Ribbon lift guide

In a printer having a platen for supporting a record medium, a laterally movable carrier for traversing a print line, a printing mechanism supported on said carrier for printing characters on said record medium, wherein said printing mechanism includes a print hammer, rotatable daisy wheel print element including a hub, a plurality of spokes extending radially outward from said hub and each spoke terminating in a character slug with a print surface and an impact surface, a ribbon supply means, a ribbon feed means for feeding an ink ribbon past said print element and a ribbon lift means for positioning said ribbon between a first position and then a second position for printing;

• an improved ribbon lift guide comprising:
• a substantially circularly shaped flexible disc member coupled to the hub of the print wheel element on the side of the print wheel containing the print surface of the character slug and positioned in a first plane formed by the print surfaces of said character slugs, said first plane being parallel to and a predetermined distance from a second plane formed by said spokes, said disc having a radius of a predetermined value less than the distance from the center of the hub to the closest point on the print surface of the character slug, the distance between the outer periphery of the disc and the closest point on the print surface being less than the height of the ribbon, said disc being coaxial with the print wheel to guide the ribbon to a print position with respect to the print surfaces during ribbon lift operation;
• and
• an annular member positioned between the disc and the spokes and coupled to the disc to maintain the disc in operable relationship with the print surfaces, said member being coaxial with the disc.