US3787881A - Apparatus and method for bar code printing - Google Patents

Apparatus and method for bar code printing Download PDF

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Publication number
US3787881A
US3787881A US00289772A US3787881DA US3787881A US 3787881 A US3787881 A US 3787881A US 00289772 A US00289772 A US 00289772A US 3787881D A US3787881D A US 3787881DA US 3787881 A US3787881 A US 3787881A
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Prior art keywords
drops
charging
streams
bars
jets
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US00289772A
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English (en)
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P Duffield
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Eastman Kodak Co
Mead Corp
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Mead Corp
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Assigned to EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY A NJ CORP. reassignment EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY A NJ CORP. ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST. Assignors: MEAD CORPORATION THE A CORP. OF OH
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    • G—PHYSICS
    • G06—COMPUTING OR CALCULATING; COUNTING
    • G06K—GRAPHICAL DATA READING; PRESENTATION OF DATA; RECORD CARRIERS; HANDLING RECORD CARRIERS
    • G06K1/00—Methods or arrangements for marking the record carrier in digital fashion
    • G06K1/12—Methods or arrangements for marking the record carrier in digital fashion otherwise than by punching
    • G06K1/121—Methods or arrangements for marking the record carrier in digital fashion otherwise than by punching by printing code marks

Definitions

  • ABSTRACT There is disclosed an apparatus and method for con- [22] Filed: Sept. 18, 1972 21 A L N trolling a row of ink jet streams to produce printed 1 PP 0 289,772 bars. Ink drops generated by a first group of streams are periodically gang charged and caught under the [52] U.S. CI. 346/75 control of an input clock signal. Those of the drops in! CI ld 15/18 which are uncharged deposit upon a moving print re- [58] Field of 3 6/75, 1 DCving medium to print a series of regularly spaced bars.
  • references Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS are gang switched and caught under the joint control of the clock signal and a binary code signal. This latter group of streams prints extensions on selected ones of the bars printed by the first group of streams.
  • This invention provides apparatus and method for improved non-contact bar code printing at higher speeds than have previously been possible. This has been accomplished by producing a row of fluid jet streams, stimulating the streams to produce a curtain of uniformly sized and regularly spaced drops, and digitally switching selected drop groups in accordance with the changing state of a binary input control signal. Digital switching of drop groups is achieved by gang charging of simultaneously generated groups of drops, deflecting the drops in correspondence to their charges, and thereafter selectively catching drop groups in correspondence with the deflection thereof.
  • the fluid streams are produced by supplying a printing liquid under pressure to an orifice plate having a row of regularly spaced orifices therein.
  • the printing fluid passes through these orifices and exits therefrom as a row of regularly spaced fluid filaments which in turn are stimulated as above mentioned to break up into a curtain of uniformly sized and regularly spaced drops.
  • Ganged charging of simultaneously generated drop groups is accomplished by applying a charge control signal to one or more elongated electrodes situated near the point where the fluid filaments break up into drops. For printing a bar/half-bar code there are provided two such electrodes of equal length.
  • a clocking signal and a binarily coded information signal jointly control the charging action of these electrodes to enable selective deflection by an electrostatic deflection field and selective catching by a common catcher.
  • Overlap of the printed dots in the two principal coordinate directions is achieved by appropriate adjustment of the fluid supply pressure, the drop stimulation frequency and the speed of movement of the print receiv' ing medium.
  • FIG. 1 is a diagrammatic cross sectional view of apparatus made in accordance with this invention.
  • FIG. 2 is a pictorial representation of the charging, catching and drop deposition action of a bar/half-bar printer
  • FIG. 3 is an enlarged representation of a long printed bar
  • FIG. 4 is a pictorial representation of an assembly for a complete print head.
  • FIG. 5 is a partially cut away view of an assembled print head as seen from underneath.
  • a bar code printer In a bar code printer according to the practice of this invention there is generated a row of ink jets which are broken up into trains of uniformly sized and regularly spaced drops by apparatus as shown for instance in Beam et al U.S. Pat. No. 3,577,198. During drop formation most of the drops are charged for deflection and catching by a common catcher. However, selected groups of drops are permitted to remain uncharged. These drops avoid catching, and impact upon a print receiving member. Drop generation is adjusted such that there is overlapping of dots printed by simultaneously impacting drops from adjacent trains, and the print receiving member is moved at a speed such that there is overlapping of dots printed by successively impacting drops from the same train.
  • FIG. 1 there is provided an arrangement as shown in schematic cross section in FIG. 1 wherein a reservoir of ink 10 is maintained under pressure within a manifold 11. There is provided an orifice plate 12 having a series of orifices 13 through which the ink flows to form a series of filaments 14. A stimulator 15 is threaded into manifold l 1 and transmits regular frequency vibrations to the ink therein. This causes the filaments 14 to break up into trains of drops 16 for catching or deposition as shown in FIG. 2.
  • each charging electrode 30 cooperates with an opposing charging area on the other charge strip.
  • Electrode 19 is a non conductive probe with a conductive area 20 coated thereon. The drops which are so charged impact the face of catcher 21 and run downwardly for injestion into an open slot directly above blade 23.
  • Operation of the apparatus as a bar code printer is accomplished by gang charging and catching of the drops as shown in FIG. 2.
  • the apparatus is operative to print either long bars 24 or short bars 25 on a print receiving medium 26.
  • there are drop streams. Five of these streams are reserved for printing only the extended portions of the long bars 24.
  • the other five streams print short bars and the non extended portions of long bars 24.
  • These latter five streams are switched on and off at a regular frequency under the control of a clocking signal.
  • the drops 16b which are deposited by these five streams create bar strokes at a frequency equal to the clocking frequency. The spacing between these bar strokes depends upon the clocking frequency and the speed of movement of receiving member 26.
  • Print receiving medium 26 which may be a piece of mail, a continuous web of paper, or other recording medium moves in the directionof the arrow to create the regularly spaced bar strokes sequence illustrated in FIG. 2.
  • This regularly spaced stroke pattern may be used to generate a clocking signal for an optical reader which will scan the bar code at some later time.
  • Drops 16a which print the extended portions of long bars 24, are switched under the joint control of the above-mentioned clocking input signal and a binary code signal.
  • a pair of input terminals 32 and 33 an AND gate 34, and a pair of inverting amplifiers 35 and '36.
  • Input terminal 33 provides clock pulses directly to inverting amplifier 36 which provides charging signals to one of electrodes for charging of drops 16b.
  • Amplifier 36 must invert the clock pulses because printing or drop deposition is accomplished by generation of uncharged drops.
  • the electrode 30 which controls the charging of drops 16a is driven by the output of inverting amplifier 35.
  • Inverting amplifier in turn is connected to AND gate 34 which has inputs from both of terminals 32 and 33.
  • a binary code signal comprising a series of short pulses is applied to the terminal 32.
  • the code generating apparatus which creates the binary code will ordinarily generate code pulses only during clock pulse periods. Thus the presence of a code pulse during a clock period may correspond to a binary one while the absence of a code pulse during a clock period corresponds to a binary zero. This being the case, AND gate 34 may be functionally unnecessary, but it is shown for completeness of illustration.
  • each printed short bar 25 corresponds to the occurence of clocked zero at input terminal 32
  • each long bar 24 corresponds to the occurence of a clocked one at input terminal 32.
  • a bar code of the type commonly known as a bar/half-bar code is printed.
  • a single charging electrode 30 could print a code comprising a series of bars of equal length and variable thickness.
  • the two electrodes 30 could be of non equal length so that short bars 25 could be more or less than half the length of long bars 24.
  • additional drop streams and additional electrodes 30 could be employed to produce segmented bars for higher level codes.
  • FIG. 3 there is illustrated in enlarged form a typical printed bar such as one of the long bars 24.
  • the bar as illustrated in FIG. 3 comprises thirty printed dots; each dot being the roughly circular mark made upon print receiving medium 26 by impact of one of drops 16. These dots as shown are formatted into an overlapping 10 X 3 matrix.
  • the three-dot-width feature is produced by adjusting the drop stimulation frequency such that each filament 14 generates three drops 16 during the time period of one clock pulse.
  • Mutual overlapping of the three dot columns is achieved by adjusting the movement speed of print receiving medium 26.
  • the dot diameter may be about 12 mils and the drop stimulation frequency may be about 50 kiloHertz.
  • the speed of print receiving medium 26 will be about 335 inches per second. Slower speeds will produce greater overlap and faster speeds will produce printing voids within the bar.
  • the bar illustrated in FIG. 3 also has printed dot overlap in the direction of the bar axis.
  • five overlapping dots 27a define the length of a short bar
  • these five dots in combination with five overlapping dots 27b define the length of the long bar.
  • all of dots 27a and 27b are printed simultaneously or nearly so.
  • Overlapping dots 28a and overlapping dots 29a also define the length of a short bar and overlapping dots 28b and 29b cooperate therewith for also defining the long bar length.
  • the relationship between a short bar and a long bar is emphasized in FIG. 3 by shading of the short bar defining dots 27a, 28a and 29a.
  • dots 27a and 27b Illustrated in phantom lines within dots 27a and 27b are a series of small circular areas 37 which correspond in spacing and area to orifices 13. Areas 37 also correspond in spacing and area to the cross sectional area and spacing of filaments 14. For the scale of FIG. 3, areas 37 represent circles of about l.8 mil diameter with a center to center spacing of 10 mils. Thus it will be observed that the printed dot made by each depositing drop 16 is considerably larger than the orifice from whence the drop came. This is an operational requirement which necessarily results from the use of an orifice plate 12 having a single row of spaced orifices 13.
  • adjustments to achieve printed dot overlap in the bar axis direction may be effected by adjusting the drop stimulation frequency and/or the pressure applied to the ink 10in manifold 11. More particularly, the dot diameter increases either with a decreasing stimulation frequency or an increasing ink supply pressure.
  • the appropriate fluid pressure and stimulation frequency are most conveniently established by a simple trial and error procedure.
  • the stimulation frequency should be somewhere near the natural drop formation frequency which is well known to have a wave length of about 4.5 times the crosssectional diameter of the fluid filament. For efficient stimulation it is desirable not to deviate any very large amount from this frequency.
  • the diameter of a printed dot is very nearly an exponential function of the momentum of the dot producing drop.
  • the dot diameter in mils was very nearly equal to l 1.8 times an exponential factor found by raising the drop momentum to the 0.47 power.
  • the drop momentum is expressed in micro dyne-sec.
  • the first step is to apply classical techniques for computing the mass flow rate through an orifice.
  • this step reference may be made for instance to Hydrodynamics by I-l. Lamb, Dover Publications, 1945. Knowing the mass flow rate, the stream diameter, and the stimulation frequency, it becomes a simple matter to determine the drop mass and velocity. See for instance R. G. Sweets report entitled High-Frequency Oscillography with Electrostatically Deflected Ink Jets, Standored Electronics Lab SEL-64-004. The drop mass and velocity determine the drop momentum which may be related to printed dot diameter as above discussed.
  • FIGS. 4 and 5 More particular construction details of the apparatus of FIG. 1 are illustrated in FIGS. 4 and 5.
  • an ink inlet tube 38 and a vacuum outlet tube 39 are provided with access to the interior of manifold 11.
  • a pair of mounting bars 40 are fastened to a manifold 11 for mounting the print head on a holding fixture (not shown).
  • a support plate 42 secures orifice plate 12 in position between manifold 11 and a gasket 41.
  • Charge strips 17 are mounted in a deep recess in the underside of support plate 42 as shown in FIG. 5.
  • a pair of brackets 44 are seated in a pair of shallow recesses in the underside of support plate 42 for securing charge strips 17 in place.
  • Catcher 21 and deflection electrode assembly 19 also fit into a shallow recess on the underside of support plate 42. Deflection electrode assembly'19 and catcher 21 are held in place by a pair of brackets 43.
  • printing of bar codes is accomplished by catching groups of charged drops forming a portion of a falling drop curtain and permitting uncharged drops to strike a print receiving medium.
  • the invention could also be practiced by catching the uncharged drops and printing with groups of charged drops. The choice is merely a matter of catcher placement.
  • the our tain of falling drops could be coded into drop groups of two discrete non-zero charge levels. In an arrangement of this type the drop charge coding would produce trajectory coding by deflecting the groups of drops by different amounts. Printing again would be effected by catching one drop group and permitting the other drop group to impact on the print receiving medium.
  • Bar code printing apparatus comprising:
  • an orifice plate provided with a series of uniformly sized orifices regularly spaced along a straight line
  • a common extended charging electrode responsive to a binary charging signal for charging to a common level those drops in at least two adjacent streams which are generated during one state of said binary charging signal
  • Apparatus according to claim 1 further comprising a second common extended charging electrode responsive to a second binary charging signal for charging to a common level those drops in at least two other adjacent streams which are generated during one state of said second binary charging signal, said electrostatic deflection field generating means, said transporting means, and said catching means acting as aforesaid on the drops in said at least two other adjacent streams whereby a second series of bars is printed corresponding to said second charging signal.
  • Apparatus according to claim 2 the first aforesaid electrode commonly charging drops within all of said streams propagating from jets situated on one side of an interior point within said straight line and said second common charging electrode commonly charging drops within all of said streams propagating from jets situated on the other side of said interior point whereby said series of bars and said second series of bars are printed in side-by-side relationship.
  • said catching means being arranged for catching of drop groups having a deflected trajectory characterization whereby said pair of bar codes are printed by uncharged and undeflected drops.
  • Bar code printing apparatus comprising:
  • a common extended first charging electrode responsive to a first charging signal for charging to a common level all of said drops generated during the period of said first charging signal and propagating from jets situated on one side of an interior point within said line,
  • a common extended second charging electrode responsive to a second charging signal for charging to a common level all of said drops generated during the period of said second charging signal and propagating from jets situated on the other side of said interior point within said line
  • a bar code printing system comprising means for generating first and second binary information signals and means for printing a bar code corresponding therewith, the improvement wherein said printing means comprises: r
  • said electrodes both comprising flat strips of conductive material.
  • said electrode comprising a flat strip of conductive material.
  • Apparatus according to claim 13 said drops having sufficient mass and velocity for printing dots with sideby-side overlap.

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  • Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
  • General Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
  • Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
  • Theoretical Computer Science (AREA)
  • Particle Formation And Scattering Control In Inkjet Printers (AREA)
  • Ink Jet (AREA)
  • Combination Of More Than One Step In Electrophotography (AREA)
  • Facsimile Heads (AREA)
US00289772A 1972-09-18 1972-09-18 Apparatus and method for bar code printing Expired - Lifetime US3787881A (en)

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US28977272A 1972-09-18 1972-09-18

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JP (1) JPS555428B2 (OSRAM)
CA (1) CA974570A (OSRAM)
GB (1) GB1429978A (OSRAM)
IT (1) IT992327B (OSRAM)

Cited By (15)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3947851A (en) * 1974-06-27 1976-03-30 International Business Machines Corporation Drop charging method for liquid drop recording
US4250510A (en) * 1979-09-04 1981-02-10 The Mead Corporation Fluid jet device
US4324117A (en) * 1980-06-11 1982-04-13 The Mead Corporation Jet device for application of liquid dye to a fabric web
EP0102428A1 (en) * 1982-09-02 1984-03-14 Polaroid Corporation Method and system for testing and sorting batteries
EP0105061A1 (en) * 1982-09-30 1984-04-11 The Post Office Luminescent address bar codes
US4503437A (en) * 1981-10-26 1985-03-05 Siemens Aktiengesellschaft Ink jet color-coding method for leads
US4550323A (en) * 1982-06-30 1985-10-29 Burlington Industries, Inc. Elongated fluid jet printing apparatus
EP0214720A1 (en) * 1985-07-01 1987-03-18 Burlington Industries, Inc. Method and assembly for mounting fluid-jet orifice plate
US4714934A (en) * 1985-11-26 1987-12-22 Exxon Research & Engineering Company Apparatus for printing with ink jet chambers utilizing a plurality of orifices
US4797687A (en) * 1985-05-01 1989-01-10 Burlington Industries, Inc. Patterning effects with fluid jet applicator
US4901093A (en) * 1985-11-26 1990-02-13 Dataproducts Corporation Method and apparatus for printing with ink jet chambers utilizing a plurality of orifices
US6042279A (en) * 1998-01-22 2000-03-28 Intermec Ip Corporation Method and apparatus for printing with real-time print quality correction, such as in one or two dimensional bar code printing
US20030048460A1 (en) * 2001-09-07 2003-03-13 Lluis Vinals-Matas Optimized ink jet printing of barcodes
US20060092230A1 (en) * 2004-10-04 2006-05-04 Steiner Thomas W Non-conductive fluid droplet forming apparatus and method
US20060158683A1 (en) * 2004-12-10 2006-07-20 Peter Gustafsson Method for automatic adjustment of media settings for a printer

Families Citing this family (3)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US4188635A (en) * 1977-10-03 1980-02-12 International Business Machines Corporation Ink jet printing head
JPS5959277A (ja) * 1982-09-28 1984-04-05 住友ゴム工業株式会社 黒色又はそれに近い色のゴム製品の識別バー形成方法
DE3687449T2 (de) * 1985-11-26 1993-05-06 Dataproducts Corp Tintenstrahlgeraet.

Citations (3)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3560641A (en) * 1968-10-18 1971-02-02 Mead Corp Image construction system using multiple arrays of drop generators
US3577198A (en) * 1969-11-24 1971-05-04 Mead Corp Charged drop generator with guard system
US3596276A (en) * 1969-02-10 1971-07-27 Recognition Equipment Inc Ink jet printer with droplet phase control means

Patent Citations (3)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3560641A (en) * 1968-10-18 1971-02-02 Mead Corp Image construction system using multiple arrays of drop generators
US3596276A (en) * 1969-02-10 1971-07-27 Recognition Equipment Inc Ink jet printer with droplet phase control means
US3577198A (en) * 1969-11-24 1971-05-04 Mead Corp Charged drop generator with guard system

Non-Patent Citations (1)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Title
Gamblin et al; Electrostatic Ink Deflection Bar Code Printer; IBM Tech. Disc. Bulletin; Vol. 11, No. 12, May 1969; pp. 1736 1737 *

Cited By (19)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3947851A (en) * 1974-06-27 1976-03-30 International Business Machines Corporation Drop charging method for liquid drop recording
US4250510A (en) * 1979-09-04 1981-02-10 The Mead Corporation Fluid jet device
US4324117A (en) * 1980-06-11 1982-04-13 The Mead Corporation Jet device for application of liquid dye to a fabric web
US4503437A (en) * 1981-10-26 1985-03-05 Siemens Aktiengesellschaft Ink jet color-coding method for leads
US4550323A (en) * 1982-06-30 1985-10-29 Burlington Industries, Inc. Elongated fluid jet printing apparatus
EP0102428A1 (en) * 1982-09-02 1984-03-14 Polaroid Corporation Method and system for testing and sorting batteries
EP0105061A1 (en) * 1982-09-30 1984-04-11 The Post Office Luminescent address bar codes
US4797687A (en) * 1985-05-01 1989-01-10 Burlington Industries, Inc. Patterning effects with fluid jet applicator
EP0214720A1 (en) * 1985-07-01 1987-03-18 Burlington Industries, Inc. Method and assembly for mounting fluid-jet orifice plate
US4714934A (en) * 1985-11-26 1987-12-22 Exxon Research & Engineering Company Apparatus for printing with ink jet chambers utilizing a plurality of orifices
US4901093A (en) * 1985-11-26 1990-02-13 Dataproducts Corporation Method and apparatus for printing with ink jet chambers utilizing a plurality of orifices
US6042279A (en) * 1998-01-22 2000-03-28 Intermec Ip Corporation Method and apparatus for printing with real-time print quality correction, such as in one or two dimensional bar code printing
US20030048460A1 (en) * 2001-09-07 2003-03-13 Lluis Vinals-Matas Optimized ink jet printing of barcodes
US7311395B2 (en) * 2001-09-07 2007-12-25 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. Optimized ink jet printing of barcodes
US20060092230A1 (en) * 2004-10-04 2006-05-04 Steiner Thomas W Non-conductive fluid droplet forming apparatus and method
US7658478B2 (en) * 2004-10-04 2010-02-09 Kodak Graphic Communications Canada Company Non-conductive fluid droplet forming apparatus and method
US7992975B2 (en) * 2004-10-04 2011-08-09 Kodak Graphic Communications Canada Company Non-conductive fluid droplet forming apparatus and method
US20060158683A1 (en) * 2004-12-10 2006-07-20 Peter Gustafsson Method for automatic adjustment of media settings for a printer
US7324125B2 (en) 2004-12-10 2008-01-29 Intermec Ip Corp. Method for automatic adjustment of media settings for a printer

Also Published As

Publication number Publication date
DE2344180B2 (de) 1977-03-10
DE2344180A1 (de) 1974-04-18
JPS4970513A (OSRAM) 1974-07-08
CA974570A (en) 1975-09-16
IT992327B (it) 1975-09-10
GB1429978A (en) 1976-03-31
JPS555428B2 (OSRAM) 1980-02-06

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