Charge electrode assembly and method of aligning components of a printhead

A printhead for a continuous inkjet printer comprising:

• a charge electrode assembly comprising.
• a charge electrode defining a passage for charging ink droplets, the passage extending from an inlet aperture to an outlet aperture along an ink travel axis, along which an ink jet travels from a nozzle of a printhead during printing, the charge electrode being configured to induce a charge on selected ink droplets by capacitive coupling;
• and
• a mounting arrangement configured to couple the charge electrode to a nozzle body, the mounting arrangement being configured to permit movement of the charge electrode relative to the nozzle to compensate for ink jet misalignment:
• the nozzle, for generating and ejecting the ink jet which subsequently undergoes jet breakup into a stream of the ink droplets for printing;
• a deflection electrode, configured to deflect droplets of ink after the droplets of ink have been charged by the charge electrode;
• and
• a gutter for receiving droplets of ink that are not used for printing.

A method of configuring a printhead for a continuous inkjet printer, the method comprising:

• adjusting a nozzle of the printhead to align an ink jet ejected from the nozzle with a gutter for receiving droplets of ink that are not used for printing;
• securing the nozzle to a body of the printhead in an aligned configuration;
• adjusting a position of a charge electrode relative to the nozzle to compensate for ink jet misalignment;
• and
• securing the charge electrode to the nozzle in an adjusted configuration.