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US 4,874,264 AGranted
Selective magnetic attachment of a print head to a drive belt
AssigneeRicoh Company, Ltd.
InventorsTakami Suzuki, Yoshikuni Tatara, Tomoyuki Moriya
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A hybrid printer includes at least one impact type print head and at least one non-impact type print head, which are selectively used to print not only graphic information but also character information. For example, the impact type print head may be a type wheel print head and the non-impact type print head may be a pen print head. The print heads are selectively magnetically coupled to the carriage drive belt.
Claims7
A printer for printing graphic information as well as character information selectively, comprising:
- a housing;
- a platen roller rotatably supported in said housing;
- first driving means for driving said platen roller to rotate it;
- a plurality of printing means supported to be movable independently from one another along said platen roller in a reciprocating manner;
- second driving means for driving at least one of said printing means to move it along said platen roller;
- coupling means for selectively coupling at least one of said printing means to said second driving means;
- and
- control means connected to said first and second driving means, said plurality of printing means and said coupling means for controlling the operation of said printer, wherein
- said second driving means includes a transmitting member disposed along said platen roller and a driving motor for driving said transmitting master in either direction, and said coupling means includes at least one magnetic element fixedly attached to said transmitting member and a plurality of electromagnet units each fixedly provided in a corresponding one of said printing means, one of said plurality of electromagnet units being selectively energized by said control means to be coupled to said magnetic element.
6 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.