Gas-supported electrographic writing head

An apparatus for forming a latent image on an image carrier comprising,

• means for supporting an image carrier,
• an electrographic writing head disposed adjacent to said image carrier,
• biasing means operatively associated with one of said supporting means and said writing head for resiliently biasing said image carrier and said writing head into mutually contacting rest positions;
• writing means coupled to said writing head for selectively forming an electrographic latent image on said image carrier, and
• means coupled to said writing head for providing a flow of gas at said image carrier, said flow of gas resulting in a force opposing said biasing means to the extent that an equilibrium condition is reached in which one of said image carrier and said writing head is in spaced relation to the respective rest position.

A method of writing an electrostatic image on an image carrier comprising,

• resiliently biasing one of an electrographic writing head and an image carrier into contact with the other,
• directing a flow of gas from said writing head to impinge said image carrier so as to produce a force opposing said resiliently biasing to the extent that said one of a writing head and image carrier is moved to a desired equilibrium position relative to the other,
• providing relative motion between said writing head and said image carrier for the formation of a latent image on said image carrier, and
• energizing charging elements of said writing head to produce a pattern of localized charges, said pattern forming said latent image.