Incremental printing of symbolic information – Ink jet – Ejector mechanism
Reexamination Certificate
1999-02-18
2001-09-18
Nguyen, Thinh (Department: 2861)
Incremental printing of symbolic information
Ink jet
Ejector mechanism
C347S049000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06290332
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to the field printing. In particular, an improved reciprocating carriage apparatus for reliably and accurately retaining disposable ink jet cartridges, or pens, so that all the ink emitting nozzles of said pens can be registered in an ink jet print engine relative to one another and wherein the entire carriage can be articulated vertically to accommodate a variety of ink jet printing media of varying thickness while consistently maintaining an optimum spacing between the nozzles and the ink receiving surface of said printing media.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention addresses the issues related to consistently and accurately retaining a plurality of disposable ink jet pens in a pen receiving socket of a multi-head reciprocating carriage assembly. Many approaches of securing disposable ink jet pens have been tested and tried over the years and the driving concern has often been ease of use by the end user or operator of the print engine. Thus, while convenience in operation is required for consumer acceptance, as more and more ink jet pens have been added to ink jet print engines the difficulty in assembling the carriage and its associated pen retaining features have increased while at the same time the overall complexity of the pen retaining sockets and the carriage assembly itself have greatly increased.
In addition, an ever increasing variety of specialized ink jet printing substrates have been developed for a number of new niche markets, for example such as the so-called ‘fine art’ market characterized by relatively thick and non-compliant media. These new types of media often require specialized ink jet ink formulations for durability, light-fastness, and color fidelity all of which are improved when a common, optimum spacing between the ink emitting nozzles and the ink receiving surface of the media is maintained during printing operations. Accordingly, a need exists for ink print engines that can readily adapt to media of differing thickness as well as those print engines that have simple procedures for removing and accurately replacing ink jet pens with other ink jet pens containing, for example, new specialized formulations of ink jet ink. A need exists in the prior art to thus simplify the operation of changing ink jet pens, not only when faulty or expired, but also for convenience and so that the operator can utilize the vast variety of new ink formulations available now and in the future as well as rapidly re-set the spacing between the ink emitting nozzles and the printing substrate. Finally a need exists in the art to simplify assembly of the pen retaining sockets of the carriage assembly, and to reduce the number of parts and complexity of assembling a carriage assembly having a vertical adjustment relative to the printing substrate.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The apparatus of the present invention increases the utility of ink jet printing engines by allowing the engine operator the freedom to select the types of ink to be used and the spacing between the ink emitting nozzles and the printing substrate. The preferred embodiment of the present invention comprises a reciprocating carriage assembly having twelve (12) individual ink jet pen receptacles and a manual vertical adjustment feature so that precision control of critical printing parameters is easily practiced by print engine operators in the field. The inventive pen holder, or socket, employs a solderless assembly of parts, all retained by a simple tongue-in-groove style coupling for the a biasing leaf spring, a resilient base member, and a rubber pad which cooperate to promote electrical contact between a complex flex circuit having mass terminations of electrical traces on the flex and corresponding electrical features of a high resolution pen. The flex cable is retained in a rear portion of a pen receiving socket with a few post features (one having a lip feature to ‘hang’ the flex circuit in place during assembly) and is threaded through an aperture in the rear portion of each socket to create electrical communication between a pen disposed in the socket and a printed wiring board residing on the carriage assembly. Another leaf spring is friction fit over a side wall of the socket and biases the pen to points of location that correspond to tightly controlled tolerance locations on the pen body. A vertical bias force is preferably provided by one portion of a continuous spring that preferably provides a (downward) bias to a set of pens (i.e., six pens). The carriage head height adjustment feature taught herein features dual, manually-actuated axial screws that cooperate with a constrained screw to raise and lower the entire carriage assembly. This adjustment is practiced by simply turning one or both axial screws until a desired head height (spacing above a media residing on the platen) is reached. In the preferred embodiment, a backing plate rigidly attached to a trolley apparatus which reciprocates on a grooved rail in response to a tensioned driving belt is linked to what has heretofore been known as a traditional carriage assembly. Thus, the entire carriage assembly, including circuit boards, pen holders, electronics, and on board imaging devices (if any) all move in unison when the axial shafts are rotated. In this way, no additional wear, tolerances, or interference arises when the carriage is actuated. A simple spacer tool, ground to a preselected thickness is used to confirm that an optimum head height has been reached, although other, more elaborate mechanisms could also be used (much like a spark plug gap tool).
The following figures are not drawn to scale and only detail a few representative embodiments of the present invention, more embodiments and equivalents of the representative embodiments depicted herein are easily ascertainable by persons of skill in the digital imaging arts.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5646665 (1997-07-01), Swanson et al.
patent: 5696541 (1997-12-01), Akahane et al.
patent: 5953028 (1999-09-01), Nobel et al.
patent: 6022104 (2000-02-01), Lin et al.
patent: 09029982 (1997-04-01), None
Barclay Aaron Gerald
Crystal Kevin Reed
Gonier Larry William
MacDermid Acumen, Inc.
Nguyen Thinh
Vo Anh T. N.
Woodcock Washburn Kurtz Mackiewicz & Norris LLP
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