JPH0434509B2 - - Google Patents

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Technical Field] The present invention relates to a printer, and more specifically, a type wheel and a print hammer are mounted on a carriage, and the type arranged on the type wheel is driven by the striking action of the print hammer. It relates to a printer that prints.

[Prior art]

In conventional printers of this type, the type provided on the type wheel is driven by a printing hammer onto the printing paper via an ink ribbon, and the carriage is equipped with a type wheel, a printing hammer, and a wheel drive motor. The type wheel rotates while being moved to the next printing position by the carriage, and remains stationary relative to the platen holding the paper during printing. After printing is completed, it is rotated again to select the type to be printed next and is moved by the carriage.

In addition, since the optimal value for the impact pressure on type with a printing hammer differs depending on the size of the type, a table of impact pressure corresponding to the type area is generally provided, and by looking up this table, the optimal impact pressure for each type can be determined. It is configured to control as obtained. In addition, in order to obtain this type of impact pressure, since the mass of the hammer is constant, the current applied to the magnetic coil is changed so that the speed of the hammer can be changed. It was common to control the voltage by changing it depending on the voltage or voltage.

However, in such conventional printers, in the series of printing operations described above, a rotation start signal for rotating the type wheel and a rotation start signal for rotating the type wheel and the carriage are sent after a certain sufficient period of rest after one printing operation is completed. Since a movement start signal for movement is output, in order to increase the speed, it is necessary to shorten the stationary time of the carriage and type wheel as much as possible.

〔the purpose〕

The present invention relates to a printer that stops a carriage and prints, and that increases the printing speed of character strings.

〔Example〕

Embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below based on the drawings.

1 and 2 show one embodiment of the invention.

Here, only the parts directly involved in the printing operation, such as the carriage and platen, are shown, but 1 is the platen, 2 is the printing paper held by the platen 1, and 3 is the type 3A arranged at the tip of the radial arm. It is a type wheel with paper 2 and type 3.
The ink ribbon 4 interposed between the ink ribbon A and the ink ribbon 4 is supplied from an ink ribbon cassette 5.

Furthermore, 6 is a motor that rotates the type wheel 3, 7 is a printing hammer that drives the type 3A toward the paper 3 via the ribbon 4, and 8 is the printing hammer 7.
It is an electromagnetic coil that holds the Thus, by excitation of the electromagnetic coil 8, the printing hammer 7 can be caused to perform a striking operation. 9 is a printing hammer return spring; 10 is an elastic buffer for holding the printing hammer 7 in the return position; 11 is the coil 8 and spring 9;
and a hammer case housing a buffer body 10, and the hammer case 11 is attached to a carriage 13 with screws 12. type wheel 3
Type hammer case 11 along with ribbon cassette 5
Carriage 13 loaded with timing belt 1
4 and is connected to the carriage drive motor 15.
It is moved in a direction parallel to the platen 1. 16 is a guide shaft of the carriage 13.

In the printer configured in this manner, the printing hammer 3 is energized by energizing the magnetic coil 8, and the dynamic force obtained at this time drives the type 3A together with the ribbon 4 toward the paper 2. When printing is completed, the repulsive force of the platen 1 and the spring force of the spring 9 cause the type wheel 3 and the print hammer 3 to return to their original positions.

Figure 3 shows the printing hammer 7 in the printer of the present invention.
This figure shows the relationship between the driving operation and return operation and the timing of outputting the carriage movement signal and the wheel rotation signal, and the right half in FIG. 3 is related to the position in FIG. 2 for easy understanding.

That is, the vertical line P ₁ in the right half of FIG.
P ₂ , P ₃ and P ₄ are on the surface of platen 1, type 3A
, the back position of the type 3A and the tip position of the printing hammer 7, and therefore the line
The distance between P ₁ and P ₂ corresponds to the total dimension of the paper 2, the ribbon 4, and the wheel thickness of the type 3A portion.

Furthermore, in the left half of FIG. 3, the timing at which the excitation signal of the electromagnetic coil 8, the carriage movement signal, and the wheel rotation signal are generated is shown below, with the time immediately before the excitation of the electromagnetic coil 8 as a base of t=0. It is shown in line with the printing hammer operation curve in the right half of Figure 3.

Therefore, here, a case where the magnet excitation signal A _i that causes the hammer 7 to generate a large impact force is output, and a case where the magnet excitation signal B _i that causes the hammer 7 to generate a small impact force is output. Two ways were displayed.

That is, when the excitation signal A _i is output, the tip of the hammer 7 moves along the trajectory shown by the curve A,
When excitation signal B _i is output, its tip is curve B
It operates with the trajectory shown in .

As is clear from these trajectories A and B, although the times T A and T B until the tip of the hammer 7 finishes striking are different, the times T _A and T _B are different at each point in time when the tip of the hammer 7 finishes striking. Carriage 13
There is no problem in starting to move the . Therefore, in the present invention, the carriage movement signals A _C and B _C are generated at these times.

Furthermore, as is clear from the right half of Figure 3, the time it takes for the tip of the hammer to finish printing and return to position _P3 on the back of the type is T C when the trajectory is A, and T _C when the trajectory is B. In this case, it is T _D. Therefore, there is no problem in rotating the type wheel 7 after these times.

However, in this example, the tip of the hammer is from the line P ₂ .
Trajectory B is slower than trajectory A in returning to the P ₃ line. Therefore, in this example, after the carriage movement signal A _C or B _C is output, the type wheel rotation signal A _W or B _W is output after T time has elapsed, as shown in the left half of the figure, in accordance with the slower time interval. Do it like this.

In addition, in this example, the magnet excitation signal is A _i and
The two cases of B _i have been described, but these can be set in multiple ways depending on the type area, and in such a case, the carriage movement start time can be set in the same way as described above. All you have to do is set up a table, and when the type wheel rotation signal occurs, the line P ₂ will be selected among these multiple cases.
The fixed delay time T may be determined in accordance with the case where the return time interval from to _P3 is the slowest.

That is, since the time point at which the carriage movement signal is generated and the time point at which the type wheel rotation signal is generated are set in relation to the operation of the printing hammer, the stationary time of the type wheel 7 and the carriage can be reduced to the minimum. can.

FIG. 4 shows an example of a control means for controlling the timing of actuation of the print hammer, carriage and type wheel as described above in accordance with the present invention.

Here, the target printed information 21 input from a keyboard (not shown) or the like and converted into a parallel signal is
After being read into the memory of the printer control CPU 22, it is immediately converted to the target position of the type wheel 3 by the type target position conversion table 23. next,
The CPU 22 refers to the value of the printing pressure table 24 corresponding to the target position of the type, and at the same time controls the type wheel 3 and carriage 13 shown in FIG. .

Then type wheel 3 and carriage 13
After confirming that CPU2 has reached the target position, CPU2
2 writes a value proportional to the printing hammer excitation time to the timer 31 in the program timer module PTM 25, which selects the printing hammer excitation time corresponding to the reference value from the printing pressure table 24, and starts the timer 31. Each timer 31 _, 32, .

On the other hand, from the value referenced from the printing pressure table,
The CPU 22 refers to the corresponding value in the waiting time table and starts the timer 32 almost simultaneously with the timer 31. At this time, the value written to the timer 32 is the value written in the timer 31.
When the value written to is N, the relationship is set to be k1/N+m.

Here, k and m are constants determined by the performance of the printing hammer 7. Output of output port 27
HMRE is a carriage 13 and type wheel 3
As soon as it reaches the target position, it changes to "ON", so the output HMR of the OR gate 8 (printing hammer drive signal, that is, the magnet excitation signals A _i , B _i . . . ) remains active during the output time τ _i of the timer 31. In this state, the printing hammer 7 is driven. On the other hand, timer 31
The timer 32, which was started almost at the same time, becomes zero after the elapse of (k1/N+m)×(clock cycle) and interrupts the CPU 22. In response to this interrupt from the timer 32, the CPU 22 turns on the carriage motor drive signal in the output port 27, and
Starts control to move to the next printing target position.

On the other hand, the CPU 22 accepts the interrupt from the timer 32 and immediately after returning the timer 32, writes the constant C to the timer 32 again and restarts the timer 32.

The timer 32 becomes zero after a certain period of time T (T=C×(clock period), and requests an interrupt to the CPU 22 again. When the CPU 22 receives this interrupt, it turns the type wheel motor drive signal WME of the output port 27 “ON”. ”, control for rotating the type wheel 3 to the next target position is started. Through the above series of processes, the print hammer 7, the carriage 13, and the type wheel 3 can continue to operate in a time-efficient manner.

〔effect〕

As described above, according to the present invention, when the drive time for various types of type is different, the drive start of the carriage is changed according to the drive time, and furthermore, in order to select the type to be struck next, By rotating the wheel, you can increase the printing speed when printing character strings.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing an overview of the carriage drive section and platen of the printer of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a model diagram showing the relative positions of each member in the printing section of the printer of the invention, and FIG. 3 is a printing pattern of the printer of the invention. FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing a relative relationship between the operating locus of the tip of the printing hammer and the output timing of the hammer drive electromagnetic coil drive signal, carriage movement signal, and wheel rotation signal in the control section used in the present invention. FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an example. 1... Platen, 2... Paper, 3... Type wheel, 3A... Type, 4... Ink ribbon, 5...
... Ribbon cassette, 6 ... Motor, 7 ... Printing hammer, 8 ... Electromagnetic coil, 9 ... Spring, 10 ...
Buffer, 11...hammer case, 12...screw,
13... Carriage, 14... Timing belt, 15... Drive motor, 16... Guide shaft, A _C ,
B _C ... Carriage movement signal, A _W , B _W ... Type wheel rotation signal, A _i , B _i ... Magnet excitation signal, 21 ... Target type information, 22 ... CPU, 2
3...Print target position conversion table, 24...Print pressure table, 25...Program timer module,
27...Output port, 31, 32...Timer.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A carriage equipped with a type wheel provided with a plurality of type characters, and a type wheel mounted on the carriage and provided with a plurality of type characters is rotated to bring the type characters to be printed into a hammer striking position. rotation control means for positioning; drive time information storage means for storing drive time information based on printing pressure information of each of the plurality of printed characters; and drive time information storage means for storing drive time information based on printing pressure information of each of the plurality of printed characters; a hammer driving means for initially striking a recording medium with a hammer; and after the hammer driving means starts driving the hammer, the hammer finishes striking a desired printed character and returns to a position on the back side of the printed character. and a counting means for counting the time until the hammer finishes striking the desired type and returns to the position on the back of the type, when the count means counts the time until the hammer finishes striking the desired type and returns to the position on the back of the type, the rotation control means is controlled. control means for initiating rotation of said type wheel to the next type to be printed.