Patent ID: 6704036
Filing Date: 2004-03-09
Classification: B41J

Abstract:
A color thermal printer for printing full-color images in a continuous color thermosensitive recording paper in which first-Nth coloring layers are formed on a base for respectively coloring, N mono-color images being recorded in different print areas of said color thermosensitive recording paper almost simultaneously to print said full-color images sequentially, said color thermal printer comprising:first-Nth thermal heads provided for said respective first-Nth coloring layers, each of said first-Nth thermal heads having plural heat elements which are arranged in a main-scanning direction, each heat element contacting to said color thermosensitive recording paper, and being driven on a basis of corrected mono-color image data to apply a heat energy for coloring to said coloring layer, and to record said mono-color image line by line; first-Nth platen roller confronting to said first-Nth thermal heads respectively for supporting said color thermosensitive recording paper pressed by said first-Nth thermal heads; and a calculation means to calculate for each line a friction between each thermal head and said color thermosensitive recording paper on basis of a heat energy corresponding to a mono-color image data at each thermal head, and to calculate a transport friction fluctuation according to said frictions between a recording line and a first previous line, said mono-color image data of said Kth thermal head being adjusted on the basis of all of said transport friction fluctuations of first-Nth thermal heads to become said corrected mono-color image data of said Kth thermal head, while K satisfies 1&lE;K&lE;N.