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:
Oct. 02, 2007
Filed:
Jul. 01, 2005
Hideo Ueda, Daito, JP;
Hideo Ueda, Daito, JP;
Funai Electric Co., Ltd., Daito-shi, JP;
Abstract
In a thermal transfer printer, before a thermal head transfers an ink component of a yellow region on a recording paper, the thermal head is preheated up to a transfer temperature and by sublimating a black ink component constituting a mark pattern during preheating, records used information in the mark pattern. After turn-on of an electric power, when an optical sensor reads the used information, an ink ribbon driving mechanism is driven until the optical sensor detects the rear mark pattern in which the used information is not recorded to locate the start of an unused region of an ink ribbon. Thus, residual amount of the ink ribbon is grasped accurately and the start of the unused region is located accurately without increasing the costs of ink ribbon.