Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Yoh Matsushita

Takahiko Tokumasu

Toshio Yamamoto

Kunio Hakkaku

A transfer type thermal printer includes a heat sensitive ink ribbon which is fed along an ink ribbon feeding path, a part of which is defined as a recording section, a thermal printhead and a platen roller, both located at the recording section in pressure contact with the ink ribbon sandwiched therebetween. A paper transporting path is defined in the printer for transporting a sheet of recording paper through the recording section where the recording paper is passed between the printhead and the platen roller in surface contact with the ink ribbon. A main feature of the present printer includes a housing which is generally divided into two: upper housing half and lower housing half, and the upper housing half is pivotted to the lower housing half at one end so that the upper housing half may be pivotted open or closed with respect to the lower housing half with the printhead being mounted in the upper housing half and the platen roller being disposed in the lower housing half.

Transfer-type thermal printer

A thermal recording head driving control system for controlling the activation of heat-producing elements mounted on a substrate is provided. The driving control system includes a shift register having a number of bits corresponding to the heat-producing elements. The image data stored in the shift register is serially supplied to one input terminal of an AND gate which has its the other input terminal connected to receive a control pulse and its output terminal connected to supply an activation pulse to the thermal recording head. The activation pulse is formed from the image signal depending upon the condition of the control pulse which is determined by the temperature of the substrate on which the heat-producing elements are mounted and the activation history of each of the heat-producing elements. Specifically, the same image data is repetitively supplied to the shift register over a predetermined number of times at a speed much faster than the line scanning speed along the linear array of heat-producing elements, wherein the number of activation pulses produced is controlled by changing the binary state of the control pulse.

Thermal recording head driving control system

An AC switching device includes a switch element associated with the primary side of a transformer so that the switching element is turned on or off always at a zero-crossing point where the alternating current shifts from predetermined one of the positive and negative phases to the other. The switching element is turned off at a zero-crossing point which occurs immediately after the arrival of a turn-off command signal while it is turned on at a zero-crossing point which occurs after the arrival of a turn-on command and at the same phase of the alternating current as the turn-off phase.

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Yokohama, Japan

Yoh Matsushita