The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 22, 1998
Filed:
Sep. 30, 1996
Chan Nguyen, San Diego, CA (US);
Alan Shibata, Vancouver, WA (US);
Atsushi Kobayashi, Nagano Ken, JP;
Noriyoshi Fujimori, Shiojiri, JP;
Hewlett-Packard Company, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Abstract
A service station for use in servicing one or more inkjet print cartridges includes a service station sled assembly movably attached to a service station chassis. The service station can be used with either a facsimile machine that uses thermal inkjet printing, or with a thermal inkjet printer. In one embodiment, the service station includes an alignment mechanism for aligning a print carriage with respect to the sled assembly during capping to achieve improved alignment, relative to previous service stations, of a cap with respect to a corresponding print cartridge printhead. In another embodiment, the service station includes a positioning mechanism for positioning the print carriage with respect to the sled assembly during wiping such that, viewed in a direction parallel to the direction of motion of the print carriage, the edge of a wiper distal from a sled base extends beyond the print cartridge printhead by a predetermined amount in order to achieve optimum wiping performance. In another embodiment, the service station includes both the alignment mechanism and the positioning mechanism.