Seiko Epson Corporation

Hiroe Niimura

Toshio Kumagai

Kenichi Kanbayashi

Toshihisa Saruta

Haruo Nakamura

Junhua Chang

Toru Fukushima

An ink coagulating agent of metal salt is provided in a waste ink tank. The coagulating agent is dissolved in aqueous solvent to be a metal salt solution. Absorbers of a porous material are impregnated with the metal salt solution and disposed in the waste ink tank.

Ink jet recording apparatus and waste ink tank thereof

Ink jet recorder and recording head cleaning method

Disclosed is an ink-jet type recording device that includes drive signal generation circuit 84 for generating a trapezoidal drive signal in synchronization with a timing signal applied from an external device, switching transistors respectively for outputting a drive signal to piezoelectric vibrators in accordance with a printing signal applied from an external device, and control signal generation means for generating a pulse signal to turn on the switching transistors so that only a portion of the drive signal is output to any piezoelectric vibrators set in a non-printing condition in synchronization with a timing signal. This portion of the drive signal is applied to the piezoelectric vibrators belonging to those nozzle openings that should not jet out ink droplets in accordance with the pulse signal, so that menisci in the nozzle openings are merely vibrated slightly, respectively. As a result of this, ink existing in a pressure generation chamber and ink existing in the neighborhood of the nozzle openings are mixed together and thus solvent is supplemented to the ink existing in the neighborhood of the nozzle opening, thereby preventing formation of an ink film due to evaporation of the solvent. Also, even in the non-printing period, the piezoelectric vibrators respectively generate heat to thereby be able to prevent absorption of humidity from the peripheral environment.

Ink-jet type recording device

Growing community of inventors

Nagano, Japan

Hiroe Niimura