Abstract: A suction device is provided for cleaning a nozzle surface of a print head. The suction device comprises a suction surface and a spacer, whereby the spacer is provided with a spacer channel, the spacer channel comprising a spacer opening at an outer surface of the spacer and the spacer channel being operatively coupled to an air flow source. The spacer is configured for positioning the suction surface at a predetermined distance from the nozzle surface for providing a suction gap. The suction device is configured to provide in operation an air flow through the suction gap, along the nozzle surface and into the suction channel. An air flow may be provided through the spacer channel of the spacer in order to clean an area of the nozzle surface of the print head.

Abstract: A head cleaning apparatus is configured to move relatively along a nozzle surface of a droplet ejection head to clean the nozzle surface. The head cleaning apparatus includes: a web configured to wipe the nozzle surface; a web driving unit configured to cause the web to travel; a pair of rigid body pressing members configured to press both end portions of the web in a width direction to the nozzle surface; an elastic body pressing member provided between the pair of rigid body pressing members and provided to further protrude to a nozzle surface side than the pair of rigid body pressing members, the elastic body pressing member being configured to press a center portion of the web in the width direction to the nozzle surface; and a support member configured to support the pair of rigid body pressing members and the elastic body pressing member.

Abstract: A liquid ejecting apparatus includes a housing and a movement region of a carriage including a liquid ejecting head, an ink tank positioned at the outer side of the movement region of the carriage, an ink supply tubes connecting the ink tank and an adapter on the carriage, and a fixing portion fixing a portion of the ink supply tubes. In the housing, a containing unit of a sheet feeding cassette is formed to project to a discharge direction of a sheet and an operation panel unit is configured to have a housing portion having an inclined surface whose lower side further projects to the discharge direction than the upper side. The ink supply tubes have a deformable moving unit performing a movement of the carriage on a portion of a liquid ejecting head side rather than a fixing portion using a fixing tool.

Abstract: A printing device or discharge test device comprising a head that includes a nozzle discharging liquid to a medium, a temperature obtaining section that obtains a temperature related to the head, a missing-dot detecting section that detects whether or not the liquid is discharged from the nozzle, and a control section that controls the head and the missing-dot detecting section. When the temperature obtained is within a first temperature range, the head is configured to discharge the liquid to the medium and whether or not the liquid is discharged from the nozzle is detected. No such detection is made at other temperatures. When the temperature obtained is outside the first temperature range and within a second temperature range, the head is configured to discharge the liquid to the medium, and when the temperature obtained is outside the second temperature range, the liquid is not discharged to the medium.

Abstract: A drawing device includes a recording head that discharges ink which cures when receiving irradiation light; a transport device that transports a sheet coated with the ink discharged from the recording head, along a transport path that faces the recording head; a gap sensor that is provided further upstream along the transport path than the recording head, and detects an error with respect to a gap between the sheet and recording head; a light irradiation device which is provided further downstream along the transport path than the recording head, and irradiates the ink coated on the sheet with light; and an advancing/retracting device which retracts the recording head to a position away from the transport path.

Abstract: A printing apparatus prints by discharging inks from respective nozzle arrays, the printhead having a plurality of nozzle arrays including at least a first nozzle array, a second nozzle array, and a third nozzle array, and the first nozzle array and the second nozzle array being arrayed to be shifted in a nozzle arrayed direction. The printing apparatus controls the first and second nozzle arrays to discharge inks to form a plurality of first patterns. The printing apparatus controls the third nozzle array to discharge inks to form second patterns while changing a shift amount in a direction which intersects with the nozzle arrayed direction with respect to the plurality of first patterns. The printing apparatus calculates an adjustment value required to adjust relative printing positions between the first nozzle array and the third nozzle array in the intersecting direction using the first patterns and the second patterns.

Abstract: A printing device that forms a background by a first ink and images on the background by a second ink includes a head having first and second nozzle lines that eject, respectively, the first and second inks. The inks are ejected as the head moves, with respect to a medium, in a main scanning direction intersecting the first and second nozzle lines. A transport section transports the medium in a sub-scanning direction along the first and second nozzle lines. In an ejecting operation, the first and second inks are ejected in the relative movement in the main scanning direction and the relative transportation in the sub-scanning direction is performed. In the sub-scanning direction, first and second nozzle line used areas are set where the first and second inks, respectively, are ejected from the first and second nozzle lines. A nozzle unused area is defined therebetween.

Abstract: An image forming apparatus includes an apparatus body, a print medium, a conveyance unit, art image forming unit, a cutter unit, a holding unit, a sensor, and a controller. The print medium has an adhesive face with no separation sheet. The cutter unit cuts the medium having an image formed into a print medium piece. The holding unit is configured to hold the piece in a state in which the piece is drawable from outside of the body. The holding unit has a surface separatable from an adhesive face of the piece to hold the adhesive face of the piece. The sensor detects presence or absence of the piece held by the holding unit. After the sensor detects that the piece is drawn out, the controller controls the conveyance unit to convey the medium to the holding unit and controls the holding unit to hold the medium.

Abstract: A liquid ejection head includes a substrate that carries thereon a plurality of ejection energy generating elements arranged in rows to generate energy necessary for ejecting liquid and an ejection port plate that is laid on the substrate and has a plurality of ejection ports formed therein and arranged vis-a-vis the respective ejection energy generating elements. The ejection port plate has a groove, or an oblong recess, formed on the surface thereof where the plurality of ejection ports are formed such that the groove surrounds the region where the ejection ports are formed and has a corrugated inner lateral surface and a flat outer lateral surface arranged oppositely relative to the inner lateral surface.

Abstract: An image forming device includes a drive transfer device that selectively transmits a driving force of a first drive source to one of liquid feed pumps, a suction part of a maintenance recovery device and an air-vent opening part. The air-vent opening part is arranged to have a maximum driving-force transmission path leading to the drive transfer device among the liquid feed pumps, the suction part and the air-vent opening part. The maintenance recovery device, the drive transfer device and the liquid feed pumps are arranged in order in a sheet transport direction. The suction part of the maintenance recovery device and the drive transfer device are arranged on opposite sides of a cap of the maintenance recovery device in the sheet transport direction.

Abstract: A printer capable of preventing clogging the printhead nozzles due to paper dust produced from sprocket holes in continuous paper, and preventing the printhead from ejecting ink droplets except on the continuous paper, has a printhead that ejects ink droplets toward continuous paper having sprocket holes formed along both sides of the paper width; a cover member that covers the edge part of the width of the continuous paper where sprocket holes are formed in the range of the printhead in the conveyance direction of the continuous paper, and can move in the paper width direction; and a detection mechanism that detects the position of the cover member in the paper width direction.

Abstract: Disclosed is an image forming apparatus including a head configured to discharge an aqueous recording liquid onto a recording medium; and a coating unit configured to apply a process liquid onto the recording medium, wherein the process liquid is formed by emulsifying, by a first surfactant, water including a water-soluble polymer and a low polarity solvent which is not compatible with the water, wherein the water and the low polarity solvent are emulsified as a W/O emulsion in which the water is in a dispersed phase and the low polarity solvent is in a continuous phase.

Abstract: To provide an inkjet ink composition that has excellent discharge stability and gives an ink image film having excellent substrate adhesion and film hardness, and an inkjet recording method employing the inkjet ink composition. An inkjet ink composition comprises (Component A) a dendritic polymer compound having a weight-average molecular weight of 3,000 to 100,000 and having a constituent repeating unit represented by Formula (I); (Component B) a polymerization initiator; and (Component C) a radically polymerizable compound. (In Formula (I), R1 and R2 independently denote a hydrogen atom or an alkyl group having 1 to 6 carbons, R3 denotes an alkyl group having 1 to 12 carbons, and R2 and R3 may be bonded to form a ring structure.

Abstract: A printing method where ink is discharged by a nozzle row, which has a plurality of nozzles, being relatively moved in a main scanning direction and a sub-scanning direction with regard to a print medium, and printing of a print image is performed to be formed of an independent region where raster lines, which are dot rows lined up in the main scanning direction, are completed in one main scanning and an overlapping region where the raster lines are completed in a plurality of main scannings, the printing method comprising: allocating whether each of the dots of the overlapping region is formed in either a preceding main scanning or a following main scanning in the plurality of main scannings; and performing the preceding main scanning and the following main scanning in an order which corresponds to the result of the allocating.

Abstract: A wide-format printing apparatus can suppress a posture variation of a carriage to improve landing accuracy of ink, and can reduce an HP (head to platen) distance to the minimum gap, thus achieving higher image quality and mass-production performance. The HP distance, the main rail and the sub rail are adjustable, and the curve amount of both rails is made to be in agreement with the curve amount of the platen. After that, the adjustment for minimizing the local deformation of both rails is performed.

Abstract: An ink jet recording apparatus has a first discharge port array in which discharge ports of a plurality of nozzles which discharge an ink composition containing an inorganic pigment are disposed side by side, a second discharge port array in which discharge ports of a plurality of nozzles which discharge an ink composition containing a coloring material other than the inorganic pigment are disposed side by side, a nozzle plate having the first discharge port array and the second discharge port array, a liquid repellent film provided on the nozzle plate, a wiping member which wipes the surface of the nozzle plate and has absorbability of the ink composition, in which, in a series of operations in which the surface of the nozzle plate is wiped by the wiping member, the second discharge port array is wiped in priority to the first discharge port array.

Abstract: A liquid ejecting apparatus includes a carriage having a removable liquid receptacle that holds a liquid or a removable connector connected via a flexible liquid channel to an external liquid receptacle that holds a liquid, an ejecting head, mounted in the carriage, that has a nozzle that ejects the liquid, and a maintenance unit that runs maintenance on the ejecting head; the ejecting head has a filter disposed so as to be capable of contact with a liquid absorption member provided in the liquid receptacle and in the connector.

Abstract: The invention aims to form an ink coating having a predetermined film thickness on a surface of a printing medium having a three-dimensional structure in shorter time. As solving means, a plurality of times of scanning process is included, ink 80 is discharged to head-facing areas (10a, 10c) in a state of facing straight toward a printhead 110 in one scanning process, and the ink 80 is discharged to a non-head-facing area (10b) so that the total film thickness of the ink coatings (11, 12) to be formed without facing straight toward the printhead 110 in two or more times of the scanning process becomes a predetermined film thickness T0.

Abstract: The present invention provides an inkjet printing apparatus in which aggregate or the like clogged in a nozzle is sucked to recover the clogged nozzle and provides a clogged nozzle recovering method. The inkjet printing apparatus in accordance with the present invention includes a cap which is structured to cover some of plural nozzles formed in a nozzle face of a head of an inkjet printer, a pressure sensor which acquires a pressure in an inside of the cap in a state that the some of the plural nozzles are covered by the cap, a suction means which sucks the inside of the cap with a pressure lower than a negative pressure at which a meniscus of a nozzle that is not covered with the cap is broken, and a nozzle recovery judgment means which judges recovery of a nozzle by comparing a reference pressure value, which is obtained when nozzles without being clogged are covered by the cap and sucked and is stored beforehand, with a pressure value which is outputted from the pressure sensor.

Abstract: The present invention provides a printing apparatus comprising a storage unit storing first information about a conveyance fluctuation amount of sheet conveyance by a roller that depends on a rotational phase of the roller, and second information about a conveyance deviation amount of sheet conveyance by the roller that is independent of the rotational phase of the roller. The first and second information are used for controlling the rotation of the roller when printing an image. The second information is determined based on an actual conveyance fluctuation amount acquired by reading test patterns printed by the printing apparatus. The first information is stored previously in the storage unit.