Off-line printhead inspection and recovery unit for production piezo ink jet architectures

A printhead inspection and recovery unit for an ink jet printing system comprising:

• a modular printhead assembly disposed within the printing system for on-line printing operation;
• an off-line printhead maintenance unit including a printhead docking module for receiving the printhead assembly wherein the maintenance unit is locally disposed relative to the printing system for ready diagnostic inspection of printhead operation and including a diagnostic processor for determining ink jet failure, a user interface for reporting diagnostic results of the diagnostic processor, wherein the offline printhead maintenance unit further includes a printhead driver module, a head maintenance system, an image receiver, a receiver sensor array, and an ink delivery system,
• a spare modular printhead assembly is disposed within the off-line printhead maintenance unit wherein the spare modular printhead assembly includes a heater for selectively maintaining the spare assembly at a heated, on-line condition for ready replacement of the modular printhead assembly, and
• wherein the diagnostic processor further selectively identifies nonrecoverable and recoverable printhead failures from data detected by the receiver sensor array and the diagnostic processor performs the identifying when the printhead assembly is installed in the maintenance unit and the spare modular printhead assembly is installed in the ink jet printing system.