JPS61164863A - Thermal transfer printing apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To obtain high printing quality by enhancing the accuracy of a printing position, by controlling drive timing and a drive time. CONSTITUTION:Printing data is applied to a printing head driving means as the output from a printing data holding means 1 and the printing head driving means 2 drives a printing head 3 according to the control signal from a drive timing and time control means 40. The application start time of a drive pulse is delayed with respect to a continuously driven heat generating element to make the time reaching the melting temp. of ink equal to a usual value and, by this method, printing quality is enhanced.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a printing device used in electronic computers, data terminals, copy transmission devices, copying machines, and the like.

[Conventional technology]

FIG. 4 shows a basic configuration for driving and controlling a conventional thermal transfer printing device. Print data is given to print head driving means 2 as an output from print data holding means 1 .

The print head driving means 2 drives the heat generating elements in the print head 3 corresponding to the print data for a time specified by the output signal from the drive time control means 4. FIG. 5 shows the drive pulse, the temperature change of the heating element, and the printing position at this time. In this figure, the temperature of the heating element that is driven continuously increases too much due to the heat storage effect, so the temperature increase is prevented by setting the drive Noculus width to a value of 11/, which is smaller than the normal tl (this control is (called history control).

[Problem that the invention seeks to solve]

In the above-mentioned conventional technology, since only the width of the drive/glue is controlled, the time t until the ink reaches the melting temperature °Tm
2' becomes smaller than the normal value t2 depending on the initial temperature T0' of the heating element at the time of applying the gas. As a result, the distance X' from the reference point to the print position is also smaller than the normal distance X, which is one of the causes of deterioration in print quality.

The present invention solves the above-mentioned problems and provides an apparatus that can improve printing quality and the like by controlling the drive timing and drive time of the heating element.

[Means for solving problems]

The present invention includes a print data holding means, a print head driving means for driving a print head based on print data output from the print data holding means, and a drive for controlling output timing and output time from the print head driving means. This thermal transfer printing device is characterized by having timing and time control means, and a print head that generates heat in response to the output of the print head driving means to melt ink and transfer it to paper.

〔Example〕

Next, the present invention will be explained with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows the configuration of the present invention. The present invention is designed to control the drive timing and drive time of the heating element,
Print data is given to the print head drive means 2 as an output from the print data holding means 1, and the print head drive means 2
drives the print head 3 according to drive timing and control signals from the time control means 40.

FIG. 2 shows the relationship between the driving force, the temperature change of the heating element, and the printing position according to the present invention. In this figure, as shown by the solid line, for a heating element that is driven continuously, by delaying the start time of driving pulse application by to', it takes a time t2 to reach the melting temperature Tm of the ink.
' is equal to the normal value t2, which also changes the printing position! ':X, improving the quality of 8 characters.

In addition, in this example, a case was shown in which only the influence of the immediately preceding driving pulse was focused, but as shown in FIG. It is also possible to expect even higher quality printing by setting the time to two stages, to' and to, or by providing multiple stages of delay time by paying attention to the previous drive/gurus.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, since the present invention controls the drive timing and drive time, it is possible to match the time required for the ink to reach its melting temperature, thereby improving printing position accuracy. , which has the effect of being able to obtain high print quality.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a time chart showing the operation of the present invention, FIG. 3 is a time chart showing the operation by multi-step control in the embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. The figure is a block diagram of the prior art, and FIG. 5 is a time chart showing the operation of the prior art. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1... Print data holding means, 2... Print head driving means, 3... Print head, 4... Drive time control means, 40... Drive timing and time control means. Figure 3

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) Print data holding means, print head driving means for driving the print head based on the print data output from the print data holding means, and a drive for controlling the output timing and output time from the print head driving means. A thermal transfer printing device comprising: timing and time control means; and a print head that generates heat in response to the output of the print head drive means to melt ink and transfer it to paper.