Back to results
US 8,136,906 B2Granted
Image recording apparatus and ink amount calculation method for this image recording apparatus
AssigneeRiso Kagaku Corporation
InventorTadashi Iwasaki
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An image forming apparatus calculates an ink temperature considering a thermal capacity near nozzles and an ink circulation flow quantity of a circulation pump in addition to an ink temperature when flowing into a recording head and an ink temperature when flowing out of the recording head, and accurately estimates a waste amount of the ink ejected from the nozzles in, e.g., maintenance processing other than image formation.
Claims22
An image recording apparatus which records an image with respect to a recording medium, comprising:
- a recording head which has a plurality of nozzles that eject an ink and a common ink chamber that communicates with the plurality of nozzles;
- an upstream-side ink path which is connected with the recording head and through which the ink is supplied to the common ink chamber;
- a downstream-side ink path which is connected with the recording head and through which the ink is discharged from the common ink chamber;
- an ink path which annularly connects the upstream-side ink path, the common ink chamber, and the downstream-side ink path and through which the ink is circulated;
- an upstream-side temperature gauge which is installed in the upstream-side ink path;
- a downstream-side temperature gauge which is installed in the downstream-side ink path;
- and
- a maintenance unit which executes maintenance processing involving ejection of the ink from the nozzles to restore ink ejection performance in the recording head,
- wherein a control unit estimates a temperature of the recording head based on an output from the upstream-side temperature gauge and an output from the downstream-side temperature gauge and calculates an ink waste amount ejected from the nozzles by the maintenance processing based on the estimated temperature of the recording head and execution contents of the maintenance processing.
6 more elements
An image recording apparatus comprising:
- a recording head which has a plurality of nozzles that eject an ink and a common ink chamber that communicates with the plurality of nozzles;
- an ink path which has an upstream-side ink path through which the ink is supplied so the common ink chamber, a downstream-side ink path through which the ink is supplied from the common ink chamber, and an ink tank from which the upstream-side ink path is replenished with the ink, and annularly connects the respective paths with the tank to circulate the ink;
- a pump which circulates the ink in the ink paths;
- an upstream-side temperature gauge which is installed in the upstream-side ink path;
- a downstream-side temperature gauge which is installed in the downstream-side ink path;
- and
- a maintenance unit which performs maintenance processing that restores ejection properties of the recording head,
- wherein the control unit circulates the ink by the pump, then uses the upstream-side temperature gauge and the downstream-side temperature gauge to detect respective temperatures, calculates an ink temperature of the nozzles from the respective temperatures, and calculates a waste liquid amount of the ink ejected from the nozzles in the maintenance processing based on the ink temperature when the recording head is in a non-image-forming operation state.
5 more elements
An ink waste amount calculation method in an image recording apparatus, the apparatus comprising:
- a common ink chamber which communicates with a plurality of nozzles;
- an upstream-side ink path through which an ink is supplied to the common ink chamber;
- a downstream-side ink path through which the ink is ejected from the common ink chamber;
- an ink flow unit which circulates the ink in the upstream-side ink path, the common ink chamber, and the downstream-side ink path in the mentioned order;
- an ink tank from which the upstream-side ink path is supplied with the ink;
- an upstream-side temperature gauge which is installed in the upstream-side ink path and measures a temperature of the flowing ink;
- a downstream-side temperature gauge which his installed in the downstream-side ink path and measures a temperature of the flowing ink;
- and
- a maintenance unit which performs maintenance processing that restores ejection properties of the recording head,
- the method comprising:
- a process of obtaining an output from the upstream-side temperature gauge and an output from the downstream-side temperature gauge;
- a process of calculating a temperature of the recording head based on the output from the upstream-side temperature gauge and the output from the downstream-side temperature gauge;
- and
- a process of calculating an ink waste amount ejected from the nozzles based on the calculated temperature of the recording head and execution contents of the maintenance processing.
11 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.