Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Corporation

National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology

Shigeaki Kakiwaki

Tohru Okuda

Hirotsugu Matoba

Haruhiko Deguchi

Yasuhiro Sakamoto

Masaji Tsuji

Kaoru Higuchi

Shigemi Asai

Hidetsugu Kawai

Toshiyuki Tanaka

Tadashi Iwamatsu

Hirokazu Nakamura

Tatsushi Yamamoto

Kazuhiro Murata

Tomomi Tanaka

Yoshinori Nakajima

Hideo Okada

Takamitsu Tadera

Shigeru Nishio

Hitoshi Isono

Masaki Matsushita

Kazuhiko Furukawa

Tomoyuki Sagara

Seiichi Nagatome

Yoshiyuki Yokomachi

Masanobu Furukawa

Akihito Yoshimoto

Kazuki Murata

Len Ishikawa

Chiyoshi Yoshioka

Akinori Aratani

Yoshiyuki Hojyo

An ink jet apparatus electrifies ink in a nozzle, and ejects the ink from an ink ejecting hole onto a printing medium by a first electric field generated between the nozzle and the printing medium. The apparatus includes an ink catching device including an ink catching portion adjacent to the nozzle that catches an ejected substance. Between the nozzle and the ink catching portion, the apparatus applies a voltage for generating a second electric field which (i) causes an ejected substance, formed from the ink or the ink whose viscosity is changed, to be ejected from the nozzle, and (ii) causes the ink catching portion to attract the ejected substance. The apparatus, utilizes an electrostatic force to eject fluid, removes a clogging of an ejection head at any position, realizes less initial ejection fluctuation and improves the reliability of ejection.

Electrostatic attraction fluid ejecting method and apparatus

A nozzle plate () of the present invention is arranged such that, between (i) a first nozzle layer () having a first nozzle hole (orifice) () that discharges a liquid substance and (ii) a second nozzle layer () having a second nozzle hole () that is connected to the first nozzle hole () and receives the liquid substance, a blocking layer () having a higher resistance to etching than the first nozzle layer () is provided. In this nozzle plate (), the blocking layer () is locally formed around a connecting part at which the first nozzle hole () is connected to the second nozzle hole (). On account of this, the first nozzle hole of the nozzle plate is highly precisely formed, and the deformation of the nozzle plate, e.g. warpage, hardly occurs.

Nozzle plate and method of manufacturing the same

There are provided driving electrodes () on walls () separating both sides of individual ink chambers () formed in the form of an array of multiple grooves. External circuit connecting electrodes () for connecting these driving electrodes () to an external circuit are formed on exposed surface regions of electrically conductive material () filled in the individual ink chambers () at a rear end portion of a head. Each of the aforesaid exposed surface regions has an area larger than the cross-sectional area of each ink chamber as measured along a direction perpendicular to the ink chamber array.

Inkjet head with formed external circuit connecting electrodes

An organic insulating coating formed on a substrate is composed of two layers of a first parylene coating and a second parylene coating. Heat treatment is performed to at least the first parylene coating after being formed, at a temperature below 125&#xb0; C. for two hours. Then the second parylene coating is formed on the first parylene coating. Occurrence of pinholes is thus prevented at least in one of the two layers of the organic coatings, with the result that insulating properties of the coatings are improved.

Method for producing organic insulating coating and ink-jet printhead produced according to the method

In a droplet spray apparatus spraying out ink from an ink path by altering the volume of an ink channel formed in a trench that is covered with a cover plate and that has a conductive member provided at one end formed at a piezoelectric member, an ink supply opening to supply ink is provided at the end side where the conductive member is provided. Accordingly, an ink jet head that can be made compact, fabricated easily, and superior in productivity is obtained.

Ink jet head with partially exposed inside electrode and fabrication method thereof

A recording-medium transport device includes a pair of pinch rollers arranged closer to a printing head than to a subordinate roller and pinching and transporting a belt and a sheet of paper toward the printing head. The pair of pinch rollers can pinch the sheet of paper together with the belt, while maintaining the belt flat. As such, an image of high quality can be formed, e.g., printed on the recording medium. Furthermore, the recording medium does not divert from a transporting path. Thus reliable image formation can be achieved.

Recording-medium transport device

An image recording apparatus includes a heating portion and a granulating portion to generate colorant particles, a charging portion to charge the generated colorant particles, an ejecting portion to intermittently eject the charged colorant particles onto a recording medium in response to an electrical signal corresponding to image data to be recorded, and a transport portion to sequentially transport the colorant particles through these portions. The heating portion heats and evaporates solid or liquid colorant. The evaporated colorant is transported to the granulating portion, cooled, solidified and agglomerated into colorant particles. The colorant particles are transported to the succeeding charging portion, charged there and transported to the ejecting portion. The charged colorant particles are electrically induced toward a recording medium through an ejection hole and ejected onto a recording medium, so that the colorant particles stick and permeates to the medium according to image data.

Image recording method and image recording apparatus permitting good picture quality to be provided

An image forming apparatus including a rotatably driven transfer drum is provided. The transfer drum includes a main body and a dynamic vibration reducer. The dynamic vibration reducer includes an inertia pipe having an inertial moment, and at least one element connecting the inertia pipe to the interior of the main body so as to provide a spring-like property and a damping property therebetween. The apparatus dynamically reduces vibrations in a predetermined frequency band, such as that of the natural frequency of a specific gear, or the natural frequencies of an entire drive mechanism. In particular, the apparatus reduces vibratory peaks generated during the operation of the image forming apparatus.

Image forming apparatus with dynamic vibration reduction

A heat-controlling device is provided with a transporting carriage for supporting and transporting a semiconductor substrate and a heating device having a plurality of heaters which apply heat in the width-wise direction of the heat-receiving member that is perpendicular to the transporting direction thereof and which are individually controlled by a controller. The controller only operates a set of the heaters that are adjacent the semiconductor substrate. Among the heaters being operated, those heaters, which are located at at least the leading end and the rear end in the transporting direction, have their outputs successively varied in accordance with the movement of the semiconductor substrate. Thus, it becomes possible to easily narrow the temperature distribution of the semiconductor substrate merely by controlling the output of the heaters.

Heat-controlling device

A magnetic recording/reproducing apparatus compares speed information obtained by speed detecting means for a magnetic tape with a set travelling speed of the magnetic tape in a control circuit, and controls the rotational frequency of a driving motor for a take-up reel, thereby controlling constant-speed travelling of the magnetic tape, with employment of no capstan. According to this system, the overall apparatus can be simplified and miniaturized with reduction in weight and cost. Further, it is possible to improve constant-speed travelling performance of the magnetic tape by adjusting resonance and antiresonance appearing due to total equivalent inertia moment related to the magnetic tape and reels in the transfer characteristic of the control system.

Magnetic recording/reproducing apparatus

A magnetic tape driving apparatus includes: a stationary magnetic head capable of recording and reproducing digital signals simultanouesly on multichannel tracks; tape guide members for drawing out a magnetic tape wound on a pair of tape supply/take-up reels contained in a cassette, contacting the magnetic tape with the stationary magnetic head, and guiding running of the magnetic tape; and a constant speed driving mechanism for holding the magnetic tape and making it run at a constant speed by capstans and pinch rollers provided on both of tape feed/take-up sides of the stationary magnetic head. The stationary magnetic head and the tape guide members having level regulators for regulating running positions of upper and lower edges of the magnetic tape, to regulate the level of running of the tape with high precision. The rotating speeds of the capstans on both of the tape feed/take-up sides are regulated, whereby the tension of the tape is maintained at a desired prescribed value, to ensure a stable running of the tape.

Magnetic tape driving apparatus with capstan rotating at different speeds

A servo track recorded on a magnetic tape is traced by a pair of servo track reproduce heads. The output of the pair of servo track reproduce heads are subjected to a subtracting process by a subtractor. A pulse signal is provided to a stepping motor according to the output of the subtractor. The stepping motor provides a rotation in a positive direction or a negative direction according to the applied pulse. The rotation of the stepping motor is translated to a magnetic head via a moving mechanism whereby the position of the magnetic head is adjusted along the width direction of the magnetic tape to trace properly the data track on the magnetic tape. A closed-loop control system is implemented for the magnetic head to realize tracking control of high precision.

Magnetic head positioning device and method

A magnetic recording/reproducing apparatus includes a guide roller which rotates as magnetic tape runs, and the running speed of the tape is detected on the basis of the rotation of the guide roller. The magnetic recording/reproducing apparatus further calculates a radius of a supply reel from the rotation of the guide roller and the rotation speed of the supply reel, calculates driving torque of the supply reel from the calculated result, and the supply reel is driven so that the tension of the magnetic tape is kept constant according to the calculated result.

Magnetic recording/reproducing apparatus without capstan

A magnetic recording and reproducing apparatus utilizing a magnetic tape in a cassette, the tape being driven by reels and information data being recorded or reproduced on or from the magnetic tape. The apparatus includes a mechanism for pulling or storing the magnetic tape out of or in the cassette which mechanism includes a pair of guide rollers for restricting the running path of the magnetic tape, the guide rollers being movable between an unloading position and a loading position. A magnetic head, which can be a multi-track magnetic head having a plurality of magnetic heads, the number of which is defined to be smaller than the number of tracks standardized as a track format on the magnetic tape, records or reproduces information-data when the guide rollers are in their loading position and the head is allowed to vertically move each time the running direction of the magnetic tape is changed.

Growing community of inventors

Nara, Japan

Shigeaki Kakiwaki