Skipping printer driving method

Abstract

A skipping (draft) printer driving method is proposed for a line dot printer whose head bank (which executes shuttle action in a direction perpendicular to the paper feed direction) is provided with printing pins which are arranged in the shape of saw blade. In the saw blade printing pin arrangement, a printing pin group having L (L: 2, 3, 4, . . .) printing pins for executing dot printing for 1st through L-th dot printing rows respectively is repeated in a direction perpendicular to the paper feed direction. According to the skipping printer driving method, on each stroke (a to-action or a fro-action) of the head bank, one or more printing pins selected from the L printing pins of the printing pin group are assigned to execute dot printing during the stroke, and the printing pins that have been assigned to execute dot printing during the stroke are driven by a driving circuit of the line dot printer during the stroke so as to execute dot printing of part of a desired dot pattern to be printed on paper. For example, the printing pins are driven so that one or more selected dot printing rows in the 1st through L-th dot printing rows will be printed in each stroke of the head bank. By such skipping printer driving method, the characteristics of the head bank can be improved, and the load on the driving circuit and the noise level can be reduced.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.