Continuous inkjet printer

Details Continuous inkjet printer Continuous inkjet printer

1999-08-16

2001-05-22

Yockey, David F. (Department: 2861)

Incremental printing of symbolic information

Ink jet

Ejector mechanism

C347S094000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06234614

ABSTRACT:

FIELD THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to continuous inkjet (CIJ) printers and, more particularly, to CIJ printers of the multi-nozzle type.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Multi-nozzle continuous inkjet printers have been developed in order to provide high quality, high speed printing. A row of inkjet nozzles at very close spacings are provided and individual streams of ink issue from each of the nozzles continuously in use, being broken up into individual droplets automatically. The individual droplets are charged appropriately to cause them to be printed or else deflected into a gutter. Printers of this type are described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,613,871 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,427,986. The printers described in these specifications are of the type generally known as binary continuous multi-jet.
The drop generator of such a printer has one or more ultrasonic transducers, usually piezoelectric transducers, which cause the streams of ink issuing from the nozzles to be broken up into droplets at a certain position below the nozzle. In order to avoid unnecessary movement of other components and avoid wasteful downtime in frequent re- adjustment of the positions of the components relative to one another, the vibrations caused by the operation of the ultrasonic transducers and transmitted into the rest of the printhead need to be reduced as much as possible. Additionally, if the drop generator is to work in accordance with its design parameters then it needs to be mounted in a manner such that is not distorted by stresses imposed by the mounting.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
According to the present invention therefore a CIJ printer has a drop generator and a mount therefor, the mounting of the drop generator on the mount being achieved by means of a pair of fixing screws located in screw-threaded bores in the drop generator and disposed in resilient bushes located in corresponding bores in the mount, and two pairs of point contacts protruding between the mount and the drop generator, each pair being in alignment with the centre of a respective one of the fixing screws and on a line perpendicular to a line connecting the centres of the fixing screws.
By this means, the transfer of ultrasonic vibrations is reduced significantly and mounting stresses imposed on the drop generator are likewise reduced to a minimum.
The invention also includes a printer having such a printhead.
One example of a printhead incorporating the present invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:


REFERENCES:
patent: 4800398 (1989-01-01), Naruse et al.
patent: 4985715 (1991-01-01), Cyphert et al.
patent: 5757404 (1998-05-01), Witteveen et al.
patent: 62-294554 (1987-12-01), None

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