JPH06219028A - Multicolor printer - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Abstract] [Purpose] To provide a multi-color printing device capable of performing efficient color printing with a short printing time by minimizing waste of an ink ribbon. A first ribbon cassette 1 in which a ribbon of a first color is stored and a second ribbon cassette 2 in which a ribbon of a second color different from the first color is stored are stacked and placed. The carriage 6 is used to print the first color during the forward movement of the carriage 6 and to print the second color during the backward movement of the carriage 6.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a multicolor printer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a conventional serial thermal transfer printer as a multi-color printing device, when performing color printing, four colors of yellow, magenta, cyan, and black are sequentially arranged for each predetermined length in the main scanning direction of the printer. It is printed using the ink ribbon that is painted separately. Since the length of each color of the ink ribbon requires the length in the main scanning direction of the receiving paper, use the above-described ink ribbons arranged in the order of yellow, magenta, cyan, and black, and print one line at a time in this order. In a special case, the ink ribbon is not wasted, but when printing each line with the same color, the unused ink ribbon is fed in a blank manner, and the other three colors not used are completely wasted.

[0003]

However, in actuality, most of the characters are printed in black in practice, and most of the parts other than black are left unprinted as a used ink ribbon. It has been wound up.
This also applies to sentences that use a lot of color, and even if there is an unused color, that portion is wound up as a used ink ribbon. As described above, most of the ink ribbon is discarded even though it is unused, which is very expensive. Further, since it is necessary to send four color ink ribbons to print one line, it takes a very long time to print even if the print data is one color.

The multi-color printing apparatus of the present invention has been made in view of such a problem, and its purpose is to reduce waste of the ink ribbon as much as possible, to shorten the printing time, and to achieve an efficient color printing. An object is to provide a multicolor printing device capable of printing.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above object, a multicolor printer of the present invention accommodates a ribbon of a first color and winds a starting end of the ribbon into a take-up core and an end of the ribbon. A first ribbon cassette having a driven core connected to the first core and a ribbon of a second color different from the first color; A second ribbon cassette having a driven core, a carriage on which the first ribbon cassette and the second ribbon cassette are placed on top of each other and movable in the main scanning direction of the paper, and the ribbon by the paper. A print head provided at a sandwiching position, first and second drive shafts provided upright on the carriage and respectively inserted through the two take-up cores and a driven core, and the first drive shaft being the first drive shaft. Drive in the direction of rotation A first drive means, second drive means for driving the second rotational direction opposite to said second drive shaft first direction of rotation, the first by forward movement of the carriage
To drive the first color to perform printing of the first color, and to return the second drive means to the second movement by moving the carriage back.
And a control means for controlling the print head and the first and second driving means to perform printing of the color.

[0006]

That is, in the multicolor printing apparatus of the present invention,
A carriage on which a first ribbon cassette accommodating a ribbon of a first color and a second ribbon cassette accommodating a ribbon of a second color different from the first color are stacked and placed. The first color is printed during the forward movement of the carriage, and the second color is printed during the backward movement of the carriage.

[0007]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

In FIG. 1, reference numeral 1 is a black ink ribbon cassette as a first ribbon cassette that contains a black ink ribbon 1R, and 2 is a color ink ribbon cassette as a second ribbon cassette that contains a color ink ribbon 2R. These ribbon cassettes 1 and 2 are arranged in an overlapping manner as shown in the drawing. The ink ribbon cassette 1 is provided with a winding core 14 that winds the start end of the ink ribbon 1R and a driven core 15 that is connected to the end end of the ink ribbon 1R. attached. The black ink ribbon and the color ink ribbon take-up shafts 3 and 4 of the ribbon take-up mechanism, which will be described later, are attached to the claw so that the take-up core 14 and the driven core 1
It goes through 5. Although not shown, the ink ribbon cassette 2 also has a winding core that winds the ink ribbon 2R and a driven core that is connected to the end of the ink ribbon 2R. The color ink ribbon take-up shaft 4 passes through the follower core of the ink ribbon 2R. Further, since the ink ribbons 1R and 2R have a vertically symmetrical structure, they can be used a plurality of times by switching them upside down.

Reference numeral 5 denotes an end surface type thermal head as a print head, which is arranged to move the ink ribbon 1R or 2R from the back side toward the paper surface so as to be pressed against the paper surface so as to be perpendicular to the surface of the ink ribbon. There is. During the printing operation, the thermal head 5 does not move up and down, but the ribbon cassettes 1 and 2 move up and down, so that the thermal head 5 contacts one of the ink ribbons 1R and 2R. FIG. 1A shows a state in which printing is performed using the black ink ribbon cassette 1 set on the upper stage,
The thermal head 5 is located in the recess of the black ink ribbon cassette 1. Similarly, FIG. 1B shows a state in which printing is performed using the color ink ribbon cassette 2 set in the lower stage.

FIG. 2 is an overall view of the multicolor printing apparatus. In the figure, the ink ribbon cassettes 1 and 2 are carriages 6.
It is arranged on top. Further, on the carriage 6, a ribbon winding mechanism, which will be described later, connected to the winding shafts 3 and 4, a cassette elevating mechanism and a head driving mechanism (not shown) constituting a control unit, and a ribbon sensor are arranged. is there. Further, a guide shaft 7 is passed through the carriage 6, and the carriage 6 is moved in the main scanning direction by a motor 9 via a toothed flat belt 8.

The receiving paper 10 is sandwiched between a paper pressing roller 11 and a paper feeding roller (not shown), and the paper can be fed in the sub-scanning direction by the power of a paper feeding motor (not shown). 12 is a platen, which is used for receiving paper 10 during printing operation.
The ink ribbons 1R and 2R are pressed against the platen 12 by the thermal head 5. Frame 1
The above-mentioned parts are arranged in 3 as shown.

A part of the ribbon winding mechanism provided upright on the carriage 6 is shown in FIGS. 3 is a sectional view of the black ink ribbon take-up shaft 3 shown in FIG. 1, and FIG. 4 is a sectional view of the color ink ribbon take-up shaft 4 shown in FIG. In FIG. 3, 3a is an upper cassette winding shaft as a first drive shaft, and 3b is a lower cassette driven shaft. The upper cassette winding shaft 3a is fixed to a clutch pad shaft 3c as a first driving means, and these shafts rotate integrally. On the other hand, the lower cassette driven shaft 3b can freely rotate with respect to the clutch pad shaft 3c. A clutch felt 3g, a gear 3e, and a clutch pad 3d are provided on the clutch pad shaft 3c as shown in the figure, and are pressed by a spring 3f.

Similarly, in FIG. 4, 4a is an upper cassette driven shaft, 4b is a lower cassette winding shaft as a second driving shaft, 4c is a clutch pad shaft as a second driving means, 4e is a gear and 4d. Is a clutch pad, 4f is a spring, and 4g is a clutch felt. 3 is that the lower cassette winding shaft 4b is fixed to the clutch pad shaft 4c, and the upper cassette driven shaft 4a can freely rotate with respect to the clutch pad shaft 4c. .

The printing operation of the multicolor printing apparatus having the above-mentioned structure will be described below. First, the case of printing black print data will be described. In this case, the ribbon elevating mechanism attached to the carriage 6 holds the ribbon cassettes 1 and 2 in the lowered position. Therefore, the positional relationship between the ribbon cassettes 1 and 2 and the thermal head 5 is as shown in FIG. In this state, the thermal head 5
FIG. 5A is a view of the receiving paper 10 from the side. In this state, the carriage 6 shown in FIG. 2 moves to the print start position by the power of the motor 9. Therefore, the thermal head 5 is moved to the platen 12 by the head drive mechanism.
By driving the platen 12, the receiving paper 10 and the ink ribbon 1R against the platen 12, the predetermined printing pressure is applied.

Further, while keeping this state, the carriage 6 prints according to the print data while moving in the direction of 6b in FIG. At this time, only the black ink ribbon 1R travels in the direction 1D of FIG. 5A, the power applied to the gear 3e of FIG. 3 is transmitted to the upper cassette winding shaft 3a via the clutch pad 3d, etc. Take up the ink ribbon (BK) 1R. At this time, since the lower cassette driven shaft 3b is free, the color ink ribbon (YMC) 2
R is not wound. After printing one line of print data, the carriage 6 stops moving and the thermal head 5 moves away from the platen 12.

When performing color printing, the ribbon cassettes 1 and 2 are lifted by the cassette lifting mechanism, as shown in FIG.
As shown in (b), the thermal head 5 is held at a position that fits in the recess of the color ink ribbon cassette 2. FIG. 5B is a diagram showing this state from the thermal head 5 side toward the receiving paper 10. Contrary to the case of black printing, the carriage 6 moves to the right end of FIG. 2, which is the print start position, in this state. Therefore, the thermal head 5 is driven to the platen 12 side by the head driving mechanism, and the platen 12, the receiving paper 10 and the ink ribbon 1R are pressed against the platen 12 so that a predetermined printing pressure is applied. Then, while maintaining this state, the carriage 6 prints according to the print data while moving in the direction 6c in FIG. 2 opposite to the case of black printing.

At this time, only the color ink ribbon (YMC) 2R runs in the direction 2D of FIG. 5B, and the power applied to the gear 4e of FIG. 4 is transmitted through the clutch pad 4d and the like to the lower cassette winding shaft. 4b and the used color ink ribbon 2R is wound up. In this case, since the upper cassette driven shaft 4a is free, the black ink ribbon 1R is not wound.

By the way, in the case of color printing, overprinting may be necessary depending on the color. In that case, the color ink ribbon 2R is wound up until the predetermined color is confirmed by the ribbon sensor, the thermal head 5 is separated from the platen 12, the carriage 6 is moved to the predetermined print start position again, and the same operation is performed. Strike repeatedly.

In the above embodiment, the thermal head 5 is brought into contact with the ink ribbon 1R or 2R by holding the thermal head 5 at the same position during printing and moving the ink ribbon cassette up and down. Alternatively, the thermal head 5 may be moved and brought into contact with the ink ribbon 1R or 2R. Further, although the thermal head is used as the print head, the present invention is not limited to this, and for example, an impact type wire head may be used.
As described above, in this embodiment,

A) The black ink ribbon cassette and the color ink ribbon cassette are separated from each other in consideration that most of the documents are composed of black print data. Therefore, the amount of black ink ribbon per cassette can be increased and exchanged. You can reduce the number of times. In addition, the portion of the color ink ribbon that is not used at all will not be wound up.
Also, it is economical because only one can be exchanged. further,

B) By using an end face type head and two ink ribbon cassettes, reciprocal printing is possible, and when performing color printing, scanning can be performed from the direction opposite to the black printing direction, thus shortening the printing time. Furthermore, c) By using two ink ribbon cassettes of the same color in an overlapping manner, a single-color high-speed printer capable of reciprocal printing is obtained.

[0022]

As described above in detail, according to the present invention, the first ribbon cassette in which the ribbon of the first color is stored and the ribbon in the second color different from the first color are stored. Using a carriage on which the second ribbon cassette and the second ribbon cassette are placed in an overlapping manner, the first color is printed during the forward movement of the carriage, and the second color is printed during the backward movement of the carriage. Therefore, the waste of the ink ribbon is eliminated, and it is possible to perform efficient color printing with a short printing time.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a ribbon cassette according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an overall view of a multicolor printing apparatus equipped with the ribbon cassette of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a sectional view of a black ink ribbon winding mechanism.

FIG. 4 is a sectional view of a color ink ribbon winding mechanism.

FIG. 5 is a diagram for explaining a printing operation of the multi-color printing device.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 ... Black ink ribbon, 2 ... Color ink ribbon cassette, 3 ... Black ink ribbon winding shaft, 4 ... Color ink ribbon winding shaft, 5 ... Thermal head, 6 ... Carriage, 7 ... Guide shaft, 8 ... Flat belt with teeth , 9 ... Motor, 10 ... Receiving paper, 11 ... Paper pressing roller, 12 ... Platen, 13 ... Frame.

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Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A first ribbon cassette that accommodates a ribbon of a first color and has a winding core that winds a start end of the ribbon and a driven core that is connected to an end of the ribbon, and the first color cassette. A second ribbon cassette that stores a ribbon of a different second color, and has a winding core that winds the start end of the ribbon and a driven core that is connected to the end of the ribbon; the first ribbon cassette and the first ribbon cassette; A carriage on which two ribbon cassettes are stacked and movable in the main scanning direction of a sheet, a print head provided at a position where the ribbon is sandwiched between the sheets, and a carriage which is erected on the carriage and is provided with the two take-up rollers. First and second drive shafts respectively inserted into the core and the driven core; first drive means for driving the first drive shaft in a first rotation direction; and a second drive shaft for the first drive shaft. The opposite of the direction of rotation of Second drive means for driving in the rotational direction and forward movement of the carriage to operate the first drive means to perform printing of a first color, and return movement of the carriage to operate the second drive means. A multicolor printing apparatus comprising: a control unit that controls the print head and the first and second driving units to perform printing of a second color.