Abstract:
A bellows capping system is provided for sealing ink-ejecting nozzles of an inkjet printhead in an inkjet printing mechanism, such as a printer, during periods of printing inactivity. The system includes a support which moves between a sealing position and a rest position. The system also has a cap which extends from the support and terminates in a lip. The lip surrounds the nozzles when the support is in the sealing position. The cap has a wall with first and second leg portions joined together at a knee portion between the support and the lip. When sealing the printhead, the knee bends or buckles so the first and second portions collapse toward each other. Multiple knee portions may join together multiple wall portions in a bellows or accordion arrangement. An inkjet printing mechanism having the bellows capping system and method of using this capping system are also provided.

Description:
INTRODUCTION 
     The present invention relates generally to inkjet printing mechanisms, and more particularly to a bellows capping system for sealing an inkjet printhead during periods of printing inactivity. 
     Inkjet printing mechanisms use pens which shoot drops of liquid colorant, referred to generally herein as “ink,” onto a page. Each pen has a printhead formed with very small nozzles through which the ink drops are fired. To print an image, the printhead is propelled back and forth across the page, shooting drops of ink in a desired pattern as it moves. The particular ink ejection mechanism within the printhead may take on a variety of different forms known to those skilled in the art, such as those using piezo-electric or thermal printhead technology. For instance, two earlier thermal ink ejection mechanisms are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,278,584 and 4,683,481, both assigned to the present assignee, Hewlett-Packard Company. In a thermal system, a barrier layer containing ink channels and vaporization chambers is located between a nozzle orifice plate and a substrate layer. This substrate layer typically contains linear arrays of heater elements, such as resistors, which are energized to heat ink within the vaporization chambers. Upon heating, an ink droplet is ejected from a nozzle associated with the energized resistor. By selectively energizing the resistors as the printhead moves across the page, the ink is expelled in a pattern on the print media to form a desired image (e.g., picture, chart or text). 
     To clean and protect the printhead, typically a “service station” mechanism is mounted within the printer chassis so the printhead can be moved over the station for maintenance. For storage, or during non-printing periods, the service stations usually include a capping system which hermetically seals the printhead nozzles from contaminants and drying. To facilitate priming, some printers have priming caps that are connected to a pumping unit to draw a vacuum on the printhead. During operation, partial occlusions or clogs in the printhead are periodically cleared by firing a number of drops of ink through each of the nozzles in a clearing or purging process known as “spitting.” The waste ink is collected at a spitting reservoir portion of the service station, known as a “spittoon.” After spitting, uncapping, or occasionally during printing, most service stations have a flexible wiper, or a more rigid spring-loaded wiper, that wipes the printhead surface to remove ink residue, as well as any paper dust or other debris that has collected on the printhead. 
     To improve the clarity and contrast of the printed image, recent research has focused on improving the ink itself. To provide quicker, more waterfast printing with darker blacks and more vivid colors, pigment based inks have been developed. These pigment based inks have a higher solids content than the earlier dye-based inks, which results in a higher optical density for the new inks. Both types of ink dry quickly, which allows inkjet printing mechanisms to use plain paper. 
     During periods of printing inactivity, inkjet printheads are typically capped to prevent them from drying out, with the capping reducing evaporation of the ink components, as well as to protect the printhead from contamination due to environmental factors, such as dust, paper particles and the like. To form a good seal, the cap must conform to the printhead and supply enough force against the printhead to limit air transfer. Traditionally, capping has been accomplished using a compliant elastomer that is pressed against the printhead to create a complete seal. 
     Traditional inkjet capping solutions have used a vertical beam of elastomer that is pressed against the pen with considerable force, typically greater than 600 grams. Indeed, the forces on some pens may reach as much as 1200 grams or more due to variations in manufacturing tolerances, as well as whether the pen is properly seated against the carriage alignment datums, particularly in multi-pen systems. For instance, in a multi-pen system, one pen may be seated more deeply against the pen alignment datums than the remaining pens, leading to uneven capping forces where the more deeply seated pen receives a higher capping force than the pen which is not seated tightly against the datums. In extreme cases, very high capping forces may ultimately damage the delicate printhead orifice plate through which the ink ejecting nozzles are formed. In other cases having multiple printheads, the cumulative force experienced by one pen may actually exceed a printer&#39;s capability to maintain pen alignment and other critical specifications, actually causing the pen to be unseated from the alignment datums. To alleviate these various ills, both pen designers and printer designers look to the service station cap designers to accommodate these manufacturing and installment variations while avoiding damage to the pens. 
    
    
     DRAWING FIGURES 
     FIG. 1 is a perspective view of one form of an inkjet printing mechanism, here shown as an inkjet printer, having one form of a bellows capping system of the present invention. 
     FIG. 2 is a perspective view of one form of a service station of FIG. 1, including the bellows capping system. 
     FIG. 3 is an enlarged side elevational view of an inkjet printhead being sealed by the bellows capping system of FIG.  1 . 
     FIG. 4 is an enlarged cross-sectional view taken along lines  4 — 4  of FIG.  2 . 
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
     FIG. 1 illustrates an embodiment of an inkjet printing mechanism, here shown as an inkjet printer  20 , constructed in accordance with the present invention, which may be used for printing for business reports, correspondence, desktop publishing, and the like, in an industrial, office, home or other environment. A variety of inkjet printing mechanisms are commercially available. For instance, some of the printing mechanisms that may embody the present invention include plotters, portable printing units, copiers, cameras, video printers, and facsimile machines, to name a few. For convenience the concepts of the present invention are illustrated in the environment of an inkjet printer  20 . 
     While it is apparent that the printer components may vary from model to model, the typical inkjet printer  20  includes a chassis  22  surrounded by a housing or casing enclosure  24 , typically of a plastic material. Sheets of print media are fed through a printzone  25  by an adaptive print media handling system  26 , constructed in accordance with the present invention. The print media may be any type of suitable sheet material, such as paper, card-stock, transparencies, mylar, and the like, but for convenience, the illustrated embodiment is described using paper as the print medium. The print media handling system  26  has a feed tray  28  for storing sheets of paper before printing. A series of conventional motor-driven paper drive rollers (not shown) may be used to move the print media from tray  28  into the printzone  25  for printing. After printing, the sheet then lands on output tray portion  30 . The media handling system  26  may include a series of adjustment mechanisms for accommodating different sizes of print media, including letter, legal, A-4, envelopes, etc., such as a sliding length and width adjustment levers  32  and  33  for the input tray, and a sliding length adjustment lever  34  for the output tray. 
     The printer  20  also has a printer controller, illustrated schematically as a microprocessor  35 , that receives instructions from a host device, typically a computer, such as a personal computer (not shown). Indeed, many of the printer controller functions may be performed by the host computer, by the electronics on board the printer, or by interactions therebetween. As used herein, the term “printer controller  35 ” encompasses these functions, whether performed by the host computer, the printer, an intermediary device therebetween, or by a combined interaction of such elements. The printer controller  35  may also operate in response to user inputs provided through a key pad (not shown) located on the exterior of the casing  24 . A monitor coupled to the computer host may be used to display visual information to an operator, such as the printer status or a particular program being run on the host computer. Personal computers, their input devices, such as a keyboard and/or a mouse device, and monitors are all well known to those skilled in the art. 
     A carriage guide rod  36  is mounted to the chassis  22  to define a scanning axis  38 . The guide rod  36  slideably supports a reciprocating inkjet carriage  40 , which travels back and forth across the printzone  25  and into a servicing region  42 . Housed within the servicing region  42  is a service station  44 , which will be discussed in greater detail below with respect to the present invention. The illustrated carriage  40  carries four inkjet cartridges or pens  50 ,  51 ,  52  and  53  over the printzone  25  for printing, and into the servicing region  42  for printhead servicing. Each of the pens  50 ,  51 ,  52  and  53  have an inkjet printhead  54 ,  55 ,  56  and  58 , respectively, which selectively eject droplets of ink in response to firing signals received from the controller  35 . 
     One suitable type of carriage support system is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,366,305, assigned to Hewlett-Packard Company, the assignee of the present invention. A conventional carriage propulsion system may be used to drive the carriage  40 , including a position feedback system, which communicates carriage position signals to the controller  35 . For instance, a carriage drive gear and DC motor assembly may be coupled to drive an endless belt secured in a conventional manner to the pen carriage  40 , with the motor operating in response to control signals received from the printer controller  35 . To provide carriage positional feedback information to printer controller  35 , an optical encoder reader may be mounted to carriage  40  to read an encoder strip extending along the path of carriage travel. 
     In the printzone  25 , the media sheet receives ink from the inkjet cartridges  50 - 53 , such as the black ink cartridge  50 , the yellow ink cartridge  51 , the magenta ink cartridge  52 , and/or the cyan ink cartridge  53 . The cartridges  50 - 53  are also often called “pens” by those in the art. While the color pens  51 - 53  may contain pigment based inks, for the purposes of illustration, the color pens  51 - 53  are described as containing dye-based inks. The black ink pen  50  is illustrated herein as containing a pigment-based ink. It is apparent that other types of inks may also be used in pens  50 - 53 , such as thermoplastic, wax or paraffin based inks, as well as hybrid or composite inks having both dye and pigment characteristics. The illustrated pens  50 - 53  each include reservoirs for storing a supply of ink. 
     The printheads  54 - 58  each have an orifice plate with a plurality of nozzles formed therethrough in a manner known to those skilled in the art. The illustrated printheads  54 - 58  are thermal inkjet printheads, although other types of printheads may be used, such as piezoelectric printheads. Indeed, the printheads  54 - 58  typically include a substrate layer having a plurality of resistors which are associated with the nozzles. Upon energizing a selected resistor, a bubble of gas is formed to eject a droplet of ink from the nozzle and onto media in the printzone  25 . The printhead resistors are selectively energized in response to enabling or firing command control signals, which may be delivered by a conventional multi-conductor strip (not shown) from the controller  35  to the printhead carriage  40 , and through conventional interconnects between the carriage and pens  50 - 53  to the printheads  54 - 58 . 
     FIG. 2 shows the service station  44  as having a bellows capping system  60 , constructed in accordance with the present invention. The service station  44  includes a frame having a lower base portion  62  and an upper bonnet portion  64 . Sandwiched between the base  62  and bonnet  64  is a sled  65 , which is moved toward the forward and rear of the printer along the Y-axis by a motor and gear assembly  66 . For instance, the motor  66  may drive the sled  65  using a rack and pinion gear system, such as the system disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,980,018 and 6,132,026, currently assigned to the Hewlett-Packard Company. The interior of the service station base  62  may also be used as a spittoon  68  to capture ink which is purged or spit from the printheads  54 - 58 . 
     The sled  65  supports four bellows or accordion caps  70 ,  72 ,  74  and  76 , which are used to seal the printheads  54 ,  55 ,  56  and  58 , respectively. The caps  70 - 76  may be constructed of a resilient, non-abrasive, elastomeric material, such as nitrile rubber, silicone, ethylene polypropylene diene monomer (EPDM), or other comparable materials known in the art. To accomplish the sealing action, the sled  65  may also move in a vertical or Z-axis direction to elevate the caps  70 - 76  and bring them into a capping position, as well as to lower the caps to an inactive, rest or passive position, such as shown in FIG.  2 . For instance, cap elevation may be accomplished using a four bar linkage system as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,980,018 and 6,132,026 mentioned above, although other gears, solenoids, capping ramps and the like may be used to bring the caps  70 - 76  into sealing engagement with printheads  54 - 58 . 
     FIG. 3 shows cap  70  in the process of sealing the black printhead  54 , with sled  65  elevated into a capping or sealing position. It is apparent that in other inkjet printing implementations, it may be desirable to move the printhead  54  into engagement with cap  70 . While the illustrated embodiment shows the sled  65  carrying only caps  70 - 76 , it is apparent that the pallet may be designed to carry other printhead servicing components, such as wipers, solvent applicators, or primers, to name a few. In the lowered inactive position shown in FIG. 2, the sled  65  may be advantageously moved under the bonnet  64  to expose the spittoon  68  to receive ink spit from the printheads  54 - 58 . 
     As shown in FIG. 2 for cap  70 , each of the caps  70 - 76  have a front wall  80 , an opposing rear wall  82 , an inboard wall  84  and an opposing outboard wall  86 . As used herein, the term “inboard” refers to components facing in the positive X-axis direction, toward printzone  25 , while the term “outboard” refers to the opposite direction, that is, in the negative X-axis direction, toward the servicing region  42 . The walls  80 - 86  are joined together at the corners to form a rectangular capping structure which seals against the orifice plates of printheads  54 - 58 , with the rectangular structure being sized to surround the nozzles extending through the orifice plate. While a rectangular shaped cap is the most useful for linear nozzle arrays, it is apparent that other capping geometries may also prove useful in other implementations. 
     FIG. 4 shows cap  70  sealing the black printhead  54  to form a humid sealing region  88  between printhead  54 , cap  70 , and the sled  65 . While for the purposes of illustration, the caps  70 - 76  are illustrated as being directly molded to the sled  65 , a variety of other designs may be employed along sled  65 . For instance, cap venting systems are shown in the Hewlett-Packard Company&#39;s following U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,146,243; 5,867,184; 5,614,930; 5,956,053; and 6,220,689, all of which are suitable examples of different manners of venting the cap, as well as attaching the cap to the support sled  65 . 
     In FIG. 4 we see the inboard side wall  84  and the outboard side wall  86  as each having an upper sealing lip  90 , which is shown in FIG. 2 as being a unitary lip topping and joining together all of the walls  80 - 86 . Each of the walls  80 - 86  has a zigzag shape, forming a bellows or accordion type action within the entire cap. The upper portion of each cap wall terminates in an inwardly hooked beak or bill portion  92 , while the opposite end of each wall terminates in a base  94  which joins sled  65  in the illustrated embodiment. Each of the walls  80 - 86  has a lower leg portion  96 , adjacent the base, and an upper leg portion  98  adjacent the sealing lip  90  and hooked bill  92 , with the upper and lower legs  98 ,  96  being joined together along an edge or corner, such as by an inwardly bowed knee joint  100 . 
     FIG. 4 illustrates in dashed lines the inboard side wall  84  in an uncapped or rest position  84 ′. When brought into sealing contact with the printhead  54 , the knee joint  100  bends inwardly into the sealing region  88 , as indicated by arrow  102 , and the upper and lower leg portions  98 ,  96  are collapsed together along the exterior surfaces of the wall  84 . Simultaneously, depending upon the capping force available and required, the inwardly hooked beak  92  may also roll downwardly and inwardly into the sealing region  88 , as illustrated by arrow  104 . As the knee joint  100  buckles inwardly, the lower leg  96  rotates inwardly in the direction of arrow  106 , moving downwardly toward the sled  65 , while the upper leg  108  bows outwardly in the direction of arrow  108 , also moving downwardly toward the sled  65 . 
     The degree of flexion experienced by knee  100  of any of the walls  80 - 86  of an individual cap may vary, depending upon the alignment of a plane defined by the printhead orifice plate with respect to a plane defined by the cap sled  65 . Thus, the caps  70 - 76  may accommodate for planar variances between the sled  65  and the orifice plates forming the printheads  54 - 58 . Furthermore, different degrees of bending by knees  100  may be experienced between the various caps  70 - 76 , thereby allowing each cap to compress to a different degree to accommodate different seating depths of pens  50 - 53  within carriage  40 , as well as variations in the elevation of the orifice plates of printheads  54 - 58  due to various manufacturing tolerances within the pens themselves or within the carriage. Thus, the bellows capping system  60  allows for lower forces to be placed on the printheads  54 - 58  over a larger range of tolerance variation than was possible using earlier cap designs. The zigzag shape illustrated herein allows the caps  70 - 76  to be compressed a considerable distance while applying a desirably low force on each of the pens  50 - 53 . 
     Furthermore, the bellows caps  70 - 76  provide lower forces against the printheads  54 - 58  over a larger deflection range of the caps. Many traditional printhead caps have deflection ranges of 0.25 to 0.5 millimeters before they exceed the force capabilities of the system, potentially damaging printheads and/or unseating pens from their datums. Use of the bellows cap design allows caps to be tailored to reach almost any force versus deflection range required in inkjet printing, while still maintaining a good seal on the orifice plates. For instance, the bellows caps  70 - 76  should operate within a three millimeter range of deflection while maintaining forces of less than 600 grams against the printheads  54 - 58 . One benefit to having such a large deflection range, six to twelve times that experienced with most traditional caps, is the cost savings resulting from reduced part tolerance requirements, allowing both the printer  20  and the pens  50 - 53  to be more economically constructed. 
     A reduction in tolerance requirements makes capping multiple printheads with one piece of elastomer more feasible because the bellows capping system  60  deals with the tolerance issue from one end of the cap array to the other end. Although implementation of the bellows capping system  60  is not dependent on multiple caps being supported by a single elastomer, if the caps  70 - 76  were molded upon a common elastomeric base which is then fit over or upon sled  65 , then rather than having four separate elastomeric parts to construct caps  70 - 76 , a single capping unit may be employed. Such a single capping elastomeric part eliminates having separate spring loaded cap bases for each cap, such as the designed disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,867,184 and 5,956,053 both currently assigned to the Hewlett-Packard Company. Furthermore, fewer parts also leads to reduced assembly costs, and improved reliability for the overall system. 
     Thus, by using the bellows or zigzag geometric design, restoration forces inherent in the molded elastomeric caps  70 - 76  are controlled and manipulated, while also obtaining the greatest range of cap deflection and experiencing a very low range of forces against the printheads  54 - 58 . While other geometric designs may be used, such as by allowing the knees  100  to bend outwardly instead of inwardly, or by having multiple knees, this design may be modified in other ways to provide desired deflection and low capping forces. In the illustrated embodiment, the angled transitions, such as knees  100  and to a lesser extent the hooked bill portions  92 , produce a restoring force as they are compressed. This restoring force directly places forces onto the orifice plates of printheads  54 - 58 . These restoring forces are localized in the angled transitions or joints of the bellows, particularly the knee joints  100 . This restoring force may be controlled by adjusting a variety of variables, such as the thickness or geometry of the joints, the free angle of the joints at which they are molded, the number of joints in the bellows, as well as the material and material properties of the elastomer. 
     In the illustrated embodiment, a relaxed or uncompressed angle θ 1  formed between the upper and lower leg portions  96  and  98  at the knee  100  may range from about 90-175° when the system  60  is in the uncapped or rest position. A maximum compressed angle θ 2  may range from about 10-160° when system  60  is in the active capping position. The exact angle θ 1  for the uncompressed state would depend upon various design criteria for a specific implementation, such as desired force levels, desired range of motion, and available design space. In the illustrated embodiment, the uncompressed angle θ 1  is about 110-130°, while the compressed angle θ 2  is about 65-85°. 
     While the illustrated embodiment has been described with respect to sealing multiple printheads, it is apparent that the same bellows design may be employed for capping individual pens. Furthermore, while the knee joints  100  are shown as having an angular formation joining together two leg segments  96  and  98 , it is apparent that in some implementations the joint may be more rounded or arcuate in nature. Similarly, the leg segments  96  and  98  may be of different heights or lengths to provide variations in the capping forces. And finally, the illustrated embodiment of FIGS. 1-4 is shown to illustrate the principles and concepts of the invention as set forth in the claims below, and a variety of modifications and variations may be employed in various implementations while still falling within the scope of the claims below.