JPH03239565A - Ion flow control recording head - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To emit a sufficient ion amount to an electrostatic latent image acceptor and to improve the quality of an image by applying a non-ion emitting voltage to a control electrode of a region which does not emit ions, setting the control electrode of a region which emits ions to the same potential as a reference voltage, and applying a lower voltage than the non-ion emitting voltage to an adjacent control electrode. CONSTITUTION:When ions are passed, a third switching element 20c is connected to a ground 23 to ground a control electrode 11c desired to pass the ions, a second switching element 20b is connected to a second power source 22 to apply a voltage V1 to control electrodes 11b, 11d adjacent to the electrode 11c. When a first switching element 20a is connected to a first power source to apply a voltage V2 to control electrodes 11a, 11e, the voltage of both side parts of the ion emitting region desired to emit the ions becomes low. Accordingly, an ion flow is not interrupted by a control electric field in the non-ion emitting region adjacent to the ion emitting region, but an ion amount can be increased.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Industrial Application Field] The present invention relates to an ion flow control recording head. This invention relates to an ion flow control recording head that can obtain high quality images.

[Prior Art] In general, as an ion flow control recording head that forms an electrostatic latent image on a recording medium, ion flow control as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 61-263768 and Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 62-292449 is used. A recording head is known.

As shown in FIGS. 6 and 7, this ion flow control recording head has a cylindrical chamber 3 formed between a pair of grounded conductive shields 1 and 2, and a longitudinal direction inside the chamber 3. A discharge wire 4 is stretched along the line to form an ion generating means 5, and an insulating substrate 8 is provided below the shield 2 so as to cover the shields 1 and 2 via an insulating layer 6 and a conductive substrate 7. At the same time, an ion flow leading portion is formed by a slit 10 communicating with the ion generating means 5 between the reference electrode 9 formed in the other shield 1 and the insulating substrate 8. A plurality of control electrodes II are arranged on the side surface of the slit of the insulating substrate 8, and a control circuit 12 is connected to the control electrode 11, thereby constructing an ion flow control means 13 for controlling the extraction of the ion flow. The structure is such that

Further, the electrostatic latent image receptor 14 that charges the ions irradiated from the ion flow control recording head configured as described above is
It has a structure in which a back electrode 17 connected to a high potential source 16 is provided on the back side of the charge receptor 15, that is, on the opposite side of the surface of the charge receptor 15 facing the recording head.

In the ion flow control recording head configured as described above, ions are generated in the chamber 3 by applying a high voltage from the wire power source 18 to the discharge wire 4, and then air is introduced into the chamber 3 from above the chamber 3. By blowing the flow A, the ions in the chamber 3 are transferred to the chamber 3.
The electrostatic latent image receptor I4 can be attached and charged through the slit IO provided in communication with the electrostatic latent image receptor I4. At this time, by applying a voltage according to the image signal from the control circuit 12 to each control electrode 11, the ion flow passing through the slit 10 is controlled, and the electrostatic latent image receptor 14 is charged and the electrostatic latent image receptor 14 is charged. image can be formed.

In this case, as shown in FIG. 8, the reference electrode 9 is grounded to the earth part I9, and the ion flow is controlled by the voltage applied by the switching operation of the switching element 20 of the control circuit. That is, when passing ions, C
When ON, the control electrode is grounded (data "1"), and when ions are cut off (when OFF, data "0"), the ion non-deriving voltage V2 is applied to the control electrode 11 in the ion non-deriving region, and the ion non-deriving voltage V2 is applied between the slits 10. Ions are blocked by the electric field generated in the

Here, if the data pattern is "00100", the ion non-deriving voltage v2 is applied to the control electrodes 11a, llb, lid, and lle, and the control electrode 11c is grounded. Here, when only the control electrode 11c is grounded continuously for a certain period of time, an electrostatic latent image corresponding to a straight line with this width is formed on the charge receptor 15 of the electrostatic latent image receptor 14 (one bit line ).

Note that the ion non-lead voltage v2 is set based on the width of the slit 10 and the slit passage time of ions.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] However, in the conventional ion flow control recording head of this type, only the control electrode 11c from which ions are to be extracted is set to 0■, and the other control electrodes 11a, llb are set to 0.

Since the ion non-deriving voltage V2 is uniformly applied to 11d and Ila, the control electrode 1 adjacent to the control electrode 11c
1b, an electric field B that obstructs the extraction of ions is generated between the lid and the ion extraction region, and as a result, the amount of ions decreases and development is not performed sufficiently.
There were problems in that line reproducibility was poor and sufficient width and density could not be secured.

This invention was made in view of the above-mentioned circumstances, and in order to solve the above-mentioned problems, it is possible to prevent the ion derivation region from being disturbed by the control electric field of the ion non-derivation region, increase the amount of ions, and improve the image quality. It is an object of the present invention to provide an ion flow control recording head that can achieve the following.

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to achieve the above object, the ion flow control recording head of the present invention includes an ion generation means, an ion flow that communicates with the ion generation means, and an ion flow generated by the ion generation means. The ion flow control recording head is provided with an ion flow control recording head that includes an ion flow derivation section for deriving the ion flow, and an ion flow control means for controlling the derivation of the ion flow, and the ion flow derivation sections are arranged facing each other to form a slit. The ion flow control means is composed of a reference electrode surface and an insulating substrate, and the ion flow control means includes a plurality of control electrodes arranged on the side surface of the slit of the insulating substrate, and a voltage is applied to each control electrode based on image information. At this time, an ion non-deriving voltage (V2) is applied to the control electrode in the region from which ions are not derived, and the control electrode in the region from which ions are derived is set to the same potential as the reference electrode, In addition, a voltage (Vl '
).

In the present invention, the ion non-deriving voltage (V2) is a voltage when successive bits are turned off, and its value is determined by the slit width and the slit passage time. In this case, ■The peak value of the distribution of bit ions when they are turned on has a strong correlation with the slit width, and if the slit width is narrowed, the ion peak value can be relatively secured, but on the other hand, if the slit width is narrowed, As a result, the absolute amount of ions decreases, so it is preferable to take both of these factors into account when determining the slit width.

In addition, the voltage (Vl) applied to the control electrode adjacent to the electrode in the ion non-deriving region can be set to any value within the range of 0<Vl<V2, and can be determined according to each request. .

[Action Co. The above technical means works as follows.

With the above configuration, when the ions generated by the ion generating means pass through the slit by the air flow, they are controlled by the control means in accordance with a predetermined image signal, and the electrostatic latent image receptor is charged. be done.

At this time, an ion non-deriving voltage (V2) is applied to the control electrode in the region from which ions are not derived, and the control electrode in the region from which ions are derived is set to the same potential as the reference electrode, and the control electrode in the region from which ions are derived is set to the same potential as the reference electrode. By applying a voltage (Vl) lower than the ion non-deriving voltage (V2) to the control electrode adjacent to the ion deriving region, the ion deriving region is not disturbed by the control electric field of the ion non-deriving region, and a sufficient amount of ions can be obtained. can be applied to an electrostatic latent image receptor to improve image quality.

[Examples] Examples of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram of the control means in the ion flow control recording head of the present invention.

The control electrode 11 includes a plurality of control electrodes 11 (specifically, 11a, llb) disposed on the side surface of the slit of the insulating substrate 8 of the ion flow control recording head shown in FIGS. 6 and 7.
, 1lclld, 1ie-=), and a control circuit 12 that applies a voltage to each control electrode 11 based on image information.

The control electrodes 11 include, for example, 2.64 electrodes x 40 blocks in total.
The matrix wiring is made up of 560 wires, and electrode patterns are formed on the surface of the insulating substrate 8 by etching a thin plate of stainless steel, nickel, etc., or by using paste-like ink made of tungsten, gold, etc. By printing according to the method, the pixels are continuously formed in parallel straight lines so as to be separated according to the pixel density.

In this case, the pitch C of each control electrode 11 is set to be approximately the same as the width of the slit 10, and the electrode width of the control electrode 11 is set to be approximately 25.75% of the electrode pitch C ( (See Figure 3). Furthermore, the peak value of ions has a large correlation with the slit width, as shown in FIG. Therefore, it can be seen that if the slit width is narrowed, the peak value of ions can be secured, but on the other hand, if the slit width is narrowed, the absolute amount of ions decreases, which is not preferable.

The control circuit 1z includes a first control circuit 12a that selectively connects each control electrode 11 and a first power source 21 via a first switching element 20a, and a first control circuit 12a that selectively connects each control electrode 11 and a first power source 21 to each other via a first switching element 20a. a second control circuit 12b that selectively connects each control circuit 12 via a second switching element 20b;
and a third control circuit 12c that selectively connects the ground section 23 and the ground section 23 via a third switching element 20c. In this case, the first power supply 21 is set to +V2ff), and the second power supply 22 is set to +vl (V).

Here, V2>Vl>0.

Next, in the ion flow control means 13 configured as described above, control of the ion flow when the data pattern is set to "00100", for example, will be explained with reference to FIG.

When passing ions (data "1" when ON), the third switching element 20c is connected to the ground part 23, the control electrode 11c through which ions are to pass is grounded, and the second switching element 20b is connected to the ground part 23. Control electrodes 1+11 and Ild connected to the power source 22 of No. 2 and adjacent to the control electrode 11c
A voltage v1 is applied to the control electrodes 11a, l by connecting the first switching element 20a to the first power source.
When voltage V2 is applied to ie, since the voltage on both sides of the ion extraction region from which ions are to be extracted is low, the ion flow is blocked by the control electric field in the ion non-extraction region adjacent to the ion extraction region. It is possible to increase the amount of ions without causing any problems.

Here, the applied voltage V2. By arbitrarily setting Vl, the line width can be controlled to an arbitrary value, and in particular, the insufficiency of reproduction of a 1-bit line can be improved.

Next, a fifth comparison test of the amount of ions between the ion flow recording head of the present invention and the conventional ion flow recording head will be explained.
This will be explained with reference to the figures.

FIG. 5(a) shows the ion flow control electrode of the conventional ion flow control recording head shown in FIG.
This figure shows the ion flow control electrode of the ion flow control recording head of the present invention, and the data pattern is "0010".
0''. In this case, in the conventional control means, the control electrodes 11a, llb, lid
, ll! An ion non-deriving voltage v2 is applied to the control electrode tic, and the control electrode tic is grounded.

On the other hand, in the control means of the present invention, the control electrode 11c through which ions are to pass is grounded, and the control electrode 11c
A voltage Vl is applied to the control electrode 11b, lid adjacent to the control electrode 11b, and the other control electrodes 11a, l
A voltage v2 is applied to ie. When the amount of ions was investigated under these conditions, the results shown in FIG. 5(C) were obtained. In other words, with conventional control means, the peak value of the ion distribution is lower than the solid level, and the distribution width is also small, resulting in insufficient development, poor line reproducibility, and insufficient width and density. However, in the present invention, a large amount of ions can be obtained, and in particular, in the case of a 1-bit line, the insufficient reproduction can be improved.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, according to the ion flow control recording head of the present invention, which is configured as described above, the following effects can be obtained.

Since the ion derivation region is not disturbed by the control electric field of the ion non-derivation region, it is possible to increase the amount of ions, improve line reproducibility, and maintain sufficient width and concentration. It is possible to improve image quality by ensuring that

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Fig. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of the control means in this invention, Fig. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of the usage state of the control means in this invention, and Fig. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of the usage state of the control means in this invention. A graph showing the relationship between the pitch and FIG. 4 is a graph showing the relationship between the line width/electrode pitch and the voltage applied to adjacent electrodes in the ion extraction region, and FIGS.
5) is an explanatory diagram of the usage state of the conventional ion flow control means, an explanatory diagram of the usage state of the ion flow control means in the present invention, and a graph comparing these ion distribution states. Sectional perspective view showing the principle, No. 7
The figure is a cross-sectional view showing the main parts of the ion flow control recording head.
The figure is an explanatory diagram showing an example of a control state of a conventional ion flow control means. Code explanation (1, lla, llb, llc, lid, 1i
e) = Control electrode (2)...Control circuit (2a)...First control circuit (2b)...Second control circuit (2c)...Third control circuit (3) ...Ion flow control means (200...first switching element (20b)...
・Second switching element (20c)...Third switching element (2I)...First power supply (22)...Second power supply (23)...Grounding section

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) Equipped with an ion generation means, an ion flow derivation section communicating with the ion generation means and for deriving the ion flow generated by the ion generation means, and an ion flow control means for controlling the derivation of the ion flow. In the ion flow control recording head, the ion flow derivation section is composed of a reference electrode surface and an insulating substrate that are arranged to face each other to form a slit, and the ion flow control means is configured by forming a slit in the insulating substrate. It consists of a plurality of control electrodes arranged on the side surface and a control circuit that applies voltage to each control electrode based on image information.At this time, an ion non-deriving voltage (V2 ), and at the same time, the control electrode in the region from which ions are extracted is set to the same potential as the reference electrode, and a voltage lower than the ion non-derivation voltage (V2) is applied to the control electrode adjacent to the control electrode in the region from which ions are extracted. An ion flow control recording head characterized in that (V1) is applied.