Patent ID: 7300220

Claim:
A hand-separable ribbon spool shaft assembly for use in a high-speed encoding printer to adapt a plain ribbon spool so as to provide drive and location functions, the shaft assembly comprising: a shaft assembly composed of at least two shaft parts that are assembled to the ribbon spool and cooperate to provide a manual hand-action locking mechanism for locking the shaft parts together when assembled to the ribbon spool, the shaft assembly having first and second ends outside the ends of the ribbon spool for providing bearing and locating surfaces when the shaft assembly is positioned in a receiving slot in the high-speed encoding printer; and a spring means enclosed within one of the shaft parts to provide the locking force for the push and turn arrangement and to provide lateral force to clamp the two shaft parts onto the ribbon spool to eliminate lateral tolerance variations; wherein the bearing and locating surfaces allow the ribbon spool shaft assembly to rotate during operation of the printer, and wherein the assembly further includes a gear drive means on one of the shaft parts for driving the rotating ribbon spool; the shaft assembly is composed of a first part and a second part, the first part including the gear drive means and the second part cooperating with the first part to lock the shaft parts together when assembled to the ribbon spool; and the locking mechanism is a push and turn arrangement.