Printing – Inkers – Fountains
Reexamination Certificate
2000-02-25
2002-09-03
Eickholt, Eugene (Department: 2854)
Printing
Inkers
Fountains
C101S367000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06443063
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ink supplying apparatus for use in a printing press such as a rotary press or a sheet-fed printing press, and more particularly to an ink supplying apparatus equipped with an ink tray attachable/detachable to an ink fountain.
2) Description of the Related Art
As
FIGS. 16 and 17
show, a printing press such as a rotary press or a sheet-fed printing press is provided with an ink supplying apparatus
100
in which an ink fountain
102
is placed in front of an ink fountain roller
101
. The ink fountain
102
is composed of a circumferential surface of the ink fountain roller
101
, a plurality of ink keys (blades)
103
constituting a bottom section of the ink fountain
102
, and two side plates
104
(only one on the interior side is shown in
FIG. 16
) provided at both side surfaces of each of the ink keys
103
so that their front edges come into contact with the circumferential surface of the ink fountain roller
101
to slide thereon. In this construction, an ink lying within the ink fountain
102
is supplied through a gap between the ink fountain roller
101
and the tip portion of each of the ink keys
103
to the ink fountain roller
101
and then transferred through a non-shown ink ductor roller to a group of ink rollers lying on the downstream side.
The plurality of ink keys
103
are, as shown in
FIG. 17
, arranged in parallel with each other in a lateral direction of the apparatus so that the ink keys
103
,
103
adjacent to each other are brought into contact with each other while both the end ink keys
103
and the side plates
104
are brought into contact with each other. In addition, the ink keys
103
are made to be driven independently of each other to rock or swing about a supporting shaft
105
, and an ink quantity control device
106
is situated under the respective ink keys
103
.
The ink quantity control device
106
is provided with an adjusting cam
106
b
engaging with a lower surface of the tip portion of each of the ink keys
103
and a pusher
106
a
brought into contact with the adjusting cam
106
b
to rock the adjusting cam
106
b
by its telescopic motion, namely, protruding/retracting movements. Additionally, the tip portion of each of the ink keys
103
is driven to rock in a manner that the pusher
106
a
is operated appropriately to protrude/retract for rocking the adjusting cam
106
b
so that its engaging portion of the adjusting cam
106
b
with the ink key
103
lifts/lowers, thereby controlling the gap between the ink key
103
and the ink fountain roller
101
to adjust the thickness of the ink film to be supplied.
Meanwhile, in the aforesaid conventional ink supplying apparatus
100
, a microscopic gap is secured between the adjacent ink keys
103
,
103
and between both the end ink keys
103
and the side plates
104
in order to permit the mutual sliding motion. Accordingly, there is a possibility that the ink permeates through the very small gap, for example, between the ink keys
103
,
103
by the capillary phenomenon or the like. If the ink is hardened after permeating through the gap between the ink keys
103
,
103
, the operation of the ink keys
103
becomes unstable and the worst case reaches the difficulty of movement thereof, so that a problem exists in that the high-accuracy control of the ink film becomes impossible.
In addition, after the completion of printing or in the ink replacement, although there is a need to clean the interior of the ink fountain
102
by wiping off the ink remaining in the interior of the ink fountain
102
with a waste or the like, or by washing it off with a cleaning solvent, the removal of the ink is difficult because the ink shows a high viscosity. Particularly, difficulty is experienced in removing the ink permeating into the gap between the ink keys
103
,
103
so that a severe burden falls on the cleaning worker. Still additionally, although, for improving the productivity, there is a need to shorten the preparation for the order change for enhancing the availability factor of the apparatus, if the load on the cleaning in the ink replacement is severe as mentioned above, the cleaning takes time largely. For this reason, it has been desired strongly to relieve the burden to be imposed on the worker through the labor-saving in the cleaning operation and further to enhance the availability factor of the apparatus through the shortening of the cleaning time.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention has been developed in consideration of the above-mentioned problems, and it is therefore an object of the invention to provide an ink supplying apparatus which is capable of achieving the labor-saving of the cleaning operation and the shortening of the working time in ink replacement or the like of a printing press.
For this purpose, an ink supplying apparatus according to this invention involves the following features.
That is, an ink supplying apparatus according to this invention is equipped with an ink fountain roller, left- and right-hand side plates brought into sliding contact with a circumferential surface of the ink fountain roller to constitute a side wall section of an ink fountain, a plurality of ink keys arranged in parallel with each other to constitute a bottom section of the ink fountain and a supporting base for supporting the side plates and the plurality of ink keys, the ink supporting apparatus is characterized by comprising an ink tray having a bottom plate placed in the interior of the ink fountain for covering upper surfaces of the ink keys and a deflection restraining structure for supporting the bottom plate from below to restrain a deflection or bending of the ink tray.
In this way, since the ink tray covering the upper surfaces of the ink keys is provided in the interior of the ink fountain, the contact area of the ink keys with the ink is reducible considerably to reduce the possibility of the permeation of the ink into the gap between the ink keys, thereby stabilizing the operations of the ink keys and shortening the cleaning time of the interior of the ink fountain to improve the productivity. In addition, at the mounting of the ink tray in the ink fountain, since the deflection restraining structure supports the bottom plate from below to limit the deflection thereof, the weight reduction of the ink tray becomes feasible to provide easy handling of the ink tray, thus further improving the productivity.
Preferably, the aforesaid deflection restraining structure is made up of a supporting member protruding downwardly from a bottom surface of the bottom plate and a through hole made from an upper surface of the ink key to a bottom surface thereof so that, when the ink tray is mounted in the ink fountain, a lower end portion of the supporting member is brought into contact with the supporting base in a state of passing through the through hole to support the bottom plate.
With this construction, the deflection restraining structure can support the bottom plate from below without interfering with the ink key.
Alternatively, the deflection restraining structure is made up of a supporting member protruding upwardly from the supporting base and a through hole made to a location of the supporting member to extend from an upper surface of the ink key to a bottom surface thereof so that, when the ink tray is mounted in the ink fountain, a tip portion of the supporting member projecting through the through hole onto an upper surface of the ink key is brought into contact with the bottom plate of the ink tray to support the bottom plate.
Also with this construction, the deflection restraining structure can support the bottom plate from below without interfering with the ink key. Additionally, because the supporting member is installed on the supporting base without being required to be placed on each of ink trays, the increase in cost is suppressible.
Preferably, the supporting member is made to be attachable/detachable to/from the supporting base. This facilitates the replacem
Armstrong, Westerman and Hattori, LLP
Eickholt Eugene
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd.
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