JPS6116858A - Head for conductive transfer recording - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To allow recording for a prolonged term, and to manufacture the titled head at comparatively low cost by constituting a laminate, in which a thin- piece consisting of an electric insulating material is held by two electrodes, so that a sectional area thereof is reduced with a proceeding toward a nose or it is kept constant from a section in the vicinity of the nose. CONSTITUTION:A recording head 4 is constituted so that the sectional areas of a recording electrode 1 and a return electrode 2 are reduced or kept constant centering around an insulating thin-piece 3 with a proceeding toward a nose or in the vicinity of the nose. These electrodes 1, 2 and insulating thin-piece 3 extend only by proper length in the direction vertical to a paper surface (the surface of a body to be transferred), but a recording surface for the head 4 is flat or has an appropriate curve when it is viewed from where rectangular to the direction of conveyance of recording paper 9 or an ink ribbon 6. Consequently, an ink sheet is conveyed smoothly, and a picture having excellent quality is obtained even by recording for a prolonged term.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to an electrical transfer recording head, and more particularly to a recording head for a no-code label printer employing an electrical transfer recording method.

Recording methods of conventional code printers include wire dot method, thermal method, thermal transfer method, inkjet method,
Electrophotographic methods, electrical transfer methods, and the like are known. Each code label printer that employs these recording methods has advantages and disadvantages depending on the method. For example, the wire tod type is inexpensive but has poor image quality. The thermal type or thermal transfer type is small and has good image quality, or is rather expensive because it uses a dot-shaped heating element + a thermal head arranged in a line, and in addition, the thermal stability of the image is inferior. I have a dislike. The inkjet type is small and relatively inexpensive, but has low image density and requires maintenance. Furthermore, although the electrophotographic type has good image quality, it is expensive and requires maintenance.

On the other hand, a no-code label printer employing an electric transfer method has the advantages of being compact, producing high-density images on plain paper, and having a fast recording speed.

However, with the conventional electric transfer method / code label printer, it is not possible to obtain images with even density (barcode images) or images with good sharpness, and it is difficult to record images for long periods of time. The phenomenon of inability to do so was often observed.

OBJECTS The present invention is intended to eliminate the above-mentioned disadvantages in its implementation, and one of the objects is to provide a recording head for a no-code printer that utilizes an improved current transfer type system. Another object of the present invention is to provide an electrical transfer type recording head for a no-code printer that is easy to manufacture and relatively inexpensive.

By the way, the present inventors have conducted a lot of research and consideration on A-code label printers, but it is unclear whether high-quality images can be obtained over a long period of time with those that use the electric transfer method. It was confirmed that the structure and shape of the recording head had a major influence. Therefore, the present invention relates to an improvement in a recording head.

Structure The current transfer recording head of the present invention is composed of a laminate in which a thin piece of electrically insulating material is sandwiched between two metal piece (or metal lump) electrodes, and the head is made of a laminate in which a thin piece of electrically insulating material is sandwiched between two metal piece (or metal lump) electrodes. The cross-sectional area decreases or remains constant around the insulating thin piece, and the insulating thin piece and the electrode form the same or almost the same surface at the tip, but the cross-sectional area is bowl-shaped (curved shape). It is characterized by the fact that it is formed.

In the following, the present invention will be compared with a conventional recording head.
A more detailed explanation will be given based on the accompanying drawings. FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram for explaining that an image is obtained by electrical transfer recording, in which a head 4', an ink sheet (ink ribbon) 6, and a recording paper (transferred material) 9 are stacked to form electrodes f, 2'.
When a signal voltage is applied to the ink ribbon 6, a current flows through the ink ribbon 6 (from the recording electrode r to the return electrode τ) as shown by the arrow, generating Joule heat, and the ink in the part where the current flows is It melts and adheres to the paper 9. The adhered ink has the same length as the electrode length, and a so-called no-no-shaped no-no-turn can be printed on the paper. FIG. 2 shows that the electrode is perpendicular to the direction perpendicular to the conveying direction of the paper 11, which is indicated by a square arrow. The head 1 has a recording electrode 1' connected to a signal power source (not shown) and a return electrode τ fixed with an insulating resin 3', and an ink ribbon (ink sheet) 6 has a pace/fj 7.
An ink layer 8 is provided thereon.

By the way, in the conventional recording head 1, as shown in FIG. 1, in order to improve the contact between the electrodes r, τ and the ink ribbon 6, the electrodes &r, 2' are coated with an insulating resin 3 at the tip thereof. It is normal for the shape to be prominent in relation to ′. However, when pressure is applied to this recording head 4', although pressure is certainly applied directly below the electrodes, the pressure between the electrodes (recording electrode r) and the electrodes (return electrode 2') is smaller than that directly below these electrodes. The pressure applied is weak. For this reason, even if it is possible to print in the shape of a nozzle, the density will not be uniform and the image will have shading. That is, in an image printed in a nozzle shape, the edges of the edges are dark and the insides of the edges are thin. Further, while printing is performed many times, contact between the protruding electrodes r and 2' and the ink ribbon 6 may deteriorate due to friction between the ink ribbon and the recording head, making it impossible to print.

On the other hand, in the recording head 4 according to the present invention, as shown in FIGS. 3 to 6, the recording electrode 1 and the return electrode are arranged around the insulating thin piece 3 toward the tip or near the tip. The cross-sectional area of 2 becomes small or remains constant.

The insulating thin pieces 3 include (b) insulating resins that are difficult to peel off due to friction with the ink ribbon 6, such as (1) resin, Teflon, etc., and (b) magnesium oxide, ceramics, etc., which become powdery due to friction with the ink ribbon 6. The thickness of the insulating thin piece 3 from which the material to be scraped is adopted is sopm~1.
It is a+li degrees. Note that when the insulating thin piece 3 made of the material (a) is used, the most protruding part of the recording head 4 (after all, the tip of the insulating thin piece 3) should be curved (bow-shaped). It is desirable that a recording surface is formed.

Both the recording electrode 1 and the return electrode 2 are made of a metal lump or piece of copper, bronze, phosphor bronze, or the like.

The electrodes 1.2 are kept at a constant distance by a plate-like insulating foil 3. The metal block or metal piece generally has a shape that tapers toward the recording surface (the tip of the head 4). Both electrodes 1.2 have a thickness of 50 to 200 mm at the tip.
PM: 6 degrees, width: approximately 5 to 30 mm.

As shown in FIG. 7, these electrodes 1 and 2 and the insulating thin piece 3 extend an appropriate length in the direction perpendicular to the plane of the paper (the surface of the transferred object), but the recording surface of the head 4 Recording paper 9
Alternatively, when viewed from a position perpendicular to the conveying direction of the ink ribbon 6, it is flat or has an appropriate curvature as described above. Note that the electrode 1.2 is provided with a terminal (not shown) for connection to an external power source (signal power source 5).

To make such a recording head 4, prepare a metal piece or metal lump that will become the electrode 1.2, make the mating surface with the insulating thin piece 3 sufficiently smooth, and then insulate the electrode 1 (or electrode 2). Adhere to the flexible thin piece 3 with adhesive, screws, or other method,
Furthermore, electrode 2 (or electrode 1) may be bonded to this, and finally it may be polished to have a cross-sectional shape as shown in FIGS. 3 to 6. Is there any engineering in the adhesive? Commercially available electrically insulating materials such as resin can be used.

FIG. 8 shows how the recording head 4 is used to record the cross-code. In this figure, 10 is a platen roller, 11 is ink that has been transferred to the paper, and 12 is ink that has not been transferred and remains on the base layer 7.

By using the recording head 4 having the above-mentioned specific shape of the present invention, it is possible to obtain a high-quality image.As shown by diagonal lines in FIG. 9, the electric field tends to concentrate at both ends of the electrodes 1.2. Since the current density increases, the image may become thicker or abnormal discharge may occur at that point, causing damage to the recording head.

In order to prevent such inconvenience from occurring, it is desirable to provide a hole at each end of the electrode 1.2 so that the electric field changes gradually at both ends (FIG. 1O). Alternatively, as shown in FIG.
．． It is also effective to provide a receding angle I to the leading edge surface of the image (i.e., the surfaces at both ends located perpendicularly to the direction of movement of the transferred object) formed by the insulating thin piece 2 and the insulating thin piece 3.

As described above, the recording head 4 of the present invention has a flat or curved tip. However, the electrode 1.2 may protrude somewhat from the surface of the insulating thin piece 3, but since the tip of the electrode is extremely thin, even if it does protrude, it must be at most several tens of pm (No. Figure) 0 To arrange the /S code symbol using such a recording head 4, as before, the ink layer 8 of the ink sheet is brought into close contact with the recording paper (transferred material) 91m, and the recording Electricity may be applied while the head 4 is brought into contact with the surface of the ink sheet at a constant pressure. The width of the signal to be recorded is controlled by changing the energization time and the like. The ink sheet (ink ribbon) 6 and the recording paper 9 are normally conveyed at a constant speed while being in close contact with each other, but the speed does not necessarily have to be constant, and the ink sheet (ink ribbon) 6 and the recording paper 9 may be conveyed intermittently in steps.

The ink sheet (ink ribbon) 6 used here is a film-like base layer in which carbon black is mixed in resin and conductive treatment is performed, and an ink layer mainly composed of wax, resin, and carbon black is coated with a thickness of 3 to 10 μm. It was coated on.

This ink sheet for electrical transfer recording has a higher softening temperature than the ink sheet used for thermal transfer recording, and is therefore thermally stable.

The Nono-code symbol thus obtained has a uniform density without edge effects.

Effects According to recording using the head of the present invention, the ink sheet is smoothly conveyed, and high-quality images can be obtained even during long-time recording. This effect is thought to be due to the fact that the tip of the head is flat or curved, so no unnecessary load is placed on the head, and the head is in contact with the ink sheet over a wide area, so it is less prone to wear. In particular, insulating flake 3
If the recording head 4 is made of a material that will turn into powder due to friction with the ink ribbon 6, the insulating thin piece 3 will also be worn cleanly at the same time as the itt pole 1.2 of the recording head 4 is worn out during printing, so the overall This has the effect of preserving the initial state.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Fig. 1 is a diagram for explaining that printing is done by electrical transfer recording, Fig. 2 is a diagram showing that the electrode is in the shape of a nozzle, Figs. 3, 4, 5, and FIG. 6 is a sectional view of the recording head according to the present invention, FIG. 7 is a perspective view showing the positional relationship between the recording head of the present invention and an ink ribbon, and FIG. FIG. 9 is a diagram to explain that the electric field tends to concentrate at both ends of the electrode. FIG. 10 is a diagram showing a state where R is formed at both ends of the electrode. FIG. 11 is a view of the head of the present invention in a state where sweepback angles are provided on both sides of the tip. 1... Recording electrode 2... Return electrode 3... Insulating thin piece

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. Consists of a laminate in which a thin piece of electrically insulating material (3) is sandwiched between two metal pieces or bulk electrodes (1) and (2), and the thin piece of electrically insulating material (3) is sandwiched between two metal pieces or bulk electrodes (1) and (2). ), and the cross-sectional area becomes smaller or constant around
1. An electrical transfer recording head, characterized in that the heads form the same or substantially the same surface or bowl-shaped cross section.