Patent ID: 6234604
Filing Date: 2001-05-22
Classification: B41J

Abstract:
An ink jet recording apparatus, comprising:a carriage shuttling across a width of a recording medium;a recording head being mounted on said carriage and jetting ink droplets out of a nozzle opening;an ink receiving means arranged in a nonprinting region, said ink receiving means for receiving ink droplets jetted during a periodic flushing operation performed at a predetermined cycle during a printing operation;a cap member capable of sealing said recording head during at least one of a period of non-operation of said ink jet recording apparatus and a recovery operation;a timer outputting a signal upon measurement of a predetermined time, which is longer than the predetermined cycle, during a period of operation of said ink jet recording apparatus measured from one of a point in time at which said recording head is released from said cap member after a print command has been outputted and a point in time at which said timer is reset and restarted; anda flushing control means controllable to move the recording head to the ink receiving means so that the recording head jets ink droplets, in response to the signal from the timer, and to reset the timer.