position, faces upward. It shows the result of measuring the change in the accompanying negative pressure.

FIGS. 6A, 6B and 6C show the operation when the ink cartridge indicated by the characteristic curve B and the ink ejection surface of the recording head are used in an upside-down posture opposite to the normal printing. It is a figure showing a state. As shown in (a), (b), and (c) of FIG.
The ink cartridge 38 is arranged upside down with respect to the vertical direction indicated by the arrow C in FIG. That is, the air communication hole 42 is arranged at the bottom, the recording head 43 is integrally arranged at the top, and the ink ejection surface 43-1 is in the upward posture.
The ink supply pipe 44 of the ink cartridge 38 that supplies ink to the recording head 43 is upward. The operation state described below is based on the above-described black ink cartridge 13 and the color ink cartridge 14.
The same applies to

In the initial state, the ink cartridge 38 holds the ink 41 in the ink suction member 39 for generating a negative pressure therein in a sufficient state, that is, in a state of 100%. When the ink 41 is ejected from the recording head 43 in this state, the ink can be ejected almost normally during the initial period of the characteristic curve B in FIG. 5 and as shown in FIG. 6A. It is.

However, as the discharge operation proceeds, FIG.
As shown in (b), even if the ink 41 inside decreases and the ink 41 above the ink absorbing member 39 becomes thin, the ink 41 below does not sufficiently move upward. This is considered to be because the descending force due to the weight of the ink 41 is superior to the adsorbing force due to the capillary phenomenon of the ink adsorbing member 39.

Then, the printing operation further proceeds, and the ink 4
As shown in FIG. 5 (c), although the ink 41 still remains in the lower part of the ink cartridge 38 even more than half as shown in FIG. Discharge becomes impossible. That is, when the remaining amount of ink is 50
% Before it became impossible to discharge. Since this is not practical, the printing posture of the recording head is limited to the downward direction.

Further, in a type in which the recording head and the ink cartridge are arranged separately and a negative pressure is obtained by the difference in potential energy between the recording head and the sub-tank, an experiment shows that the negative pressure is opposite to the normal printing. When printing with the print head facing upward, the positions of the air phase and the ink phase in the sub tank are reversed, and no ink is conducted to the ink flow path of the print head. Turns out. Therefore, also in the case of this type, the printing attitude of the recording head is limited to the downward direction, as described above.

[0030]

By the way, as information devices have become mobile as in recent years, and the demand for portable printers as peripheral devices has increased, printers having a configuration based on a stationary type have been developed. Failure occurs. For example, when using a portable device, it is best to be able to use it in any orientation, and therefore, if the installation orientation of the device during use is restricted, it is inconvenient to use and dissatisfaction remains .

Further, since the size of a portable device is required to be reduced, it is necessary to provide the internal configuration with a degree of design freedom corresponding to the size reduction. However, as described above, the structure of the recording head is based on the assumption that the ink ejection surface is used with the ink ejection surface facing downward. In this respect, there is no degree of freedom in design, and dissatisfaction remains at the design stage.

The object of the present invention is to solve the above-mentioned conventional problems.
An object of the present invention is to provide an ink tank that allows a recording head to perform printing regardless of the orientation of an ink ejection surface.

[0033]

An ink tank according to the present invention is an ink tank which stores aqueous ink in an ink chamber and supplies ink from the ink chamber to an ink jet head. An ink absorber provided near the supply port, an oily high-viscosity fluid sealed in contact with the ink on the side opposite to the supply port in the ink chamber, Position maintaining means for maintaining the amount of air in the ink chamber in contact with ink on the opposite side increased by the amount of displacement of the highly viscous fluid moved toward the supply port.

The position maintaining means includes an air pump, for example, so that air corresponding to the displacement amount is forcibly supplied into the ink chamber by the air pump. Is done. Further, the highly viscous fluid may be composed of mineral oils, for example, as described in claim 3, or may be composed of silicon oils, for example, as described in claim 4.

Further, the ink initial conduction device of the present invention comprises: an ink chamber containing aqueous ink; an ink absorber provided near a supply port for supplying ink from the ink chamber to the ink jet head; An ink tank made of an oily high-viscosity fluid sealed in contact with the ink on the side opposite to the supply port, a detecting means for detecting the mounting of the ink tank, and supplying the ink to the supply port side. Pressurizing means for applying pressure to the highly viscous fluid to move to
And control means for operating the pressurizing means to perform initial conduction of ink when the mounting of the ink tank is detected by the detecting means.

[0036]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1A is a perspective view of an ink tank according to an embodiment, and FIG. 1B is a plan sectional view thereof. As shown in FIGS. 3A and 3B, the ink tank 45 has three ink chambers 46 therein, and the ink chambers 46 contain aqueous inks 47 of a predetermined color. ing. At one end of the ink chamber 46, a supply port 48 for supplying ink to an external inkjet print head is provided, respectively.
One end of a flexible tube 49 is connected to each of the supply ports 48, and the other end of the flexible tube 49 is connected to an ink receiving port of an inkjet print head (not shown).

In the vicinity of the supply port 48 in the ink chamber 46, an ink absorber 51 is provided. As the ink absorber 51, a sponge body made of an appropriate material is compressed and arranged. The ink absorber 51 absorbs and retains the water-based ink 47 as a whole without containing air bubbles. The ink absorber 51 prevents the ink 47 from flowing out more than necessary when the ink 47 flows as shown by the arrow D in the drawing and is supplied from the supply port 48 to the inkjet print head via the flexible tube 49. An appropriate flow resistance is applied to the ink 47.

On the other hand, the high viscosity fluid 52 is sealed in the ink chamber 46 by contacting the ink 47 on the side opposite to the supply port 48. The high-viscosity fluid 52 may use mineral oils such as polybutene, liquid paraffin, and spindle oil.
Alternatively, silicone oils such as dimethyl silicone oil and methylphenyl silicone oil may be used. These highly viscous fluids 52 have a higher viscosity than the aqueous ink 47.

The ink 47 and the highly viscous fluid 52 are
They are separated from each other without mixing due to their aqueous and oily properties, and are sealed so as to be in liquid-liquid contact without containing air bubbles at the interface. In this encapsulation, air bubbles can be easily removed at the interface by sucking air by, for example, a vacuum defoaming device, and a stable liquid-liquid contact surface can be obtained. When the surface tension and the viscosity of the high-viscosity fluid 52 related to the cross-sectional area of the ink chamber 46 are appropriately selected on the large (high) side, the ink 47 becomes the ink absorber 51 and the high-viscosity fluid 52.
To be enclosed.

From the supply port 48 to the flexible tube 49
When the ink 47 supplied to the ink-jet printhead via the ink-jet printhead gradually decreases along with the printing operation of the ink-jet printhead, the high-viscosity liquid and liquid adhere to the ink 47 in accordance with the reduced displacement. Fluid 5
As shown by the arrow D, the supply port 48 does not lose its shape.
Move to the side. The high-viscosity fluid 52 forms a concave meniscus 52-1 on the opposite side of the contact surface with the ink 47, and the surface tension of the meniscus 52-1 is appropriately adjusted from the supply port 48 to the ink 47 supplied to the outside. Negative pressure is created.

The high viscosity fluid 52 is in contact with air 53 on the opposite side of the ink 47 in the ink chamber 46. The air 53 is reduced when the ink 47 is reduced by the printing operation of the ink jet print head and the highly viscous fluid 52 is discharged.
Is moved toward the supply port 48 side, external air is supplied by an amount corresponding to the moved amount via the air supply pipe 54, the air supply port 55, and the air conduction path 56 as position maintaining means, and the displacement The air amount corresponding to the amount is maintained.

At this time, physical properties such as surface tension and viscosity of the highly viscous fluid 52 are set so that the air 53 can be restrained so that the air 53 does not enter the ink 47 side.
It is adjusted in advance based on the consumption speed of the ink 47, the sectional area of the ink chamber 46, and the like. In this configuration, when the ink tank 45 is disposed and used in the printer main body with the right and left sides of FIG. 2B facing up and down, the ink tank 45 has its own weight, the flow resistance of the ink absorber 51 and the high viscosity. Due to the negative pressure of the fluid 52, an appropriate amount of ink is supplied from the supply port 48 to the inkjet print head via the flexible tube 49. Accordingly, an appropriate amount of ink 47 is always supplied to the inkjet print head, regardless of the direction of the ink ejection surface of the inkjet print head.

In contrast to the above arrangement, even when the printer is used in the printer body with the left and right sides of FIG. 4B facing up and down, the ink is drawn by the suction force from the ink jet print head. 47 is supplied to the ink jet print head via a flexible tube 49, and the weight of the ink 47, the action of the ink absorber 51, and the high viscosity fluid 5
2 maintains an appropriate negative pressure.

When the ink jet printer main body is of a portable type, the ink 47 in the ink chamber 46 is not affected by the appropriate viscosity of the high-viscosity fluid 52 regardless of the posture of the ink tank during carrying. The occurrence of such a problem that air bubbles flow into the ink jet print head by flowing to the opposite side of the supply port 48 is prevented.

FIG. 2 is an external plan view showing a configuration in which an air pump is connected to the air supply pipe 54 of the ink tank 45, together with an ink jet print head connected to the other end of the flexible tube 49. As shown in the figure, an air pump 57 having a simple structure is connected to the air supply pipe 54, and the ink receiving port (not visible behind in the figure) of the ink jet print head 58 is connected to the flexible tube 49. Are linked.

When it is detected that the ink tank 45 has been mounted by the ink cartridge mounting detecting means (not shown), the air pump 57 as a pressurizing means operates to pressurize and send out the air. The air passes through the air supply pipe 54, the air supply port 55, and the air passage 56 in FIG.
The pressure is applied to the high-viscosity fluid 52 by 3 to move the ink 47 to the supply port 48 side to perform the initial conduction operation of the ink 47. When the initial conduction operation is completed, the air pump 57 is released to the atmosphere, and air corresponding to the amount of ink consumed during printing flows into the ink tank 45 as air 53.

Further, the ink jet print head 58
No matter how the printing posture changes, that is, no matter what direction the ink ejection surface 61 in which the three orifice rows 59 are formed is oriented, An air pump 57 feeds air through the supply pipe 54, and the ink chamber 46 shown in FIG.
If it is configured to pressurize the air 53 inside, the ink in the ink flow path between the ink jet print head 58 and the ink tank 45 will not be pulled back to the upstream side and will not be interrupted. An ink 47 can be supplied.

As a result, printing can be continuously performed regardless of the printing posture of the ink jet print head 58. Since the flow conditions of the ink 47 hardly change, the ink 47 can be used up to the end while maintaining the average ink ejection state.

[0049]

As described above in detail, according to the present invention, the ink is sealed between the ink absorber disposed near the ink supply port of the ink chamber of the ink tank and the movable high-viscosity fluid. The high-viscosity fluid moves in the direction of the ink supply port in contact with the ink by the amount of ink reduced by printing, so that the ink supply status can be changed regardless of the printing attitude of the inkjet print head. Does not change, thereby enabling the ink jet head to discharge ink normally regardless of the direction of the ink discharge surface.

Further, since the ink can be normally ejected from the ink jet head regardless of the direction of the ink ejection surface, it is easy to design a small ink jet printer or a portable ink jet printer.
Also, there is no need to generate negative pressure in the sponge body,
Unlike the conventional case, there is no need to provide a sponge body in the entire ink chamber, and the ink can be held as it is,
Thus, a small ink tank having a large ink storage capacity can be configured.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1A is a perspective view of an ink tank according to an embodiment, and FIG. 1B is a plan sectional view thereof.

FIG. 2 is an external plan view showing a configuration in which an air pump is connected to an air supply pipe of an ink tank together with an ink jet print head.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view schematically showing a conventional ink jet printer.

4A is an exploded perspective view schematically showing a color ink cartridge integrated with a recording head of a conventional ink jet printer, FIG. 4B is a front view of the recording head, and FIG.
FIG. 4B is an enlarged view taken along the line CC ′ of FIG.

FIG. 5 is a characteristic diagram of an ink ejection function when an ink ejection surface of a recording head is upward and downward.

FIGS. 6A, 6B, and 6C are diagrams illustrating an operation state when the ink ejection surface of the ink cartridge and the recording head is used in an upward direction.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Ink-jet printer 2 Recording head 3 Carriage 4 Platen roller 5 Guide shaft 6 Toothed belt 7 Motor 8 Paper 9 Auxiliary roller 11 Motor 12 Head cleaning device 13 Black ink cartridge 14 Color ink cartridge 15 (15a, 15b, 15c) Ink Chamber 16 Ink suction member 17 Ink replenishing part 18 Ink replenishing hole 19 Inner lid 21 Conducting hole 22 Upper lid member 23 Atmospheric chamber 24 Atmospheric conducting hole 25 Chip substrate 26 Drive circuit 27 Heating part 28 Individual wiring electrode 29 Common electrode 31 Partition 32 Orifice plate 33 Ink ejection nozzle 34 (34a, 34b, 34c) Nozzle array 35 Ink supply groove 36 Ink supply hole 37 Ink flow path 38 Ink cartridge 39 Ink adsorption member 41 Ink 42 Atmospheric conduction hole 43 Recording head 44 ink supply pipe 45 ink tank 46 ink chamber 47 ink 48 supply port 49 flexible tube 51 ink absorber 52 high viscous fluid 52-1 meniscus 53 air 54 air supply pipe 55 air supply port 56 air passage 57 air pump 58 inkjet print Head 59 Orifice array 61 Ink ejection surface

Claims (7)

[Claims] 1. An ink tank that stores aqueous ink in an ink chamber and supplies ink from the ink chamber to an ink jet head, the ink being provided near a supply port that supplies the ink in the ink chamber. An absorber, an oily high-viscosity fluid sealed in contact with the ink on the opposite side to the supply port in the ink chamber, and the ink chamber in contact with the high-viscosity fluid on the opposite side to the ink. An ink tank comprising: a position maintaining unit that maintains an amount of air increased by an amount of displacement of the highly viscous fluid moved toward the supply port. 2. The ink tank according to claim 1, wherein the position maintaining means includes an air pump, and forcibly supplies air corresponding to the displacement amount into the ink chamber by the air pump. . 3. The ink tank according to claim 1, wherein the highly viscous fluid is a mineral oil. 4. The ink tank according to claim 1, wherein the high-viscosity fluid is a silicone oil. 5. An ink chamber for storing aqueous ink, an ink absorber provided near a supply port for supplying ink from the ink chamber to the inkjet head, and a supply port for the ink in the ink chamber. An ink tank made of an oily high-viscosity fluid sealed in contact with the opposite side of the ink tank; a detection means for detecting the mounting of the ink tank; and the high-viscosity fluid for moving the ink to the supply port side. A pressurizing means for applying pressure to the ink tank; and a control means for operating the pressurizing means when the detection means detects the mounting of the ink tank to perform initial conduction of ink. Conductive device. 6. The ink initial conduction device according to claim 5, wherein the highly viscous fluid is a mineral oil. 7. The ink initial conduction device according to claim 5, wherein the high-viscosity fluid is a silicone oil.