Patents by Inventor Frank Drogo

Frank Drogo has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 6913338
    Abstract: A wet-wiping printhead cleaning system for inkjet printer incorporating a wiper for wiping the printhead including a treatment fluid applicator configured for placing treatment fluid onto at least one element of the printhead and wiper elements involved in wiping the printhead orifice plate surface, the treatment fluid being placed on said at least one element by direct contact of the applicator, subsequently the wiper wipes the printhead, the treatment being available to enhance cleaning effectiveness, the treatment fluid lubricating the wiper so as to lengthen wiper service life and enhance wiping performance, as well as acting to render unwanted accumulations on the printhead more removable by wiping.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 28, 2002
    Date of Patent: July 5, 2005
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
    Inventors: W. Wistar Rhoads, Eric Joseph Johnson, Steve Castle, Frank Drogo, John Ferraro, Paul E. Martinson, Eric Mattis
  • Publication number: 20020171705
    Abstract: A wet-wiping printhead cleaning system for inkjet printer incorporating a wiper for wiping the printhead including a treatment fluid applicator configured for placing treatment fluid onto at least one element of the printhead and wiper elements involved in wiping the printhead orifice plate surface, the treatment fluid being placed on said at least one element by direct contact of the applicator, subsequently the wiper wipes the printhead, the treatment being available to enhance cleaning effectiveness, the treatment fluid lubricating the wiper so as to lengthen wiper service life and enhance wiping performance, as well as acting to render unwanted accumulations on the printhead more removable by wiping.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 28, 2002
    Publication date: November 21, 2002
    Inventors: W. Wistar Rhoads, Eric Joseph Johnson, Steven Castle, Frank Drogo, John Ferraro, Paul E. Martinson, Eric Mattis
  • Patent number: 5909231
    Abstract: In a inkjet print cartridge ink flows from the reservoir around the edge of the silicon substrate before being ejected out of the nozzles. During operation, warm thermal boundary layers of ink form adjacent the substrate and dissolved gases in the thermal boundary layer of the ink form the bubbles. If the bubbles to grow larger than the diameter of subsequent ink passageways these bubbles choke the flow of ink to the vaporization chambers. This results in causing some of the nozzles of the printhead to become temporarily inoperable. The disclosure describes a method of avoiding such a malfunction in a liquid inkjet printing system by providing a method for reducing residual air bubbles in an inkjet print cartridge by flushing the empty cartridge by passing carbon dioxide through the fill port or the ink ejection nozzles prior to filling the print cartridge with ink and thereby eliminating residual air bubbles from the print cartridge when the print cartridge is filled with ink.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 30, 1995
    Date of Patent: June 1, 1999
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Co.
    Inventors: Winthrop D. Childers, Brian J. Keefe, Barbara Parcells, Frank Drogo, Shailendra Kumar, Steven L. Webb, Hanno Ix, Kai Kong Iu
  • Patent number: 5905514
    Abstract: A wet-wiping printhead cleaning system for inkjet printer incorporating a wiper for wiping the printhead including a treatment fluid applicator configured for placing treatment fluid onto at least one element of the printhead and wiper elements involved in wiping the printhead orifice plate surface, the treatment fluid being placed on said at least one element by direct contact of the applicator, subsequently the wiper wipes the printhead, the treatment being available to enhance cleaning effectiveness, the treatment fluid lubricating the wiper so as to lengthen wiper service life and enhance wiping performance, as well as acting to render unwanted accumulations on the printhead more removable by wiping.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 13, 1996
    Date of Patent: May 18, 1999
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Company
    Inventors: W. Wistar Rhoads, Eric Joseph Johnson, Steve Castle, Frank Drogo, John Ferraro, Paul E. Martinson, Eric Mattis
  • Patent number: 5880758
    Abstract: A color ink-jet printer is provided, with one pen for dispensing black ink onto a print medium and at least one pen for dispensing color ink onto a print medium. The pen for dispensing black ink is adapted to jet droplets of black ink of a first volume and the pen(s) for dispensing color ink are adapted to jet droplets of color ink of a second volume, with the first volume being larger than the second volume. Such a color ink-jet printer provides both superior text quality of the black ink and does not require as much ink volume of the color ink(s) as previous ink-jet printers.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 27, 1997
    Date of Patent: March 9, 1999
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Company
    Inventors: John L. Stoffel, Keshava A. Prasad, Ronald A. Askeland, Michele E. Shepard, Frank Drogo, Leonard Slevin, Mark S. Hickman, Clayton L. Holstun
  • Patent number: 5745140
    Abstract: A color ink-jet printer is provided, with one pen for dispensing black ink onto a print medium and at least one pen for dispensing color ink onto a print medium. The pen for dispensing black ink contains a pigment-based ink and the pen(s) for dispensing color ink contain a water-miscible dye-based ink. Such a color ink-jet printer provides both superior text quality (black ink) and relative ease of service (color inks), since the black ink is used more than the color inks and thus tends to require less spitting due to its frequency of use. On the other hand, since the color inks are used less, the utilization of water-miscible inks, which require less spitting than pigmented inks to keep the nozzle clear, also require less spitting even with relatively lower frequency of use.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 2, 1996
    Date of Patent: April 28, 1998
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Company
    Inventors: John L. Stoffel, Keshava A. Prasad, Ronald A. Askeland, Michele E. Shepard, Frank Drogo, Leonard Slevin, Mark S. Hickman, Clayton L. Holstun
  • Patent number: 5726690
    Abstract: A method of operating a thermal inkjet printer having a thermal inkjet printhead that includes the steps of selecting an ink drop volume, selecting a pulse width that will cause the thermal inkjet printhead to deposit an ink drop having the selected drop volume, and operating the thermal inkjet printhead with the selected pulse width and at an operating energy that is greater than a turn-on energy of the printhead for the selected pulse width.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 30, 1994
    Date of Patent: March 10, 1998
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Company
    Inventors: Jaime H. Bohorquez, Clayton Holstun, Brian P. Canfield, Susan Tousi, Kenneth J. Courian, Frank Drogo
  • Patent number: 5600351
    Abstract: An inkjet printer system fires smaller ink droplets in a single-pass print mode to achieve addressible print resolution of 600 dpi in the carriage scan axis along with 300 dpi resolution in the media advance axis, without having to employ any dot-depletion algorithms. In one embodiment, the system provides a fast print mode which prints the smaller drops of ink on a 300 dpi grid in the carriage scan axis. In another embodiment, the system provides a single-pass color print mode wherein primary colors are printed with two color droplets of the same primary color in two adjacent sub-pixels on the 300.times.600 grid, and secondary colors are printed with two color droplets of different primary colors in two adjacent sub-pixels on the 300.times.600 grid.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 23, 1994
    Date of Patent: February 4, 1997
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Company
    Inventors: Clayton L. Holstun, Ronald A. Askeland, Frank Drogo, Brian P. Canfield
  • Patent number: 5541625
    Abstract: An inkjet printer system fires smaller ink droplets in a single-pass print mode to achieve addressible print resolution of 600 dpi in the carriage scan axis along with 300 dpi resolution in the media advance axis, without having to employ any dot-depletion algorithms. In one embodiment, the system provides a fast print mode which prints the smaller drops of ink on a 300 dpi grid in the carriage scan axis. In another embodiment, the system provides a single-pass color print mode wherein primary colors are printed with two color droplets of the same primary color in two adjacent sub-pixels on the 300.times.600 grid, and secondary colors are printed with two color droplets of different primary colors in two adjacent sub-pixels on the 300.times.600 grid.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 23, 1994
    Date of Patent: July 30, 1996
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Company
    Inventors: Clayton L. Holstun, Ronald A. Askeland, Frank Drogo, Brian P. Canfield
  • Patent number: 5528269
    Abstract: An inkjet printer has a pen holder for removably holding an ink pen, a detector circuit for detecting whether ink with a degraded quality is likely to be ejected by said ink pen, and a servicing circuit responsive to said detector circuit for causing an initial quantity of ink to be discharged from said ink pen to ensure that ink with a degraded quality will not be used during normal printing.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 2, 1994
    Date of Patent: June 18, 1996
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Company
    Inventors: Frank Drogo, Ronald A. Askeland, Brian P. Canfield
  • Patent number: RE40294
    Abstract: A wet-wiping printhead cleaning system for inkjet printer incorporating a wiper for wiping the printhead including a treatment fluid applicator configured for placing treatment fluid onto at least one element of the printhead and wiper elements involved in wiping the printhead orifice plate surface, the treatment fluid being placed on said at least one element by direct contact of the applicator, subsequently the wiper wipes the printhead, the treatment being available to enhance cleaning effectiveness, the treatment fluid lubricating the wiper so as to lengthen wiper service life and enhance wiping performance, as well as acting to render unwanted accumulations on the printhead more removable by wiping.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 17, 2001
    Date of Patent: May 6, 2008
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
    Inventors: William Wistar Rhoads, Eric Joseph Johnson, Frank Drogo, John Ferraro, Paul Eliot Martinson, Steven Todd Castle, Eric Stephen Mattis