Patent ID: 7201465

Claim:
An ink jet printing apparatus comprising: a carriage mounted with a printing head for ejecting ink and for scanning the printing head in a main scanning direction; a suction pump for sucking ink from the printing head; capping means for performing a cap closing operation in which an ejection port surface of the printing head is covered with a cap when said suction pump sucks ink from the printing head and performing a cap opening operation in which the cap is separated from the ejection port surface after suction by said suction pump; help means for performing a cap opening help operation that facilitates the cap opening operation, when said capping means performs the cap opening operation; detection means for detecting whether the cap opening operation by said capping means can be performed or not; and control means for causing said help means to perform the cap opening help operation if said detection means detects that the cap opening operation by said capping means cannot be performed.