Incremental printing of symbolic information – Ink jet – Medium and processing means
Reexamination Certificate
2001-07-27
2003-08-05
Tran, Huan (Department: 2853)
Incremental printing of symbolic information
Ink jet
Medium and processing means
C347S102000, C346S136000, C101S487000, C400S579000, C400S618000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06601951
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to printers and to a printing method; and more, particularly, the invention relates to printers which form images on continuous webs that are fed at high speed.
In the general types of printers that form images on webs, pin members of a tractor mechanism mounted on the printer are engaged with feed holes disposed along the edges of the web, and the tractor mechanism is driven to feed the web as an image is formed thereon using the image forming section of the printer. After the web with the feed holes has been printed, however, the portions of the web in which these feed holes (usually, the left and right edges of the web) are provided need to be cut off, and thus additional time is spent after printing in obtaining the final printed matter. Also, the printer itself requires a tractor mechanism as a component thereof, and so such a printer inherently has a complex configuration. Such a cutting operation as mentioned above can be omitted by adopting webs that are free of feed holes, using a web roller mechanism instead of a tractor mechanism of the printer.
In this regard, for a printer that uses webs that are free of feed holes and which forms an image on a web while feeding it by use of a feed roller mechanism, if this printer is of the type which operates in no higher than a middle-speed region in which only about 50 pages per minute are printed on A4-paper on a horizontal feed basis, printing not conspicuous in terms of print position offsets is possible, since not too significant slipping occurs between the web and the feed rollers. If, however, the printer is of the high-speed type that is capable of printing more than 100 pages per minute, or is of the ultrahigh-speed region type that is capable of printing more than 200 pages per minute, it is difficult with a conventional configuration to feed the web to the image forming section accurately, with the result that a need arises to control the tension, traveling position, moisture, etc. of the web being fed.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
A primary object of the present invention is to provide a printer and printing method that enables stable feed of webs with high accuracy by maintaining almost constant web status, irrespective of the web type, prior to feeding the web to the image forming section of the printer.
A secondary object of the present invention is to provide a printer by which the image formed on a web fed at high speed can be fixed or dried using a compact heating means.
The objects set forth above can be achieved by providing a printer having a web handling unit comprising a web conditioning means for providing fixed control of the moisture within the web being fed, a skew correction means for adjusting the traveling position of the web which has passed through said web conditioning means, and a tension assigning means for assigning fixed tension to the web,and an image forming means that forms an image on the web sent from said web handling unit.
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Ishizawa Katsumi
Kuwabara Akitomo
Nakajima Isao
Yokokawa Shuho
Antonelli Terry Stout & Kraus LLP
Hitachi Koki Co,. Ltd.
Mouttet Blaise
Tran Huan
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