Abstract:
Data in memory means of an ink cartridge can be read, written and rewritten by a recording apparatus. When abnormality has occurred in the recording apparatus, the information can be notified to a user or the like based on the data stored in the memory means of the ink cartridge. Further, control means is provided, which reads, writes and rewrites the data stored in the memory means of the ink cartridge, and in case that abnormality such as print error has occurred in the recording apparatus, the information can be given to the user based on the data stored in the memory means of the ink cartridge.

Description:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
     This is a continuation application of International Application No. PCT/JP99/05002 filed on Sep. 13, 1999. 
    
    
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention relates to an ink cartridge capable of supplying ink to printing means of an ink jet recording apparatus such as an ink jet printer, and its recording apparatus. 
     This type of a conventional printing apparatus has been disclosed in, for example, JP-A-8-248839 (known example). The summary of this apparatus is that a component exchangeably mounted to the printing apparatus are provided with a memory of which data can be read, written, and rewritten by the printing apparatus. 
     In the known example, a recording method is changed based on data from the memory so as to effectively perform a printing operation. 
     However, in this known example, the data of the memory is utilized solely for the purpose of changing the recording method. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     A first problem that the invention is to solve is to provide what can judge availability of an ink cartridge and compatibility thereof to the recording apparatus based on data of memory means provided to the ink cartridge and notify a user of them. 
     A second problem that the invention is to solve is to provide what can rapidly remove a cause of abnormal state such as print error in the recording apparatus. 
     A third problem that the invention is to solve is to provide what causes an user to precisely know a stable using state of the ink cartridge, a stable using state between the ink cartridge and the recording apparatus, etc. and to suitably adopt them. 
     The present disclosure relates to the subject matter contained in Japanese patent application No. Hei. 10-260052 (filed on Sep. 14, 1998), which is expressly incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. 
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
     FIG. 1 is a diagram showing one embodiment of an ink jet recording apparatus of the present invention. 
     FIG. 2 is a diagram showing one embodiment of a recording mechanism of the ink jet recording apparatus of the invention. 
     FIGS. 3A and 3B are diagrams each showing one embodiment of an ink cartridge used in the ink jet recording apparatus of the invention. 
     FIG. 4 is a constitutional view showing one embodiment of the ink jet recording apparatus of the invention. 
     FIGS. 5 and 6 are flowcharts according to a first aspect of the invention. 
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT 
     The detail of the invention will be described below based on the shown embodiment. 
     FIG. 1 shows one embodiment of an ink jet recording apparatus of the invention, in which ink cartridges  1  and  2  for supplying ink to a recording head are stored within a case  3 . 
     On an exposed surface of the case  3 , an operation panel  4  is provided, on which there are arranged a power switch  5 , an ink cartridge exchanging instruction-switch  6 , a black head cleaning instruction-switch  7 , a color head cleaning instruction-switch  8 , and displays  9 , 10  such as LEDs that are turned on and off or turned on when ink in a black cartridge and a color ink cartridge ends or an error occurs. 
     FIG. 2 shows a summary of the printing mechanism. A carriage  11  is connected to a carriage driving motor  13  through a timing belt  12  and constructed so as to reciprocate in parallel with a platen  15  while being guide by a guide member  14 . In the carriage  11 , a recording head  17  which ejects black ink is fixed on a printing region side (in the figure, on the left side) of its surface opposite to a recording sheet  16 , and a recording head  18  which ejects a color ink is fixed on non-printing region side (in the figure, on the right side) of the same. 
     A capping unit  19  disposed at the non-printing region is provided with a slider on which a cap  20  for sealing the black ink recording head  17  and a cap  21  for sealing the color ink recording head  18  are mounted, and each of the caps is connected through a tube to a duplex pump unit  23  which is driven by a motor  22 , and constructed so as to individually receive supply of a negative pressure. 
     Each of the caps  20  and  21  is formed in the shape of a cup made of elastic material such as rubber having a size with which the nozzle opening surface of the associated recording head  17 ,  18  can be sealed by one space. These caps  20  and  21  are so designed that they can seal the nozzle opening surfaces of the recording heads  17  and  18  at the non-printing time and can cause the recording heads  17  and  18  to forcibly eject ink by the negative pressure from the pump unit  23  at the time of a recovery operation of ejecting capacity or at the time of exchange of the ink cartridges  7  and  8 . Further, in the vicinity of the capping unit  19 , a cleaning unit  24  is disposed, which brings a wiping blade into contact with the nozzle opening surfaces of the recording heads  17  and  18  by power from a driving source (not shown). 
     FIGS. 3A and 3B show one embodiment of the black ink cartridge  1  and one embodiment of the color ink cartridge  2 , respectively. The black ink cartridge  1  has, on a surface thereof opposite to the carriage  11  when it is mounted on the carriage  11 , in this embodiment, on a bottom surface  30  thereof, an ink supply port  31  connectable to an ink guide passage of the recording head  17 , and memory means  32 , such as EEPROM that is a rewritable nonvolatile memory. 
     The color ink cartridge  2  is divided into a plurality of rooms that store individually a plurality of color ink therein. On a bottom surface  40  of the color ink cartridge  2 , there are provided ink supply ports  41 ,  42  and  43  which are communicated with respective ink chambers and can be connected to the ink guide passage of the recording head  18 , and also memory means  44 , such as EEPROM that is a rewritable nonvolatile memory. 
     These memory means  32  and  44  provided for the ink cartridges  1  and  2  are mounted on substrates  27  and  28 , and connected to control means  53  to be described later through contacts  33  and  45  connected to said memory means  32  and  44  by contacts  34  and  46  formed at the carriage, so that data stored in these memory means  32  and  44  are read or data of the memory means in a main body of the recording apparatus is written. 
     Each memory means of the ink cartridges of the invention has at least the following data relating to the ink cartridge. As a data storage mode, data is stored with a data format that can be recognized by the recording apparatus main body or by a host computer connected to the recording apparatus. 
     (a) Kind of Data 
     Kind (type number) of ink cartridge 
     (b) Recovery Data 
     Data at the time of the preceding recovery operation 
     (c) Manufacturing Data 
     At least data of year and month when the ink cartridge has been manufactured is stored, and also data of date and time when the ink cartridge has been manufactured can be stored. 
     (d) Mounting Data 
     Data of at least year and month when the ink cartridge has been mounted 
     (e) Destination Data 
     Destination data such as corresponding areas or corresponding countries of the ink cartridge 
     FIG. 4 shows one embodiment of a controlling device of the recording apparatus. The control device is so designed that in a state where the contacts  34  and  46  of the carriage  11  are connected to the contacts  33  and  45  of the ink cartridges  1  and  2 , data reading and writing means  50  read the data in the memory means  32  and  44  of the ink cartridges  1  and  2  or write the data of the memory means provided for a recording device to be described later into the memory means  32  and  44  of the ink cartridges  1  and  2 . 
     Ink cartridge exchange judging means  51  receives signals from switches  35  and  47  that are located at positions of the carriage  11  opposite to the ink cartridges  1  and  2 , in this embodiment on a cartridge receiving surface of the carriage  11 , and that are push-operated by the ink cartridges  1  and  2 , to thereby detect attachment and detachment of the ink cartridges  1  and  2 . 
     Upon reception of control from the controlling means  53 , carriage motor controlling means  52  causes the carriage  11  to reciprocate for printing and also causes the recording heads  17  and  18  to move to positions where the recording heads  17  and  18  can be capped at the time of the ejection recovering operation. 
     Upon reception of control from the controlling means  53 , suction controlling means  54  causes the recording heads  17  and  18  to be sealed by the capping unit  19 , and causes pump driving means  55  to control suction force of each suction pump  23   a ,  23   b  and suction time thereof thereby to forcibly eject ink from the recording heads  17  and  18  for the purpose of recovery of ink ejecting capacity. Further, when the ink cartridges  1  and  2  are exchanged, the suction controlling means  54  fills ink into the recording heads  17  and  18  from the ink cartridges  1  and  2  so that the printing operation can be performed. 
     Printing/flashing control means  56  causes head driving means  57  to output driving signals for ejecting ink droplets to each of the recording heads  17  and  18  based on the print data from the host, thereby to execute printing. Further, when each of recording heads  17  and  18  is located at a flashing position (for example, a position opposite to the cap), the means  56  causes the ink droplets to be ejected from all of nozzle openings by outputting the similar driving signals as the aforesaid signals, so that the viscosity-increased ink is ejected to the cap serving as an ink reception member. 
     Residual ink amount detecting means  58  adds up the number of dots formed by the printing operation, the number of the ink droplets ejected by the flashing operation, and the amount of ink consumed by the filling operation and the cleaning operation to calculate the amount of the residual ink in the ink cartridges  1  and  2 . 
     Power-break detecting means  59  detects on/off of the power switch  5  and outputs signals indicative of that state. Further, when a power-off operation is performed, after the predetermined following operations have been executed, the means  59  stops power-supply to the apparatus. 
     The control means  53  receives signals from the ink cartridge exchanging instruction-switch  6  of the panel  4 , the cleaning instruction switches  7  and  8  of the panel  4 , the power-break detecting means  59 , the residual ink amount detecting means  58  and the host, and generalizes operations, such as a power-on operation, a power-off operation, a cleaning operation, a residual ink amount checking operation, a printing operation and an ink cartridge exchanging operation. Further, the control means  53  stores, in the memory means  63 , various statuses associated with the exchange of the ink cartridge at the time of the power-off operation. Moreover, the control means  53  receives signals from a paper-supply error detecting section  62  for detecting paper-supply error such as paper-jam, and an ejection error detecting section  63  for detecting ejection error of ink droplets, and performs an error displaying operation. 
     This ink cartridge  1 ,  2  and the recording apparatus aim to continue the high quality recording operation of a high quality by supplying the optimum ink from the ink cartridge  1 ,  2  mounted in the recording apparatus to the recording apparatus, and are featured in that, when a problem such as the print error occurs, the recording apparatus reads data of the recording means  32 ,  44  of the ink cartridge  1 ,  2 , and informs an operator of a main cause of the problem to promote the execution of the corresponding countermeasures. 
     Next, operations of this ink cartridge and recording apparatus will be described with reference to flowcharts shown in FIGS. 5 and 6. 
     The ink cartridges  1 ,  2  are mounted on the carriage  11  serving as a mounting portion of the recording apparatus, and the ink supplying portions  31 ,  41 ,  42 ,  43  are communicated with the recording heads  17 ,  18  to enter a stand-by state for ink supply (S 1 ). 
     In this state, the memory means  32 ,  44  are connected to respective contact portions  34 ,  46  of the recording apparatus so that the kind data (c) of the data stored in the memory means  32 ,  44  is read-out by the data reading and writing means  50 , and compared by the control means  53  with the designated ink cartridge data retrieved from the memory means  60 , whereby compatibility of the ink cartridges  1 ,  2  to the recording apparatus is judged (S 2 ). If the ink cartridge  1 ,  2  is not compatible to the recording apparatus, the incompatibility is displayed in the displays  9 , to give an alarm to the operator (S 3 ), and a starting operation of the recording apparatus is restrained (S 4 ). 
     If it is judged that the ink cartridge  1 ,  2  is compatible to the recording apparatus, the date data is recorded in the memory means  60  (S 5 ), and when a recording instruction is given by operation means (not shown), ink supplied from ink storage portion of the ink cartridge  1 ,  2  is supplied from the ink supplying portion to the recording head portion, whereby the desired recording operation is executed (S 6 ). 
     Next, when the operator requires the recovery operation of the recording head according to the necessity as the recording operation processes (S 7 ), the recording apparatus records, in the memory means  60 , time point at which the recovery operation such as a suction operation for sucking ink from the recording head has been performed (S 8 ). 
     After the recording operation has been thus executed suitably, the control section  53  calculates elapsed time based on time data of a timer means  61  and the recovery operation time point data of the memory means  60 , and compares the elapsed time with standard recovery interval data of the memory means  60  (S 9 ). In case that a predetermined time elapses, a normal recovery operation (S 10 ) is executed, while in case that the predetermined time does not elapse, the data reading and writing means  50  reads out data of the manufacturing date from the memory means  32 ,  44  and retrieves data of an effective period of use from the memory means  60  so that the control section  53  judges whether the effective period of use has been passed (S 11 ). If passed, the display sections  9 ,  10  display the passing of the effective period of use (S 12 ), and then the procedure proceeds to step S 13 . 
     Sequentially, mounting data is retrieved from the memory means  60  and compared with time point data of the timer  61  by the control section  53  (S 13 ). 
     As a consequence of this comparison, if the time elapsed from the mounting date exceeds the effective period of use, the display sections  9 ,  10  display similarly the passing of the effective period of use (S 14 ) and then the procedure proceeds to a step S 15 . 
     Next, destination data corresponding to this ink cartridge  1 ,  2  is read out by the data reading and writing means  50  from the memory means  32 ,  44 , and compared with the designated ink cartridge data of the recording means  60  by the control section  53  (S 15 ). In case that the destination data is not compatible to the designated ink cartridge data, the display sections  9 ,  10  display the incompatibility (S 16 ). 
     Then, the recovery operation for abnormal state is executed (S 17 ), and the procedure returns to the recording operation (S 6 ). 
     All of the elapsed time data confirmed by the recording apparatus (S 9 , S 11  and S 13 ) during this procedure is-informed of the memory means  32 ,  44  of the ink cartridge  1 ,  2  by the data reading and writing means  50 , and stored in the ink cartridges  1 ,  2  in a rewritten manner, so as to be effectively used in future recycling of the ink cartridge. 
     According to this ink cartridge and recording apparatus described above, a main cause of abnormal state which continuously requires the recovery operation is precisely informed of the operator by the display section, so that the operator can rapidly and correctly execute the operation for solving the problem. 
     Further, the effective countermeasure as described above makes it possible to eliminate operation error and damage of the recording apparatus caused by the ink cartridge. 
     As the display means, the display members  9  and  10  disposed in the case  3  are used, however, the indication and the alarm may be conducted on a host computer connected to the recording apparatus. In this case, more detailed data can be displayed than that in the display member of the recording apparatus, and can be also informed by voice. 
     As another informing method, the data to be informed may be printed on a paper medium. This method can be utilized in case that there is no display member, and even in case that there is a display member, this method can inform more detailed data. 
     Further, the informed data is stored in the memory means  60  of the recording apparatus for a predetermined period, whereby it can be utilized as the data for exchanging the cartridge by taking out the stored data according to the circumstances. 
     Further, a recording apparatus using an on-carriage type ink cartridge, which mounts an ink cartridge on a carriage, has been described as a recording apparatus. However, the invention can be applied to a recording apparatus using an off-carriage type ink cartridge, in which an ink cartridge is attached to a main body, i.e. a portion other than a carriage, of the apparatus, and ink is supplied to a recording head by a tube. 
     Effects of the above-described invention is as follows: 
     A main cause of problem on the recording operation due to the ink cartridge mounted on the recording apparatus can be recognized precisely, so that the corresponding operation for solving the problem can be rapidly executed. 
     Further, damage of the recording apparatus caused by the ink cartridge can be eliminated preliminarily.