JP2002086762A - Ink jet recording device - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Problem] To prevent the generation of unnecessary ink mist due to a flushing operation and prevent a specific ink component from accumulating in a flushing area. SOLUTION: In a flushing box 11 arranged in a flushing area, a porous member 21 is arranged on a surface facing a recording head. This porous member 21
Is formed so that its center is bent and slightly depressed, and openings 22, 23 and 24 are formed. In accordance with the flushing operation, ink droplets ejected from the two recording heads are represented by virtual lines 4a, 4b, 4c and 5
It flies to the positions indicated by a, 5b, and 5c and is captured. Since the porous member 21 is bent at the center and is inclined, the ink that easily accumulates is mixed with the ink that is unlikely to accumulate and is discharged to the upstream side, and is formed on the porous member 21. The liquid is dropped in the direction of gravity through the opening.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

The present invention relates to an ink jet recording head mounted on a reciprocating carriage and ejecting ink droplets from nozzle openings to form an image on a recording medium. A flushing drive signal is sent to the recording head. The present invention relates to an ink jet recording apparatus in which a flushing area for receiving ink droplets when supplied is disposed on a movement path of the recording head.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A serial type ink jet recording apparatus is provided with a recording head mounted on a reciprocating carriage and a paper feeding means for conveying recording paper in a direction perpendicular to the moving direction of the recording head. By using a recording head capable of discharging black ink and each color ink of yellow, cyan, and magenta, not only text printing with black ink,
By changing the ejection ratio of each ink, full-color printing is enabled.

[0003] A recording head used in such a recording apparatus is characterized in that ink pressurized in a pressure generating chamber is ejected as ink droplets from a fine nozzle opening onto recording paper to perform printing. There is a problem that printing failure occurs due to an increase in ink viscosity due to evaporation of the ink.

[0004] For this purpose, a function of applying a drive signal unrelated to printing to the recording head to cause the ink droplets to be ejected idly is provided. This is called a flushing operation. This flushing operation is performed at regular intervals for the purpose of preventing clogging due to thickening of ink, for example, at a nozzle opening that emits a small amount of ink droplets during a printing operation.

[0005]

The flushing operation described above is performed in a capping means capable of sealing a recording head in many models. However, in order to increase the throughput, the flushing operation is performed. There is also provided a model in which a flushing area is set on the side opposite to the position where the capping means is arranged without moving the head to the capping means, and flushing is executed in this flushing area.

For example, when the paper size to be handled is large and the moving direction of the carriage is on the flushing area side, or when the printing direction and the timing at which flushing is required are engaged, flushing is performed in the flushing area. A sequence to be executed is employed.

[0007] Especially in recent models, during printing operation, on average every several seconds several tens of shots / 1.
Flushing about the nozzle is performed. This flushing operation is executed at the timing after the cleaning operation for forcibly sucking and discharging the ink from the recording head to prevent color mixing, or also at the timing at the start of printing. In this case, thousands to thousands of nozzles are sent from each nozzle. Discharge of tens of thousands of ink droplets may be performed.

As described above, in a conventional recording apparatus in which a flushing area is set and a flushing operation is performed at the location, for example, an opening hole is formed in a paper guide member for conveying recording paper, and It is configured such that flushing is performed toward the waste liquid absorbent disposed on the lower side. In such a configuration, the distance from the nozzle forming surface of the recording head to the waste liquid absorbing material is considerably increased, and the flying distance of the ink droplet during flushing is inevitably increased.

For this reason, a part of the ink droplet ejected from the nozzle opening of the recording head is divided into smaller ink droplets by receiving air resistance before reaching the absorbing material.
This changes into a mist (ink mist) and floats, causing a problem of contaminating the surroundings.

The ink droplets ejected from the nozzle openings are charged to a considerable extent, and are affected by static electricity generated in a driving section in the recording apparatus, and furthermore, an air flow by an exhaust fan arranged to suppress a rise in temperature in the apparatus. And the surroundings (outside) where the recording device is arranged may be contaminated. In particular, in a recent recording apparatus which controls the amount of one-shot ink droplet as small as possible in order to realize high image quality, such a problem appears more remarkably.

Therefore, it is desirable that the distance between the absorbing material disposed in the flushing area and the nozzle forming surface of the recording head be as small as possible, and that the ejected ink droplets rebound toward the recording head. In order to suppress the effect, it is desirable to use a porous member as the absorbent.

On the other hand, in recent years, diversification of printing has progressed, and inks using pigments have been used in order to obtain better reproducibility. It is known that a state occurs in which a part of the pigment ink does not penetrate into the porous member, and a pigment component or the like accumulates on the surface thereof.

Therefore, when the porous member is arranged so as to approach the recording head in the flushing area, the pigment component or the like accumulates on the porous member in a mountain-like manner. A state may occur in which the load comes into contact with the recording head that has moved to the flushing area.

An object of the present invention is to solve the above-mentioned problems at present, and to effectively suppress the generation of ink mist due to the flushing operation, thereby preventing the inside and outside of the apparatus from being contaminated. It is an object of the present invention to provide an ink jet recording apparatus excellent in commercial value. Another object of the present invention is to provide an ink jet recording apparatus which can solve the problem that solidified ink accumulates in a flushing area even when a pigment ink is used.

[0015]

According to the present invention, there is provided an ink jet recording apparatus which is mounted on a reciprocating carriage and ejects ink droplets from nozzle openings to form a recording medium. An ink jet recording apparatus, comprising: an ink jet recording head that forms an image on the recording head; and a flushing area that receives an ink droplet when a flushing drive signal is supplied to the recording head, disposed on a movement path of the recording head. In the flushing area, a porous member is arranged so as to be close to and facing the recording head when the recording head is located in the flushing area, and the surface of the porous member facing the recording head has a recording surface. The head is arranged in a non-parallel state with respect to the nozzle forming surface, and the porous member has a flash. Avoiding a position opposed to a nozzle row of the recording head grayed operation is performed, it is configured with openings to flow ink received by flushing in the direction of gravity.

In this case, the nozzle forming surface of the recording head is preferably arranged so as to be orthogonal to the direction of gravity, the surface of the porous member facing the recording head is arranged in an inclined state, and flushing is performed. The opening is formed on the downstream side of the arrival position of the ink droplet ejected onto the porous member by the operation to flow the ink in the gravity direction.

In the nozzle forming surface of the recording head, there are formed a nozzle row from which ink that easily accumulates is ejected, and a nozzle row from which ink that hardly accumulates is ejected. It is desirable that the ink droplets ejected upward reach the ink that is less likely to accumulate than the ink that tends to accumulate, on the upstream side on the inclined surface of the porous member.

On the other hand, in an ink jet recording apparatus in which two recording heads are mounted on a carriage in a direction of movement of the carriage, the porous member facing each recording head is preferably a single sheet-like member. , And the sheet-like member is arranged close to the nozzle forming surface of each recording head.

In this case, the single sheet-shaped porous member is bent at the center thereof so as to face the nozzle forming surface of each recording head in a non-parallel state. The configuration is suitably adopted.

In any of the above embodiments, the waste liquid absorbing material for absorbing and holding the ink received by the porous member is disposed below the position of the porous member in the direction of gravity. It is desirable to do.

In this case, it is preferable that the waste liquid absorbing material is stored in an absorbing material storing case, and the absorbing material storing case is detachably attached to a supporting case supporting the porous member.

According to the ink jet recording apparatus according to the present invention, the ink droplets flushed from the recording head in the flushing area are:
It is received by a porous member disposed so as to be close to and facing the recording head. In this case, since the porous member is disposed in the immediate vicinity of the recording head, most of the ink droplets ejected from the nozzle openings fly to the porous member, and a part of the ink droplets becomes a mist and floats. Can be made extremely small.

Further, since the porous member has an opening formed on the downstream side for flowing the flushed ink in the direction of gravity, the ink received by the flushing operation is passed through the opening. Can be collected.

Further, the ink droplets ejected onto the porous member by the flushing operation reach the upstream position on the inclined surface of the porous member when the ink that does not easily accumulate with respect to the ink that easily accumulates. With the set configuration,
The ink that easily accumulates is mixed with the ink that hardly accumulates and is discharged to the upstream side, and flows toward the opening.
Accordingly, it is possible to effectively suppress the accumulation of the ink component on the porous member despite the long-term use of the recording apparatus.

[0025]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Hereinafter, an ink jet recording apparatus according to the present invention will be described based on an embodiment shown in the drawings. 1 to 3 show the basic configuration of an ink jet recording apparatus to which the present invention is applied. FIG. 1 is a top view of the recording apparatus in a partially transparent state, and FIG. 2 is a bottom view of the recording apparatus in a partially transparent state. FIG. 3 is a side view of the recording apparatus in a state where a part of the recording apparatus is similarly seen through.

In the drawing, reference numeral 1 denotes a carriage. The carriage 1 is guided by a guide member 2 arranged in a horizontal direction via a timing belt driven by a carriage motor (not shown) so as to be reciprocated. It is configured. On the surface of the carriage 1 facing the recording paper 3 (the lower side surface of the carriage 1), two recording heads 4 and 5 are mounted side by side in the moving direction of the carriage 1. That is, the nozzle forming surfaces of the two recording heads 4 and 5 are arranged so as to be orthogonal to the direction of gravity.

A paper feed roller 6 is arranged in parallel with the guide member 2. The recording paper 3 is conveyed in a direction perpendicular to the moving direction of the carriage 1 by the rotation of the paper feed roller. Acts as follows. Therefore, ink droplets selectively ejected from the recording heads 4 and 5 mounted on the reciprocating carriage 1 are:
An image is printed on the recording paper 3 by being driven onto the recording paper 3 conveyed in a direction orthogonal to the recording paper 3.

In this embodiment, as described above, the two recording heads 4 and 5 are moved in the moving direction of the carriage 1.
Are mounted side by side. The left print head 4 shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 has three nozzle rows 4a and 4
b, 4c are formed, and these nozzle rows 4a,
From 4b and 4c, black, cyan and magenta inks are respectively ejected. Similarly, the three nozzle arrays 5
a, 5b, and 5c are formed, and each of the nozzle rows 5a, 5b, and 5c is configured to eject light cyan, light magenta, and yellow inks, respectively.

As shown by solid lines in FIGS. 1 and 2, when the carriage 1 is moved to the home position (right side), the nozzle forming surfaces of the recording heads 4 and 5 mounted on the carriage 1 are changed. A capping unit (not shown) that can be sealed, a suction pump that can suction the internal space of the capping unit, and the like are arranged near the home position.

On the other hand, a flushing area is set on the left side of the apparatus in FIGS. 1 and 2 facing the home position. That is, the flushing area is
It is set immediately below the carriage 1 indicated by a virtual line. A flushing box to be described later is installed in the flushing area, and a porous member arranged in the flushing box is configured to capture ink droplets ejected from each of the recording heads 4 and 5 at idle. .

FIGS. 4 and 5 show the structure of the flushing box. FIG. 4 is a top view of the flushing box in a partially transparent state.
(A) is a side view of the flushing box in a partially transparent state. FIG. 5B is a bottom view of the flushing box in a partially transparent state. In addition,
The top view shown in FIG. 4 is shown enlarged in comparison with FIG.

The flushing box 11 includes a first case 12 and a second case 13 as shown in FIG. The first case 12 constitutes a support case for supporting a porous member for receiving ink droplets by the flushing operation, and the second case 13 constitutes an absorbent storage case for storing a waste liquid absorbent. I have. The second case 13 is detachably attached to the first case 12 as described later.

The first case 12 has a substantially rectangular opening when viewed from above as shown in FIG. 4, and has an arm member for positioning when mounted on a recording apparatus. 14 and 15 are formed integrally.
Further, the first case 12 also includes an arm member 16 formed with a through hole 16a for fastening the first case 12 positioned by the arm members 14 and 15 to the recording apparatus with one screw. Is formed.

The first case 12 corresponds to FIG.
As shown in the side view of FIG. 2A, the width of the lower end is reduced downward from the upper opening, and the lower end 18 having the window hole 18a is inserted into the upper opening of the second case 13. It is formed so that. The first case 12 is formed with a pair of engagement pieces 19 extending downward.
The through holes formed in the pair of engagement pieces 19 respectively correspond to the protrusions 1 formed on both side wall surfaces of the second case 13.
The second case 13 is detachably attached to the first case 12 by engaging with 3a. And
In the second case 13, a waste liquid absorbing material 30 formed in a flat shape is stored.

A plurality of pin members 20 are arranged on the inner surface of the first case 12 along the opening, and each of the pin members 20 is formed upward. And it is penetrated by each said pin member 20,
A single sheet-shaped porous member 21 is attached so as to cover the opening of the first case 12.

As shown in FIG. 4, the porous member 21 has a relatively long rectangular opening 22 formed at the center thereof, and small rectangular openings 22 on the left and right sides thereof. Parts 23 and 24 are formed. Then, when the carriage 1 moves to the flushing area and the recording heads 4 and 5 perform idle discharge of ink droplets by the flushing operation, the above-described nozzle arrays 4a and 4a formed on the recording heads 4 and 5 are formed. 4b, 4c and 5a, 5b, 5
The ink droplet ejected from c is configured to fly on the porous member 21 to the same reference numeral indicated by a virtual line.

As shown in FIG. 5B, the porous member 21 formed in a sheet shape is slightly bent in the shape of a letter "C" at the center thereof and moved to the flushing area. The recording heads 4 and 5 are configured to face the nozzle forming surfaces in a non-parallel state. In other words, when the arrangement position of each pin member 20 formed on the inner surface of the first case 12 is set to the porous member 21 formed in a sheet shape, the porous member 21 It is configured to be bent.

In the above configuration, when the recording heads 4 and 5 that have moved to the flushing area perform idle ejection of ink droplets due to the flushing operation, the nozzle arrays 4a, 4b and 4c indicated by phantom lines in FIG. Each of the ink droplets flies on the porous member 21 corresponding to each of the porous members 21 and 5a, 5b, and 5c and is captured by the porous member 21. In this case, the distance between the nozzle forming surface of each of the recording heads 4 and 5 and the porous member 21 is small, so that the degree of each ink droplet changing to an ink mist during its flight can be extremely reduced. .

As described above, the ink captured by the porous member 21 is bent slightly at the center of the porous member 21 so as to be slightly depressed, so that the ink is directed along the slope toward the center. Flows. Then, it enters one of the openings 22, 23, 24 arranged on the downstream side, and in the second case 13 through a window hole 18 a formed in the lower end of the first case 12 according to gravity. To be dropped. Then, the ink waste liquid dropped into the second case 13 is absorbed and held by the waste liquid absorbing material 30 stored in the second case 13.

Here, when, for example, a pigment ink is used in the recording apparatus, the porous member 21 is particularly likely to be clogged, and for example, the magenta ink which is easily accumulated on the porous member 21 is used. , And are set to be discharged from the nozzle row 4c. Accordingly, in the porous member 21 shown in FIG. 4, accumulation due to magenta ink is likely to occur at a position indicated by a virtual line 4c.

However, in the porous member 21 formed in the inclined state as described above, the cyan ink which is difficult to accumulate at the position shown as 4b adjacent to the position shown at 4c where the magenta ink is discharged is located upstream. Is ejected, the magenta ink that easily accumulates is mixed with the cyan ink that is unlikely to accumulate and is ejected upstream.
Then, the gas can flow in the direction of gravity through the opening 22 formed in the porous member 21. Accordingly, it is possible to effectively suppress the accumulation of the ink component on the porous member 21 despite the long-term use of the recording apparatus.

With the above flushing operation,
The ink waste liquid is gradually accumulated in the second case 13,
When it becomes difficult to hold the waste liquid absorbing material 30 stored in the case, maintenance for replacing the waste liquid absorbing material 30 is required. In this case, as described above, the first
Since the second case 13 is detachable from the case 12, the maintenance work can be facilitated.

[0043]

As is apparent from the above description, according to the ink jet recording apparatus of the present invention, it is possible to effectively suppress the generation of ink mist due to the flushing operation. The problem of contaminating the inside and outside of the vehicle can be solved. Also,
Provided is an ink jet recording apparatus which can also suppress accumulation of a specific ink component on a porous member that captures ink droplets accompanying a flushing operation, and can guarantee a stable printing operation for a long time. be able to.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a top view showing an inkjet recording apparatus to which the present invention is applied in a partially transparent state.

FIG. 2 is a bottom view showing a partially transparent state.

FIG. 3 is a side view similarly showing a partially transparent state.

FIG. 4 is a top view showing a flushing box installed in a flushing area of the recording apparatus in a partially transparent state.

FIG. 5 is a side view and a bottom view similarly showing a part in a see-through state.

[Description of Signs] 1 Carriage 2 Guide member 3 Recording paper 4, 5 Recording head 6 Paper feed roller 11 Flushing box 12 First case (support case) 13 Second case (absorbent material storage case) 13a Projection 19 Engagement piece Reference Signs List 20 pin member 21 porous member 22, 23, 24 opening 30 waste liquid absorbing material

Claims (7)

[Claims] 1. A reciprocating carriage mounted on a carriage.
An ink jet recording head that forms an image on a recording medium by ejecting ink droplets from a nozzle opening is provided on a moving path of the recording head on a movement path of the recording head, which receives an ink droplet when a flushing drive signal is supplied to the recording head. In the ink jet recording apparatus arranged, in the flushing area, a porous member is disposed so as to be close to and opposed to the recording head in a state where the recording head is located in the flushing area, and the porous member is The surface facing the recording head is arranged in a non-parallel state with respect to the nozzle forming surface of the recording head, and the porous member has a position facing the nozzle row of the recording head where the flushing operation is performed. An opening that allows the ink received by flushing to flow in the direction of gravity is formed. Inkjet recording device. 2. The nozzle forming surface of the recording head is disposed so as to be orthogonal to the direction of gravity, the surface of the porous member facing the recording head is disposed in an inclined state, and the nozzle is formed by a flushing operation. 2. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the opening for flowing the ink in the direction of gravity is formed downstream of the arrival position of the ink droplet ejected on the porous member. 3. A nozzle row on which ink that easily accumulates is ejected and a nozzle row on which ink that hardly accumulates are ejected are formed on a nozzle forming surface of the recording head, and the porous member is formed by a flushing operation. 3. The ink-jet recording according to claim 2, wherein the ink droplets ejected upward reach ink that is less likely to accumulate than ink that easily accumulates, is set upstream on the inclined surface of the porous member. apparatus. 4. An ink jet recording apparatus having two recording heads mounted on said carriage in a direction of movement of said carriage, wherein said porous member facing each recording head is a single sheet member. 4. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the sheet-like member is formed close to a nozzle forming surface of each recording head. 5. 5. The single sheet-shaped porous member is bent at a central portion thereof, and is configured to face a nozzle forming surface of each recording head in a non-parallel state. An ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 4. 6. A waste liquid absorbing material for absorbing and retaining ink received by the porous member is disposed below the position of the porous member in the direction of gravity.
An ink jet recording apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 5. 7. The ink jet type according to claim 6, wherein the waste liquid absorbent is stored in an absorbent storage case, and the absorbent storage case is detachably attached to a support case supporting the porous member. Recording device.