JPS62242541A - Ink jet printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To prevent a discharge port of a nozzle from being contaminated with a paper powder, by providing a drive means rotating a guide shaft about a shaft center eccentrically disposed on both ends of a carriage guide shaft. CONSTITUTION:A carriage 3 is slidably attached to two guide shafts 6a, 6b. On the guide shaft 6a of one side, a shaft center 6c is eccentrically disposed and a gear 7a is fixed at the home position side end portion thereof. The gear 7a is engaged with a drive gear 8a of a motor 8 through an intermediate gear 7b. In paper-feeding, due to a paper feed signal from a control circuit; the motor 8 is rotated clockwise, the gear 7a is rotated counterclockwise through the intermediate gear 7b, and the lengthside periphery of the guide shaft 6a is disposed reverse to the platen 11, thus the carriage 3 is so lowered as to incline to the platen side thereof, and a nozzle 1a faces a paper presser 12. If a paper is fed in this condition, a paper cannot come close to or into contact with the possibility that adhesion of paper powder on the nozzle side causes clogging.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to an inkjet printer, and more particularly to an inkjet printer in which an ink failure recovery mechanism of a carriage equipped with an inkjet head is improved.

[Prior Art] An inkjet printer performs dot recording by ejecting and flying ink droplets, and has many advantages as follows.

1) Since it is a non-impact type, no noise is generated during recording.

2) It is possible to record paper passing.

3) Relatively high-speed printing is possible.

4) Colorization is easy.

5) Even if the other side is a curved surface, it can be recorded freely.

Although inkjet printers have many advantages as described above, they also have major weaknesses, the biggest of which is the ink non-ejection phenomenon.

This is inevitable because a liquid such as ink is used as a recording means, and mainly occurs due to clogging of the ink that ejects ink droplets.

There are various possible causes of this clogging, such as drying of ink, adhesion of dust, and air being sucked in from the nozzle.

Therefore, in normal inkjet printers, an ink non-discharge recovery mechanism is provided at the home position, and by operating this ink non-discharge recovery mechanism, non-discharge phenomena caused by various causes are canceled.

Particularly recently, folded fan-hold paper or roll paper with perforations are often used as recording paper, and in such cases, paper dust generated when cutting the recording paper from the perforation nozzle is If the ink droplets adhere to the surface of the ink, the direction in which the ink droplets are ejected may change or ejection may become impossible.

In addition, especially when feeding fan-hold paper, etc., the perforations inevitably form ridges, and these ridges approach or come into contact with the nozzle surface, causing paper powder to flow into the nozzle outlet. It often sticks.

Therefore, when feeding fan-hold paper or the like, the inkjet head is returned to the home position to prevent the peak of the perforation from approaching the nozzle.

[Problem to be solved by the invention] However, if we adopt the structure described above.

Not only is the operation extremely troublesome, but the inkjet head moves to a position where it does not face the recording paper, that is, the home position, each time fan-hold paper or roll paper with perforations is fed, resulting in a significant loss of time. It had the disadvantage of being large.

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention provides shaft centers provided at eccentric positions at both ends of a guide shaft that slidably guides a carriage on which an inkjet head is mounted. The structure includes a drive means that rotates the guide shaft around the center.

[Function] By adopting the above-mentioned structure, the carriage can be moved toward or away from the platen simply by rotating the guide shaft, no matter where the carriage is located. You can perform paper forwarding (fast forwarding) without returning to .

[Example] The present invention will be described in detail below based on an example shown in one drawing.

Figure 1 and the following diagrams explain one embodiment of the present invention.
The figure shows the entire main part.

In Fig. 1, the symbol l indicates an inkjet head, which in this embodiment is composed of four heads that eject black, yellow, magenta, and cyan ink from the left in the figure. A total of seven colors can be recorded by combining inks. The recording command is sent via the flexible cable 4.

The inkjet Herad l is mounted on the carriage 3, and the sub ink tank 2 is also mounted on the carriage.
Ink is supplied from Ink is supplied to the sub-ink tank 2 from a main tank (not shown) via a flexible tube 5.

The carriage 3 is slidably attached to two guide shafts 6a and 6b.

As shown in FIG. 3, an eccentric axis 6C is provided at the end of one guide shaft 6a on the home position side.
A gear 7a is fixed to this shaft center 6C, and this gear 7a is connected to a drive gear 8 of the motor 8 via an intermediate gear 7b.
It meshes with a.

Carriage 3 is an endless timing belt! 3, and is moved by running the timing belt 13, and an ink non-discharge recovery mechanism 9 is provided at its home position.

The ejection failure recovery mechanism 9 is provided with a cap 10 that seals each nozzle portion of the inkjet head. can be sealed.

Reference numeral 11 indicates a platen, and 12 a paper presser.

Next, the operation of this embodiment configured as above will be explained.

During normal recording, as shown in FIGS. 2(A) and 3(A), the peripheral surface side (longer diameter side) is perpendicular to the guide shaft 6a that is farthest from the axis 6C. carriage 3
approaches the platen IT and maintains an appropriate recording distance.

In this state, the carriage reciprocates along the platen 11 while recording dots on a recording paper (not shown).

On the other hand, during paper feeding, the motor 8 is rotated clockwise by a paper feeding (fast-forward) signal from a control circuit (not shown), and the gear 7a is rotated counterclockwise via the intermediate gear 7b.

Then, as shown in FIG. 3(B), the long axis direction of the guide shaft 6a is in the opposite direction to the platen 11, so the platen side of the carriage 3 is lowered, and the nozzle la is attached to the paper presser 1.
It will face in two directions.

If the paper is fed (fast-forwarded) in this state, the perforations will not approach or come into contact with the nozzle 1a, and paper powder will not adhere to the nozzle side and cause clogging.

When the paper feed (fast feed) is finished, the motor 8 is rotated in the opposite direction and the normal recording state is returned.

On the other hand, when the carriage 3 reaches the home position, this is detected by a sensor (not shown), and the cap 1
0 seals the nozzle portion by a drive device (not shown) and performs operations such as preventing ink from drying or recovering from non-discharging.

[Effects] As is clear from the above explanation, according to the present invention, no matter what position the carriage is in when paper is being rapidly fed, simply by rotating the guide shaft, the nozzle portion of the inkjet head can be moved to a position where it does not face the platen. Since the nozzle part is moved away from the perforation, there is no problem of paper dust causing ejection failure.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figures 1 to 3 illustrate one embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the main part, and FIG. 2 (A). (B) is a plan view explaining the operation of the carriage, and Fig. 3 (
A) and (B) are side views illustrating the operation of the carriage. 1... Inkjet head 3... Carriage 6a, 6b... Guide shaft 8
...Motor 9...Non-discharge recovery mechanism 11.
・Platen

Claims (1)

[Claims] An inkjet printer that has a carriage on which an inkjet head is mounted and a guide shaft that guides the carriage, and a drive means that rotates the guide shaft about an axis provided at eccentric positions at both ends of the guide shaft. An inkjet printer characterized by: