JP3739532B2 - Inkjet recording device - Google Patents

Description

[0001]
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a recording apparatus in which a plurality of recording units each equipped with an ink jet recording head are mounted on the same carriage.
[0002]
[Prior art]
In order to improve the printing quality and printing speed, a recording apparatus using an ink jet recording head has been steadily increasing in number of nozzle openings, and an apparatus having 1000 nozzle openings is about to be put into practical use.
When the number of nozzles is large in this way, the dot positions on the recording medium are shifted due to variations in the accuracy of the ink droplet landing positions between the recording heads. In particular, one pixel is formed in color printing. If there is an error in the position of each color dot, the print quality will deteriorate, and even if one of the nozzle openings is inconvenient to eject ink droplets, the print quality will be drastically reduced, making it meaningful as a recording device. There is a problem that the manufacturing yield of the recording apparatus having a large number of nozzles is extremely low.
[0003]
For this reason, a recording apparatus having a large number of nozzles is usually constructed by mounting a plurality of ink jet recording heads having a nozzle numerical aperture of about 100 to several hundreds on the same carriage. When positioning the recording head on the carriage, a certain degree of accuracy is ensured by engaging a positioning member formed on the recording head, such as a positioning pin, with a positioning member formed on the carriage, such as a positioning hole. can do.
[0004]
[Problems to be solved by the invention]
However, as the number of recording heads to be mounted on the carriage increases, the distance in the main scanning direction becomes longer, and the slight inclination of the recording head with respect to the main scanning direction greatly affects the landing position of the ink droplets on the recording medium. Will occur. In order to solve such problems, it is necessary to repeatedly adjust the position of the recording head within the recording apparatus box by printing a test pattern after the recording head is mounted, and adjustment work takes time. There is a problem.
The present invention has been made in view of such problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide an ink jet type capable of easily attaching a large number of ink jet recording heads as a unit to a carriage of a recording apparatus with high positioning accuracy. It is to provide a recording device.
[0005]
[Means for Solving the Problems]
In order to solve such a problem, in the present invention, ink droplets corresponding to the print signal are applied to the carriage guided by the first and second guide shafts by the reciprocating drive means and driven to reciprocate in the main scanning direction. In the ink jet recording apparatus in which a plurality of recording units to be ejected are mounted, the carriage is detachable from the first member guided by the first guide shaft, the first member, and the first member. A reference position determination unit for the second reference member, and is divided into a second member guided by the second guide shaft disposed on the side opposite to the side on which the reference position determination unit is formed, The first member includes a first positioning portion made of a pin provided at a central portion in the scanning direction of the carriage, and a second positioning portion made of a concave portion on both sides in the scanning direction. The members of A fourth positioning portion comprises a projection which recesses cooperate with the third positioning portion, and a second positioning portion comprising a long hole extending perpendicularly to the scanning direction of the pin cooperating with the first positioning portion The second member is positioned such that the third positioning portion has a backlash only in a direction perpendicular to the first guide shaft with respect to the first positioning portion of the first member, and The projection of the fourth positioning portion is configured to engage with the recess of the second positioning portion of the first member so that the projection can be positioned on the first guide shaft. is a window for exposing the recording unit to the base constituting extending in the scanning direction of the carriage is formed, sandwiching the Kimado before was or, and position fine adjustment securing of the recording unit in a direction perpendicular to the scanning direction Multiple screw holes A plurality of recording units are provided in the scanning direction, and a plurality of the recording units have a fixed positional relationship with respect to the third positioning unit and the fourth positioning unit, which are reference position determining units for the second member. A plurality of the recording units are fixed to the second member so as to have the first member attached to the guide member by the reference position determining unit via the second member. The first member and the second member are positioned in a state where the two members are attracted to each other by the elasticity imparting means spanned between the first member and the second member. The member is coupled by a fixing means in a region facing the member.
[Action]
A plurality of recording units are positioned and fixed to the second member in advance in an environment where the mounting operation is easy, and the second member is fixed to the first member incorporated in advance in the recording apparatus. When the head is attached to the recording apparatus, it is not necessary to adjust the position between the recording units, and the position adjusting operation between the recording unit and the recording apparatus can be greatly reduced.
[0007]
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Therefore, details of the present invention will be described below based on the illustrated embodiment.
FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of a recording apparatus according to the present invention. A main carriage 1 is supported so as to be movable in the vicinity of both ends in the paper feed direction to a main guide shaft 3 and a sub guide shaft 4 (FIG. 9). The carriage is driven by a carriage drive motor via a timing belt (not shown) so that it can reciprocate in the main scanning direction.
[0008]
The main carriage 1 is mounted with a plurality of, in this embodiment, six recording units 7, 7, 7... Assembled in a sub-carriage 6 which will be described later, and is connected to an ink tank (not shown) installed in the box. Ink is supplied from tubes 8, 8, 8.
[0009]
These recording units 7 include an ink jet recording head 10 having a nozzle plate 9 in which nozzle openings N, N, N... Are formed at a constant pitch as shown in FIG. The sub-tank 11 also serves as a substrate and is fixed to the substrate. The nozzle openings N are slightly larger than the outer diameters of the screws 13 and 13 at both ends in the arrangement direction. Through holes 15 and 15 are formed.
[0010]
As shown in FIGS. 4 and 5, the sub-carriage 6 includes reinforcing walls 16 and 17, an exposure window 18 for making the recording head 10 of the recording unit 7 face the recording medium, and one recording unit 7. Screwed into the main carriage 1 is a pair of screw holes 19, 19 fixed by screws 13, a reference hole 23 fitted to positioning pins 36, 37 to be described later, a through hole 24 inserted with a slight backlash. A mounting hole 29 having a backlash with respect to the mounting screw 25 is formed at four corners. The sub-carriage 6 is desirably manufactured by injection molding or pressing a metal plate in order to reduce the weight and reduce the manufacturing cost.
[0011]
In a state in which the nozzle opening N of the recording unit 7 can be observed by a solid-state imaging means or the like with the window 18 as a field of view, and the sub-carriage 6 is fixed to a jig in a posture in which the recording unit 7 can be easily attached. One side surface of the front end, front end, and rear end of the recording unit 7 is fixed by positioning members P, P, P, and the other side surfaces of the rear end, front end side, and rear end side of the recording unit 7 are elastic members P ′, P ′, Position by pressing with P ′.
[0012]
At the time of positioning, at least the position of the nozzle openings N between the plurality of recording units 7 in the sub-scanning direction becomes a specified position with respect to the reference holes 23 and 24 of the sub-carriage 6 with an error of, for example, 30 μm, preferably 20 μm or less. And fixed to the sub-carriage 6 with screws 13 and 13.
[0013]
At this time, a spacer or the like is inserted between the recording unit 7 and the sub-carriage 6 so that the height of the nozzle plate 9 is adjusted to be, for example, 100 μm or less, preferably 50 μm or less. The distance between the recording units in the main scanning direction is ideally adjusted to 30 μm or less, preferably 20 μm or less. However, since it can be adjusted by software by adjusting the printing timing, it is particularly strict. No adjustment is necessary.
[0014]
At the time of attachment, by providing a micro-moving mechanism for the positioning members P, P, P, not only the position adjustment in the main scanning direction and the sub-scanning direction but also the inclination θ of the recording unit 7 ′ is high. The position can be adjusted with accuracy.
[0015]
Since the recording unit is attached to the flat sub-carriage 6 in such a manner that its periphery is much wider than that of the box of the recording apparatus, it can be observed by a solid-state imaging means or the like. The recording unit can be easily assembled with high positional accuracy without requiring skill.
[0016]
When a plurality of recording units 7 are used, for example, when six recording units 7 are used, the nozzle openings N of the recording units 7 are arranged in the sub-scanning direction as shown in FIG. The color recording device is capable of printing with photo quality by positioning the ink cartridges so that they are positioned on the same straight line, and connecting black, yellow, dark magenta, dark cyan, light magenta, and light cyan ink cartridges to each. Can be configured.
[0017]
Further, as shown in FIG. 6B, when using five recording units, the two recording units 7-1 and 7-2 located at one end of each nozzle opening are shifted by a half pitch. In addition, the other recording units 7-3 to 7-5 are arranged so that the nozzle openings N thereof are positioned on the same line as the nozzle openings of the recording head 7-1 or the recording head 7-2, and one end thereof. If the two recording heads 7-1 and 7-2 on the head side are connected to black, and the other recording units 7-3 to 7-5 are connected to yellow, magenta, and cyan ink cartridges, the black ink text A color recording apparatus capable of printing data at high speed can be configured.
[0018]
If the sub-carriage shown in FIGS. 6 (a) and 6 (b) is configured to be detachable from the same main carriage, the product configuration can be diversified only by replacing the sub-carriage, or after purchase. Improvements can be made easily.
[0019]
Furthermore, since the recording head has variations in the amount of ejected ink droplets with respect to the same drive signal, the recording units in which the ejected ink amount becomes almost a prescribed amount when the same drive voltage is applied are selected and these are grouped. If it is mounted on the same sub-carriage, the ink amount of the ink droplets of multiple recording units on the sub-carriage can be adjusted to the specified value just by adjusting the level of one drive signal, enabling high-quality printing. It becomes.
[0020]
On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 7, the main carriage 1 faces the window 30 exposing the nozzle plate 9 of the recording head 10, reinforcing walls 31 and 32, and one end of the reinforcing wall 16 on one side of the sub-carriage 6. An eccentric cam 34 having a lever 33 and a resilient member 35 that contacts the positioning wall 17 on the other side of the sub-carriage 6 are provided at a position where the sub-carriage 6 is located. Positioning pins 36 and 37 for positioning 6 at a predetermined position are planted, and screw holes 38 into which four fixing screws 25 are screwed are provided at four corners.
[0021]
The main carriage 1 is tensioned by a timing belt or the like, and requires rigidity in order to mount a plurality of recording units 7, and is required to be lightweight in order to enable high-speed printing. It is desirable to manufacture by casting an alloy. In FIG. 7, the guide portion that is fitted to the guide shaft 3 of the main carriage 1 is omitted.
[0022]
When the sub-carriage 6 (FIG. 5) assembled with a plurality of recording units 7 is inserted into the positioning pins 36 and 37 through the reference holes 23 and 24 as shown in FIG. 8, all the recording units 7 The nozzle opening N is positioned at a substantially prescribed position with respect to the platen 5. At this stage, the sub-carriage is temporarily fixed to the main carriage 1 with screws 25, and test ink is supplied to each recording unit 7 to print a test pattern.
[0023]
When the inclination of the sub-carriage 6 is detected with respect to the scanning direction of the main carriage 1 as a result of printing, the lever 33 is rotated so that the positioning pin 36 on the opposite side is set as the rotation center. The relative position of the sub carriage 6 with respect to the main carriage 1 is finely adjusted by using the positioning holes 24 of the sub carriage 6 and the backlash of the screw holes 29.
[0024]
When the screw 25 is squeezed and fixed at the stage where it is set at a predetermined position, the main carriage 1 is mounted with its position adjusted in advance at a proper position in the moving direction. 7, 7,... Are set at regular positions with respect to the scanning direction of the main carriage 1. After the sub-carriage 6 is attached, the test ink is discharged and the ink supply tubes 8, 8, 8,... Are connected to the ink supply ports 39, 39, 39,. The recording device is completed.
[0025]
In the above-described embodiment, the positioning pins 36 and 37 are provided on the main carriage 1 and the positioning holes 23 and 24 are provided on the sub-carriage 6 side. Obviously, the same effect can be obtained even if the positioning pins are provided on the carriage 6.
[0026]
In the above-described embodiment, the main carriage 1 or the sub-carriage 6 is provided with a height adjusting mechanism such as an eccentric cam, or a spacer is inserted between the main carriage 1 and the sub-carriage 6 for adjustment. By adjusting the vertical position of the sub-carriage 6 while the main carriage 1 is fixed to the recording apparatus main body, the gap between the nozzle opening and the recording medium can be changed without requiring a complicated mechanism. It is possible to print with a proper gap secured even for thick media such as envelopes.
[0027]
In the above-described embodiment, a plurality of recording units 7 fixed to the sub-carriage 6 are mounted on the main carriage 1, but the carriage is attached to the main guide shaft 3 as shown in FIG. The guide unit 40 is divided into a guide unit 40 and a recording unit fixing unit 50. The guide unit 40 has a positioning pin 41 at the center, positioning concaves 42 and 42, and screws 43 and 43 on both sides. The recording head fixing unit 50 is configured to have a backlash in the vertical direction with respect to the window 51 for exposing the nozzle plate of the recording unit 7 and the main guide shaft 3 of the guide unit 40. Positioning hole 52 that engages with the pin 41, protrusions 53 and 53 that engage with the positioning recesses 42 and 42, and screw holes 54 and 54 that form some backlash with respect to the screws 43 and 43. , And it is configured to form a guide member 55 that engages the auxiliary guide shaft 4.
[0028]
According to this embodiment, a plurality of recording units 7, 7, 7,... Are fixed to the recording unit fixing portion 50 by the same method as in the above-described embodiment, and then the positioning holes 52 of the recording unit fixing portion 50 are set to the positioning pins 41. And the guide member 55 is engaged with the sub guide shaft 4 so that the projections 53 of the recording unit fixing portion 50 oppose the concave portions 42 on both sides of the guide portion 40. Next, the positioning hole 52 is inserted into the positioning pin 41 of the guide portion 40, and the protrusions 53, 53 on both sides are engaged with the recesses 42, 42. Preferably, the springs 46 are hung on the protrusions 45, 59 on both sides so When tension is applied, the approximate position is determined.
[0029]
In this state, if necessary, test printing is performed to finely adjust the position of the recording unit fixing unit 50 and then fixed with screws 43, 43, so that all the recording units 7, 7, 7 are moved in the scanning direction. Can be installed accurately.
[0030]
In the above-described embodiment, the recording unit fixing part 50 is fixed perpendicularly to the surface. However, as shown in FIG. 10, a surface 60 inclined with respect to the surface is guided to the recording unit fixing part 50. The recording head is formed on the side facing the portion 40, through holes 61 and 61 are formed therein, and screw holes 44 'and 44' are formed on the guide portion 40 on the opposite side. The fixing portion 50 can be pressed and fixed at a predetermined position of the guide portion 40 by pressing in both directions of the platen side and the main guide shaft 3.
[0031]
【The invention's effect】
As described above, according to the present invention, the plurality of recording units are positioned and fixed in advance on the second member in an environment where the mounting operation is easy, and the second member is incorporated in the recording apparatus in advance. It can be fixed to one member, and the individual recording units can be attached to the recording apparatus accurately and with simplified adjustment work.
[Brief description of the drawings]
FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing an embodiment of an ink jet recording apparatus according to the present invention, centering on a carriage.
FIG. 2 is a perspective view illustrating a state in which the carriage is removed from the recording apparatus and viewed from the nozzle plate side.
FIGS. 3A and 3B are a front view and a side view, respectively, from the nozzle plate side showing an embodiment of a recording unit. FIGS.
FIGS. 4A and 4B are a top view and a cross-sectional view, respectively, illustrating a process of attaching the recording unit to the sub-carriage.
FIGS. 5A and 5B are a top view and a cross-sectional view showing an example of a sub-carriage in a state where a recording unit is assembled, respectively.
FIGS. 6A and 6B are diagrams illustrating an embodiment of a plurality of recording units attached to a sub-carriage, respectively.
7A and 7B are a top view and a cross-sectional view, respectively, showing an embodiment of the main carriage of the apparatus.
FIGS. 8A and 8B are a top view and a cross-sectional view showing a state where the recording unit and the sub carriage are attached to the main carriage, respectively.
FIGS. 9A and 9B are a top view and a cross-sectional view, respectively, showing another embodiment of the present invention.
FIGS. 10A and 10B are a top view and a cross-sectional view, respectively, showing another embodiment of the present invention.
[Explanation of symbols]
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Main carriage 3 Main guide shaft 4 Guide shaft 5 Platen 6 Sub carriage 7 Recording unit 8 Ink supply tube 9 Nozzle plate 10 Recording head 11 Sub tank 18 Window 23, 24 Reference hole 25 Fixing screw 30 Window 34 Eccentric cam 35 Elastic member 36, 37 Reference pin N Nozzle opening

Claims (2)

In an ink jet recording apparatus in which a plurality of recording units that discharge ink droplets in response to a print signal are mounted on a carriage that is guided by first and second guide shafts by a reciprocating drive unit and is reciprocated in the main scanning direction.
The carriage has a first member guided by the first guide shaft, a detachable attachment to the first member, and a reference position determination unit for the first member, the reference position determination unit And is divided into a second member guided by the second guide shaft arranged on the opposite side to the side on which is formed,
The first member includes a first positioning portion made of a pin provided at a central portion in the scanning direction of the carriage, and a second positioning portion made of a recess on both sides in the scanning direction,
The second member includes a third positioning portion including a long hole extending perpendicularly to the scanning direction and cooperating with the pin of the first positioning portion, and a protrusion cooperating with the concave portion of the second positioning portion. a fourth positioning portion composed,
The second member is positioned such that its third positioning portion has backlash only in a direction perpendicular to the first guide shaft with respect to the first positioning portion of the first member, and The projection of the fourth positioning portion is configured to be engaged with the recess of the second positioning portion of the first member so as to be positioned on the first guide shaft,
The second member is a window for exposing the forming the recording unit to the base to configure this extends in the scanning direction of the carriage, sandwiching Kimado before was or, and the recording in the direction orthogonal to the scanning direction A plurality of screw holes for fixing the position of the unit so that it can be finely adjusted are provided in a plurality of rows in the scanning direction.
The plurality of recording units are fixed to the second member so as to have a certain positional relationship with respect to the third positioning unit and the fourth positioning unit which are reference position determining units of the second member. A plurality of the recording units on the first member attached to the guide member are positioned relative to the first member by the reference position determining unit via the second member;
Fixed in a region where the first member and the second member face each other in a state in which the two members are attracted to each other by the elasticity imparting means spanned between the first member and the second member. An ink jet recording apparatus connected by means. 2. The second member is fixed to a region of the first member facing the first guide shaft by a screw inclined with respect to a recording unit mounting surface of the second member. The ink jet recording apparatus described.

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