JPH08112957A - Image forming apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To obtain an image forming apparatus in which the influence of the vibration of a motor is limited to a narrow range and which obtains a calm and high quality image by providing a vibration-proof member at a site for mounting a rail for supporting an ink head holder at an apparatus body side. CONSTITUTION: A vibration-proof member 24 is so disposed as to surround a screw 11 of a clamping member between the rail support site of a support member 4 and the ends of rails 2, 3. The member 14 is also disposed as to surround a screw 11 between a support member 5 and the ends of the rails 2, 3. As the members 24, known elastic member such as rubber, etc., can be used. Thus, the vibration of a motor 10 is scarcely transmitted to the rails 2, 3 due to the presence of the members 24 to be effective to prevent the deterioration of an image due to the vibration of the holder 1 and to be also effective to prevent the generation of noise owing to the propagation of the vibration to the entire apparatus.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

[Object of the invention]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a copying machine, a printer,
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus such as a plotter, and more particularly to a guide rail holding device for supporting and running an ink head holder for image formation.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art An ink head holder having an ink head for ejecting ink is made to face a recording material such as paper mounted on the main body of an image forming apparatus, and the ink is ejected from the ink head according to an image signal. It is well known that an image forming apparatus configured to form an image on the recording material with the ink is already widely used.

A typical example of a known image forming apparatus of this type will be briefly described with reference to FIG. "Figure 6"
Is a side view of the image forming apparatus, and FIG. 7 is a front view. The periphery of the apparatus main body is surrounded by a left cover 18, a right cover 19, a rear cover 20, and a front cover 15, and a main image forming unit including the ink head holder 1 is internally provided inside the apparatus main body. An openable / closable dust cover 21 is disposed between the left and right covers 18 and 19 so that the inside can be exposed if necessary.

Covers 1 near the left and right ends of the apparatus body
Support members 4 and 5 are attached to internal positions 8 and 19, respectively, and the rails 2 and 3 are held in parallel by these members 4 and 5. A motor 10 is disposed on one of the support members (support member 5 in the figure), and pulleys are attached to the rotary shaft of the motor and the other support member, and a belt is provided between the pulleys. 8 is suspended.

The ink head holder 1 is slidably attached to the rails 2 and 3, and is further locked to the belt 8. Therefore, by driving the motor 10, the ink head holder 1 is moved via the belt 8 in the left-right direction along the rails 2 and 3 as viewed in FIG.

In forming an image, a recording material 16 is placed on a platen 12 shown in FIG. 6, and both ends of the recording material are gripped by a roller 14 and pinch rollers provided on pinch roller supporting members 6 and 7, The driving force applied to the roller 14 advances the roller 14 to the start position, during which a sensor (not shown) determines the size of the recording material, the printing area, and the like.

After that, the motor 10 on the side of the supporting member 5 is driven to move the ink head holder 1 along the rails 2 and 3 to perform printing and image formation on the recording material 16.

In such a device, the rail 2,
The both-ends supporting mechanism of No. 3 will be described with reference to FIG.
As shown in the figure, the inner surface of each of the support members 4 and 5 is formed with an annular projection into which the rail fits, and the ends of the rails 2 and 3 are fitted into these annular projections. There is. Further, the end face of each rail is fastened and fixed by screws 11 from the outside of the support member. For good image formation,
It is necessary to maintain the distance between the platen 12 and the ink head holder 1 and the front-rear positional relationship at predetermined values as accurately as possible.

In the apparatus having such a structure, the vibration due to the driving of the motor 10 reaches the pulley, the belt 8, the rails 2 and 3 and the supporting member 4 attached to the motor shaft, and the vibration is generated in the entire apparatus. There is a risk of transmission. Also, due to this vibration, the left and right covers 18, 19, the front cover 1
5, the noise increases due to the resonance phenomenon due to the presence of the rear cover 20, the dust cover 21, and the like. Furthermore, the vibration of the rails 2 and 3 causes the ink head holder 1 to move.
Also vibrates, which causes a problem that this causes deterioration of image quality.

The present invention has been made to cope with such a situation, and in the image forming apparatus as described above, a vibration isolating member is provided at a portion where a rail supporting the ink head holder is mounted on the apparatus main body side. To provide an image forming apparatus in which the influence of vibration propagation of a motor is contained within a range as narrow as possible by interposing, and a quiet and high-quality image can be obtained without the above-mentioned problems. The purpose is.

[0010]

Configuration of the Invention

In order to achieve the above object, the present invention provides a pair of support members attached to the main body of an image forming apparatus, a rail member mounted between the support members, and A fastening member that fastens the rail member to a support member, an image forming means such as an ink head holder slidably mounted on the rail member, and a connecting member connected to the image forming means and running along the rail member. In the image forming apparatus having a driving means for driving the image forming apparatus, a vibration isolating member is provided between the supporting member and at least one end of the rail member, or An image forming apparatus in which a vibrating member is arranged between a support member and a rail member, or an image forming apparatus in any one of the above, in which a vibration damping member is arranged between a rail member and a fastening member. , , In those of the one,
In the image forming apparatus, the fastening member is provided only on the support member on the side not provided with the driving unit of the image forming unit.

With this structure, it is possible to prevent the generation of noise due to the vibration of the image forming apparatus as much as possible and obtain a high quality image.

[0012]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS "FIG. 1" is a front view of a main part of an image forming apparatus showing an embodiment of the present invention. Since the overall structure of the image forming apparatus is basically the same as that of the known apparatus, the drive motor 10, the belt 8, the ink head holder 1, the supporting members 4, 5, the rails 2 and 3 are directly shown in the figure. Only relevant parts are shown.

Ends of the rails 2 and 3 are fitted into annular projections provided on supporting members 4 and 5 attached to the immovable portions of the image forming apparatus, and the rails 2 and 3 are screwed from the outside.
The structure for fixing is the same as the known device.

In such an apparatus, as shown in the figure, a vibration isolating member 24 is arranged between the rail supporting portion of the supporting member 4 and the ends of the rails 2 and 3 so as to surround the screw 11 as a fastening member. is there. Further, a vibration-proof member 24 is arranged between the support member 5 and the ends of the rails 2 and 3 so as to surround the screw 11. A known elastic member such as rubber can be preferably used as the vibration isolating member.

With this structure, the vibration of the motor 10 is less likely to be transmitted to the rails 2 and 3 due to the presence of the vibration isolator 24, and it is effective in preventing the image quality deterioration due to the vibration of the ink head holder 1. At the same time, it is effective in preventing the generation of noise due to the propagation of vibrations throughout the device.

FIG. 2 is a front view of the main part of another embodiment, in which the overall structure of the image forming apparatus is basically the same as that of the known device. ,
Ink head holder 1, support members 4, 5, rails 2, 3
Etc. are shown only.

In this embodiment, the holding portions of the rails 2 and 3 on the side of the supporting member 5 to which the motor 10 is attached are detachably fitted into the through holes formed at the positions corresponding to the rails of the supporting members. There is. The opposite ends of the rails are attached to the support member 4 with screws 11 via a vibration isolating member 24 similar to that shown in FIG.

With this structure, the rails 2 and 3 can be easily assembled and the supporting member 5 can be easily assembled.
Since the rails and the rails 2 and 3 are movable relative to each other, the vibration on the motor side is not transmitted to the ink head holder 1 and is not transmitted to cause deterioration of the image quality. Propagation can be effectively blocked by the presence of the vibration isolator.

FIG. 3 is a front view of the essential parts showing a device of still another embodiment. In this device, the vibration isolating member 25 is also arranged on the holding portion of each rail on the support member 5 side. When the distance between the ink head holder 1 and the platen 12 does not require high accuracy, such a configuration can further improve the vibration damping function.

FIG. 4 and FIG. 5 respectively show further other embodiments, and each drawing shows only the portion where the end portions of the rails are attached to the support members 4 and 5, in particular. "Figure 4"
In FIG. 5, the vibration isolator 26 is arranged between the support members 4 and 5 and the end faces of the rails 2 and 3, and in the one shown in FIG. 5, the above-mentioned FIG. 1 and FIG. The vibration damping member 27 shown in FIG. 2 has an end portion extending in the rail axis direction so as to surround the rail peripheral surface, the supporting members 4, 5, and the pis 1.
An anti-vibration member 28 is arranged between the first and second parts.

It can be easily understood that the same effects as those of the above-described respective embodiments can be obtained even with such a configuration. If high accuracy is not required for the height of the ink head holder 1 and the platen 12,
With the structure shown in FIG. 5, a better vibration damping effect can be expected.

As described above, according to the present invention,
In an image forming apparatus in which an ink head holder is slidably arranged on a rail member, vibration of a drive motor for moving the ink head holder propagates to various parts in the apparatus to generate noise or deteriorate image quality. It greatly contributes to the effective prevention of high quality images.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a front view of an image forming apparatus showing an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a front view of an image forming apparatus showing another embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a front view of an image forming apparatus showing still another embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a side view showing a portion where a rail end portion is carried by a support member according to another embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a side view showing a portion where a rail end portion is carried by a support member, showing another embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a side sectional view of a known image forming apparatus.

[Fig. 7] Front view of the above

FIG. 8 is a front view showing a portion where the rail is held by the support member.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Ink Head Holder 2, 3 Rails 4, 5 Supporting Member 6, 7 Pinch Roller Supporting Member 8 Belt 10 Motor 11 Screw 12 Platen 16 Recording Material 24, 26, 27, 28 Vibration Isolation Member

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of front page (72) Inventor Yosuke Tachimi 6-3-3 Shimorenjaku, Mitaka-shi, Tokyo Within Copia Co., Ltd. (72) 6-3-3 Shimorenjaku, Mitaka-shi, Tokyo No. 3 Copier Co., Ltd. (72) Inventor Tomohiro Ishizu 6-3-3 Shimorenjaku, Mitaka City, Tokyo Copa Co., Ltd.

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A pair of support members attached to an image forming apparatus main body, a rail member mounted between the support members, a fastening member for fastening the rail member to the support member, and a slide member on the rail member. An image forming apparatus comprising an image forming means such as an ink head holder movably mounted, and a drive means connected to the image forming means and traveling along the rail member, wherein the support member and the An image forming apparatus in which a vibration isolation member is disposed between at least one end of a rail member. 2. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the image stabilizing member is disposed between the supporting member and the rail member. 3. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the image stabilizing member is disposed between the rail member and the fastening member. 4. The "Claim 1", wherein the fastening member is provided only on the supporting member on the side not provided with the driving means of the image forming means.
The image forming apparatus according to claim 3.