Nozzle structures for bubblejet print devices
AssigneeCanon Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorKia Silverbrook
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An ink jet print head includes a substrate and a plurality of nozzles provided on the substrate for ejecting ink. The plurality of nozzles are arranged in two dimensions on the substrate such that a shortest distance between adjacent nozzles in at least one dimension is shorter than a pixel pitch.
Claims31
A monolithic ink jet head in which a plurality of nozzles are arranged in two directions for printing a multi-tone image by forming a plurality of pixels at a pixel ditch on a recording medium, each of the pixels having a gradation corresponding to a number of droplets of an ink of a same color deposited, comprising:
- a monolithic substrate;
- and
- a plurality of nozzles for ejecting the droplets of the same color provided on said monolithic substrate for ejecting the ink, said plurality of nozzles being arranged on said monolithic substrate in an arranging direction and a transverse direction which is transverse to said arranging direction such that a shortest distance between said nozzles which are adjacent, is shorter in at least one of said arranging direction and said transverse direction than the pixel pitch, and a shortest distance between said nozzles which are adjacent in an other of said arranging direction and said transverse direction which is not the one of said arranging direction and said transverse direction is not substantially longer than the pixel pitch.
A method for printing on a printing medium by using a monolithic ink jet head in which a plurality of nozzles are arranged in two directions for printing a multi-tone image by a forming a plurality of pixels at a pixel pitch on the printing medium, each of the Pixels having a gradation corresponding to a number of droplets of an ink of a same color deposited, said method comprising the steps of:
- providing said ink jet head having:
- (i) a substrate, and
- (ii) a plurality of nozzles for ejecting the droplets of the same color provided on the monolithic substrate for ejecting the ink, the plurality of nozzles being arranged on said monolithic substrate in an arranging direction and a transverse direction which is transverse to said arranging direction such that a shortest distance in at least one of said arranging direction and said transverse direction between said nozzles which are adjacent is shorter than the pixel pitch, and a shortest distance between said nozzles which are adjacent in an other of said arranging direction and said transverse direction which is not the one of said arranging direction and said transverse direction is not substantially longer than the pixel pitch;
- ejecting the ink sequentially from each of the nozzles by time share driving the nozzles;
- and
- moving the printing medium and the ink jet head relative to each other during said ejecting step.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.