IMPACT DOT HEAD FOR A PRINTER

Abstract: An impact dot head (H) for a printer comprising a printing member (3,6,7,8) having a printing wire portion (8) and a plunger portion (3) carried by a spring portion (7), the spring portion (7) urging the printing wire portion (8) towards a printing position thereof; an electromagnet (2,5);a permanent magnet (4) which is effective in attracting the plunger portion (3) towards part (5) of the electromagnet (2,5) when printing is not occurring so as to maintain the spring portion portion (7), and consequently the printing wire portion (8),in a non-printing position thereof; the electromagnet (2,5), when energized to effect printing, rendering the permanent magnet (4) ineffective in attracting the plunger portion (3) so that the spring (7) causes the printing wire portion (8) to move to its printing position characterised in that the printing member (3,6,7,8) has an abutment portion (6) which is engageable with a stopper (9) carried by said head (H), the arrangement being such that, when the electromagnet (2,5) is de-energized and consequently the permanent magnet (4) becomes effective again in attracting the plunger portion (3), the abutment portion (6) strikes against the stopper portion (9) simultaneously with or before the plunger portion (3) can strike against any part (5) of the electromagnet (2,5) whereby to prevent or reduce the force of impact between the plunger portion (3) and any such part (5).

Description: The present invention relates to an impact dot head for a printer. An impact dot head is known in which, when printing is not carried out, a plunger, which has been attracted by the magnetic flux of a permanent magnet, is held in direct contact with a core or in indirect contact with the core via a spacer interposed between the plunger and the core. With such a known impact dot head, however, since the plunger and the core collide forcibly against each other either directly, or indirectly via the spacer, at the time of the return of the plunger to a standby state after printing, the plunger and the core are subjected to heavy wear, with the result that they have a short life. In addition, generally, a material having high mechanical strength does not have good magnetic characteristics, so that it is not practicable to arrange that the plunger and the core are formed of a high-strength material having high wear resistance. On the other hand, if the spacer is made thick enough to absorb the collision energy, the efficiency of the magnetic circuit is reduced. As a result, the thickness of the spacer has to be restricted, so that it cannot be said that providing a spacer between the core and the plunger is adequate to deal with the collison problem referred to above. Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a long-life impact dot head which is capable of reducing the amount of wear on the plunger and the core without sacrificing the efficiency of the magnetic circuit. In DE-A-3,149,300, there is disclosed an impact dot head for a printer comprising a printing member having a printing wire portion and a plunger portion carried by a spring portion, the spring portion urging the printing wire portion towards a printing position thereof; an electromagnet; a permanent magnet which is effective in attracting the plunger portion towards part of the electromagnet when printing is not occurring so as to maintain the spring portion, and consequently the printing wire portion, in a non-printing position thereof; the electromagnet when energized to effect printing, rendering the permanent magnet ineffective in attracting the plunger portion so that the spring causes the printing wire portion to move to its printing position, the printing member having an abutment portion which is engageable with a stopper carried by said head. The arrangement is, however, such that, when the electromagnet is de-energized and consequently the permanent magnet becomes effective again in attracting the plunger portion, the abutment portion does not strike against the stopper portion until after the plunger portion strikes against a part of the electromagnet. This assists in dampening the oscillatory movement of the plunger portion but still causes considerable wear of the latter. According, therefore, to the present invention, there is provided an impact dot head for a printer comprising a printing member having a printing wire portion and a plunger portion carried by a spring portion, the spring portion urging the printing wire portion towards a printing position thereof; an electromagnet; a permanent magnet which is effective in attracting the plunger portion towards part of the electromagnet when printing is not occurring so as to maintain the spring portion, and consequently the printing wire portion, in a non-printing position thereof; the electromagnet, when energized to effect printing, rendering the permanent magnet ineffective in attracting the plunger portion so that the spring causes the printing wire portion to move to its printing position, the printing member having an abutment portion which is engageable with a stopper carried by said head, characterised in that the arrangement is such that, when the elctromagnet is de-energized and consequently the permanent magnet becomes effective again in attracting the plunger portion, the abutment portion strikes against the stopper portion simultaneously with or before the plunger portion can strike against any part of the electromagnet, whereby to prevent or reduce the force of impact between the plunger portion and any such part. The stopper may have a laminated construction and may thus have portions of plastics material, metallic material and rubber material. The metallic portion may have slits therein to impart resiliency thereto. The electromagnet may comprise a coil wound around a core, the core and plunger portion having adjacent surfaces which face each other. The abutment portion is preferably disposed between the plunger portion and the printing wire portion. The invention also comprises a printer provided with an impact dot head as set forth above. Thus, in the case of the present invention, the impact dot head is arranged so that the abutment portion collides with the stopper during a return to the standby state after printing and most of the kinetic energy is absorbed by the stopper. Accordingly, even if the plunger collides with the said core, either directly or indirectly via a spacer, when the abutment portion collides with the stopper, the collision energy between the plunger and the core is reduced. Accordingly, even if a soft magnetic material having a low mechanical strength but having excellent magnetic properties is used for the plunger and the core, these members are less susceptible to wear and deformation. Hence, it is possible to prolong the life of the impact dot head and improve the efficiency of the magnetic circuit. The invention is illustrated, merely by way of example, in the accompanying drawings, in which:- Figure 1 is a cross-sectional view illustrating an embodiment of an impact dot head for a printer in accordance with the present invention; Figure 1A is a view corresponding to that of Figure 1 but illustrating the magnetic circuits employed; Figure 2 is a cross-sectional view of the impact dot head of Figure 1 illustrated in divided form with a spacer 1 as a boundary; Figure 3 is an enlarged view of part of Figure 1; Figure 4 is an enlarged view of part of Figure 1 illustrating the case in which a stopper of the impact dot head is subjected to elastic deformation; Figure 5 is a perspective view illustrating a laminated construction of the said stopper; and Figure 6 is a top plan view of a printer with the impact dot head of Figures 1-5 mounted thereon. Figure 6 is a schematic top plan view of a wire dot printer provided with an impact dot head in accordance with the present invention. The wire dot printer is arranged such that a desired character, figure or the like is printed on a printing paper K interposed between a platen P and an inked ribbon R by means of an impact dot head H which is mounted on a carriage C, the carriage C being slidably mounted for movement in the direction of a line of print. Referring now to Figures 1 to 5, a description will be given of an embodiment of the impact dot head H. Figure 1 is a cross-sectional view of an impact dot head in accordance with the present invention. The left-hand portion of Figure 1 shows a standby state during non-printing when an electromagnetic coil 2, which is wound around a magnetisable core 5, is not energized, while the right-hand portion thereof shows the state at the time of printing when the electromagnetic coil 2 is energized. Figure 2 illustrates the impact print head in divided form with a spacer 1 as a boundary. During non-printing and standby, as shown in Figure 3 which is a partially enlarged view of Figure 1, since a magnetisable plunger or armature 3, which is mounted at the distal end of a spring 7, is subjected to attraction towards the core 5 by the magnetic flux produced by a permanent magnet 4, the spring 7, and consequently a printing wire 8 carried thereby, is biased into a non-printing position thereof. The permanent magnet 4 is disposed between a part of the core 5 and a magnetisable ring member 10, the latter being disposed beneath a magnetisable ring member 11. However, since an abutment member 6, which is disposed between the plunger 3 and the printing wire 8, is prevented from advancing further by a stopper 9 before the plunger 3 is brought into contact with the core 5 via the spacer 1, an end surface 3a of the plunger 3 is maintained out of contact with any other members. For printing, the effect of the magnetic flux produced by the permanent magnet 4 is caused to disappear by energizing the electromagnetic coil 2, whereby the attraction of the plunger 3 toward the core 5 is cancelled, causing the printing wire 8 secured to the distal end of the abutment member 6 to move under the urging force of the spring 7 so as to project outwardly of a casing 12 of the impact print head and into a printing position. Upon completion of the energization of the electromagnetic coil 2 and printing by means of the wire 8 striking against the printing paper K via the inked ribbon R, the plunger 3 is attracted again by the magnetic flux produced by the permanent magnet 4, the abutment member 6 strikes against the stopper 9, and kinetic energy is absorbed by the stopper 9. At this time, as shown in Figure 4, the stopper 9 is subjected to elastic deformation, with the result that the plunger 3 is brought into contact with the core 5 via the spacer 1. However, since most of the kinetic energy has already been absorbed by the stopper 9, any impact to which the plunger 3, the spacer 1, and the core 5 are subjected during collision is small, so that it is possible to prevent severe wear of the core and the plunger, both of which are formed of a soft magnetic material having a low mechanical strength. Subsequently, the stopper 9 recovers from its resilient deformation and returns to the standby state during non-printing, as shown in Figure 3. The manner in which the apparatus of Figure 1 operates is illustrated diagrammatically in Figure 1A in which the shaded portions of the apparatus indicate portions thereof which are formed of magnetisable material through which the magnetic flux will flow when a magnetic field is applied thereto, the direction of the magnetic flux being indicated by the arrows. At stand-by, the magnetic flux from the permanent magnet 4 passes through the core 5 and the plunger 3 so as to generate a magnetic force of attraction F2 such that F2 = ø₂ 2µoS, where ø₂ is the magnetic flux, µo is the magnetic permeability of the air, and S is the cross-sectional area of the plunger 3 and core 5 through which the magnetic flux passes. The magnetic force of attraction F2 is arranged to be greater than the force F1 exerted by the spring 7. Consequently, at the time of stand-by, the plunger 3 will be attracted towards the core 5 and the spring 7 will yield. The electromagnet constituted by the coil 2 and core 5 is such that, when energised at the time of printing, N and S poles are generated as shown in Figure 1A. Consequently, the magnetic flux of the permanent magnet 4, whose N and S poles are disposed as indicated, does not pass between the core 5 and the plunger 3. As a result, the force F2 is not generated so that the spring 7 will be freely moved by the force F1. Consequently, the printing wire 8 will be forced outwardly of the casing 12 and into the printing position. In this embodiment, as shown in the exploded perspective view of Figure 5, the stopper 9 has a laminated construction comprising a resin film or plastics portion 9a, a metallic portion 9b provided with slits 9d to impart resiliency thereto, and a rubber portion 9c for absorbing kinetic energy. Thus, the stopper 9 has adequate capacity for absorbing energy and, at the same time, has good durability. It should be noted that although in this embodiment the gap between the end surface 3a of the plunger 3 and an end surface 5a of the core 5 during non-printing and standby is set at 0.03 mm, and the thickness of the spacer 1 is set at 0.02 mm, the spacer 1 is not required if the gap between the end surface 3a of the plunger 3 and the end surface 5a of the core 5 during non-printing and standby is arranged to be large and within the range in which the effect of a drop in the efficiency of the magnetic circuit is small, so that the end surface 3a of the plunger 3 and the end surface 5a of the core 5 are not brought into contact with each other even when the stopper 9 is subjected to resilient deformation at the time of the collision of the abutment member 6 therewith. In order to simplify the above description reference has been made to only one single printing member 6, 7, 8 having a printing wire portion 8, a spring portion 7 and an abutment portion 6. In practice, however, the printer would have a plurality of such printing members, there being one ring-type permanent magnet which is common to all the said printing members. Moreover, although the above description refers to the abutment member 6 striking the stopper 9 before the plunger 3 strikes the core 5, it is also possible to arrange that the two collisions are simultaneous since this will have the effect of increasing the area of impact and consequently reducing its effective force.

Claims: An impact dot head (H) for a printer comprising a printing member (3,6,7,8) having a printing wire portion (8) and a plunger portion (3) carried by a spring portion (7), the spring portion (7) urging the printing wire portion (8) towards a printing position thereof, an electromagnet (2,5); a permanent magnet (4) which is effective in attracting the plunger portion (3) towards part (5) of the electromagnet (2,5) when printing is not occurring so as to maintain the spring portion (7), and consequently the printing wire portion (8), in a non-printing position thereof; the electromagnet (2,5), when energized to effect printing, rendering the permanent magnet (4) ineffective in attracting the plunger portion (3) so that the spring (7) causes the printing wire portion (8) to move to its printing position, the printing member (3,6,7,8) having an abutment portion (6) which is engageable with a stopper (9) carried by said head (H), characterised in that the arrangement is such that, when the electromagnet (2,5) is de-energized and consequently the permanent magnet (4) becomes effective again in attracting the plunger portion (3), the abutment portion (6) strikes against the stopper portion (9) simultaneously with or before the plunger portion (3) can strike against any part (5) of the electromagnet (2,5), whereby to prevent or reduce the force of impact between the plunger portion (3) and any such part (5). An impact dot head as claimed in claim 1 characterised in that the stopper (9) has a laminated construction. An impact dot head as claimed in claim 2 characterised in that the stopper (9) has portions (9a,9b,9c) of plastics material, metallic material and rubber material. An impact dot head as claimed in claim 3 characterised in that the metallic portion (9b) has slits (9d) therein to impart resiliency thereto. An impact dot head as claimed in any preceding claim characterised in that the electromagnet (2,5) comprises a coil (2) wound around a core (5), the core (5) and plunger portion (3) having adjacent surfaces (5a,3a) which face each other. An impact dot head as claimed in any preceding claim characterised in that the abutment portion (6) is disposed between the plunger portion (3) and the printing wire portion (8). A printer characterised by being provided with an impact dot head as claimed in any preceding claim.

Inventors: KURIYAMA, TOSHIO, TAKEUCHI, TAKASHI, KURIYAMA, TOSHIO, C/O SEIKO EPSON CORPORATION, TAKEUCHI, TAKASHI, C/O SEIKO EPSON CORPORATION
Applicants: SEIKO EPSON CORPORATION
Application year: 1990
Main classification: B41J2
IPC codes: B41J9, B41J2