CN118418584A

CN118418584A - Portable and usable small thermal transfer printer

Info

Publication number: CN118418584A
Application number: CN202410702095.5A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 吴晓民
Original assignee: Shenzhen Kingpek Co ltd
Current assignee: Shenzhen Kingpek Co ltd
Priority date: 2024-06-01
Filing date: 2024-06-01
Publication date: 2024-08-02

Abstract

A small thermal transfer printer which can effectively avoid the problem that printing is blocked due to abnormal contact between a printing medium entering a paper feeding channel and a ribbon or a conveying plate and is convenient to carry and use. The printer comprises a printing head, a ribbon cartridge and a printing rubber roller, wherein the paper feeding rubber roller is arranged between a paper feeding port of the printer and the printing head, and before a printing medium entering a paper feeding channel does not reach a printing position, the printing head is driven by a lifting mechanism to lift and enable a ribbon pressed by the printing head to be far away from the printing rubber roller positioned below the printing head; when the print media line reaches the print position, the print head is lowered and presses the ribbon against the print media. The printing device is greatly beneficial for the printing medium to enter the printing position in a state of no contact with the ribbon, and can effectively avoid the sticking of burrs at the front end edge of the printing medium or adhesive permeation at the edge of the self-adhesive paper to the ribbon.

Description

Portable and usable small thermal transfer printer

Technical Field

The invention relates to a thermal transfer printer, in particular to a thermal transfer printer which is small and convenient to carry and use.

Background

The prior art is a small thermal transfer printer (see Chinese patent No. CN202011054431.8, publication No. 2022.01.28, name: a thermal transfer printer) which comprises a cover, a base, a paper feeding rubber roller arranged on the bottom surface of the cover, a printing head fixedly arranged in the base and a ribbon box arranged in the base, wherein the ribbon box is divided into a winding drum and a winding drum, the winding drum and the winding drum are respectively positioned on the front side and the rear side of the printing head, and the ribbon is sent out from the winding drum (ribbon supply end) to the winding drum (waste ribbon recovery end after printing) and is recovered from the upper side of the printing head.

When printing is ready, the cover is covered on the machine base, and then the printing medium is fed into a paper feeding channel formed between the cover and the machine base in an inclined downward mode through a paper feeding port arranged on the upper front side of the cover.

When printing, the printing medium which enters the paper feeding channel and is parallel to the paper feeding rubber roller is sucked into the printing position under the rolling of the paper feeding rubber roller, at the moment, the printing medium is arranged on the color tape and is closely connected with the heating wires of the printing medium, the color tape and the printing head under the contact pressure of the paper feeding rubber roller so as to finish the printing task, and after printing is finished, the printing medium after printing is sent out from a paper outlet arranged at the rear side of the machine seat.

The thermal transfer printer has the following defects:

1. Poor paper feed: the print head is pressed on the paper feeding rubber roller to roll the inserted printing medium into the printing position, and because the main work of the print head is to finish the printing work, a large pressure is needed during printing, the print head is usually pressed on the paper feeding rubber roller with a large force, the pressure is far greater than the pressure needed by paper feeding, and the problem of poor paper feeding or paper feeding failure can be caused.

2. Waste color band: the printing head pushes the ribbon upwards on the paper feeding rubber roller, before printing, the printing medium entering the paper feeding channel and moving to the position near the paper feeding rubber roller needs to be sucked into a printing position through the rolling of the paper feeding rubber roller, the printing medium is arranged between the ribbon and the paper feeding rubber roller and is positioned at the contact and press combination position of the paper feeding rubber roller, the ribbon and the printing head, along with the rolling of the paper feeding rubber roller, the ribbon is also transmitted from front to back under the rotation of the winding drum, namely, the ribbon follows the blank to be moved in the time period from the position where the printing medium is sucked into the printing position to the position where the printing of the required content begins, and the waste of the ribbon is caused; after printing, the paper feeding rubber roller needs to move the printed printing medium away from the contact-press combination position of the three parts, and as the printing head always presses the ribbon on the paper feeding rubber roller, the ribbon inevitably rotates along with the rotation of the paper feeding rubber roller, so that the ribbon is empty to cause the waste of the ribbon (hereinafter the waste ribbon is called as empty section ribbon), and for a piece of printing medium, the waste is larger as the printing content is smaller and the empty section ribbon is longer.

3. The multi-color overprinting work cannot be completed in the print job:

Firstly, when the content on the printing medium to be printed is a text pattern composed of multiple color content, the printer cannot realize multicolor overprinting because of the uncertain printing content of the corresponding blank section ribbon length when printing single color, and even if the printing mode of printing the first color and then the second color is reloaded, the multicolor overprinting is difficult to complete.

Secondly, because the ink ribbon moves along with the paper feeding rubber roller under the top pressure of the printing head, the paper feeding rubber roller can drive the ink ribbon to move forwards or backwards by rotating forwards or reversely, and therefore, the ink ribbon with multiple colors is sequentially arranged on the same ink ribbon from head to tail, and the task of single-time printing multicolor overprinting cannot be completed.

Note that: the completion of multicolor overprinting in a single print job refers to: inserting the printing medium into the printer, printing a certain color set on the same color band, returning the printing medium to the initial printing position under the condition of not taking the printing medium out of the printer after printing, and starting the printing head to finish printing of a second color when another color on the same color band is in the printing position.

4. When the printing medium is paper label printing medium with self-adhesive paper or soft plastic sheet printing medium or printing medium of thin metal sheet label, the printing medium entering the paper feeding channel is easy to adhere to the color ribbon or cause the color ribbon to be punctured, scratched or accumulated and blocked, and other printing faults, the reasons are as follows:

The printing medium with the self-adhesive paper has the edge of Xu Jiaoye to be infiltrated outwards, the adhesive liquid is easy to adhere the front end of the printing medium with the ink ribbon when the printing medium touches the ink ribbon, and the printing medium can drag and color to be taken away along with the rotation of the paper feeding adhesive roller, so that the ink ribbon is pulled out in a transitional way or the printing medium is curled and accumulated to block a paper feeding channel.

The front edge of the ultrathin slice printing medium is sharp and possibly bent due to thinness, and when the ultrathin slice printing medium touches the ribbon or the conveying plate for supporting the printing medium in the paper feeding channel, the ribbon is extremely easy to scratch or is blocked in the paper feeding channel, so that printing cannot be performed normally.

Disclosure of Invention

The invention aims to solve the technical problem of providing a small thermal transfer printer which is convenient to carry and use when printing is blocked due to abnormal contact between a printing medium entering a paper feeding channel and a ribbon or a conveying plate.

In order to solve the technical problems, the invention adopts the following technical scheme:

the invention discloses a small thermal transfer printer convenient to carry and use on business trip, which comprises a printing head, a ribbon cartridge and a printing rubber roller which are arranged in a machine shell, and is characterized in that: a paper feeding rubber roller is arranged between a paper feeding port of the printer and the printing head, and before a printing medium entering a paper feeding channel does not reach a printing position, the printing head is driven by a lifting mechanism to lift and enable a ribbon pressed by the printing head to be far away from the printing rubber roller positioned below the printing head; when the print media line reaches the print position, the print head is lowered and presses the ribbon against the print media.

A rigid paper feeding channel which is formed by an upper limit plate and a lower limit plate made of hard materials and used for enabling a printing medium to smoothly travel to the lower part of the printing head is arranged between the ink ribbon and the printing rubber roller from a paper feeding port of the printer to the lower part of the printing head.

The paper feeding rubber roller is arranged at the paper feeding port, and an elastic pressing part which helps the printing medium to stably enter the paper feeding channel is further arranged above the paper feeding rubber roller.

The elastic pressing component is an upper rolling roller, a pressing plate or a pressing shaft lever which can rotate freely.

The upper limiting plate is a bottom plate of the ribbon cartridge, and the lower limiting plate is a supporting plate for supporting printing media to travel in the paper feeding channel.

The gap between the upper limiting plate and the lower limiting plate is 1.0mm-3.0mm.

The lifting mechanism consists of a jacking connecting rod plate, a supporting rod shaft and an eccentric cam, wherein the jacking connecting rod plate is of an integrated structure, the jacking connecting rod plate is installed on a rack in a machine shell through the supporting rod shaft and consists of a driving end and a jacking end which are respectively arranged on two sides of the supporting rod shaft, the eccentric cam is arranged on the driving end side and contacts with the driving end, the jacking end is arranged below an ear plate of a printing head support, and the driving end and the jacking end move in opposite directions under the rotation of the eccentric cam.

The driving end is positioned at one side of the paper inlet, and the eccentric cam is arranged above the driving end; the lifting end is a double fork plate with a U-shaped notch, and when the eccentric cam drives the driving end to downwards move, the double fork plate applies force upwards to the lug plate which is buckled on the end part of the roller shaft of the printing rubber roller and lifts the printing head to be separated from the pressing of the color ribbon.

The printing medium is paper or card with adhesive tape; or the printing medium is an ultrathin metal plate or a printing medium with adhesive labels and easy-to-hang color strips.

The invention sets the printing head above the color band as a lifting structure, and the structure enables the printing head to lift up a tiny distance before the printing medium enters the paper feeding channel of the printer and moves to the printing position, and the color band pressed below the printing hair heat wire is contracted and displaced upwards under the action of the tension of the color band material due to the loss of the pressing force of the printing head, so that a gap is formed between the color band and the printing rubber roll below the color band, the printing medium is greatly facilitated to enter the printing position in a state of no contact with the color band, and the phenomenon that the edge burr at the front end of the printing medium or the edge of the self-adhesive paper is adhered to the color band due to the adhesive leakage is avoided. The invention further improves that the paper feeding rubber roller is arranged at the paper feeding port, and the paper feeding rubber roller can ensure that a printing medium entering the paper feeding channel stably and timely enters a printing position when the printing head ascends. A further improvement is that the printing channel is arranged as a rigid paper feeding channel consisting of upper and lower hard plates on the basis of the above, so that the smooth running of the printing medium is further improved.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic external view of a thermal transfer printer according to the present invention.

Fig. 2 is a schematic view of the printer of fig. 1 after opening the cover.

Fig. 3 is a schematic view of the cassette assembly of fig. 2 removed.

Fig. 4 is a schematic view of the cover, base and cassette assembly of fig. 1 removed.

Fig. 5 is a schematic view of fig. 4 with the support plate and the feed roller removed from the feed path.

Fig. 6 is a schematic diagram of the main components inside the printer of fig. 1.

Fig. 7 is a schematic bottom view of fig. 6.

Fig. 8 is an exploded view of fig. 6.

Fig. 9 is an exploded view of fig. 7.

FIG. 10 is a schematic view of the printhead of FIG. 6 lowered and pressing against the ribbon.

Fig. 11 is a schematic view of the deleted ear clip of fig. 10.

FIG. 12 is a schematic view of the printhead of FIG. 6 raised and disengaged from pressing the ribbon.

Fig. 13 is a schematic view of the deleted ear clip of fig. 12.

Fig. 14 is an exploded view of fig. 5.

FIG. 15 is a right side view of the right power plenum of FIG. 5.

Fig. 15a is an enlarged schematic view of fig. 15.

FIG. 15b is a schematic view of FIG. 15a with the power plenum removed.

FIG. 16 is an exploded schematic view of the right power plenum of FIG. 15.

FIG. 17 is a left side view of the left power plenum of FIG. 5.

Fig. 17a is an enlarged schematic view of fig. 17.

FIG. 17b is a schematic view of FIG. 17a with the power plenum removed.

FIG. 18 is an exploded schematic view of the left power plenum of FIG. 17.

Fig. 19 is a schematic view of another view of fig. 2.

Fig. 20 is an exploded view of fig. 19.

Fig. 21 is a schematic view of the combination of the power compartment, cartridge assembly and cover portion of fig. 20.

Fig. 22 is a schematic view of the cassette assembly of fig. 21 assembled with a power bay.

Fig. 23 is an exploded view of fig. 22.

Fig. 24 is a schematic view of the cassette assembly of fig. 22 separated from the power bay.

Fig. 25 is a schematic view of the cassette assembly of fig. 22 in combination with a power bay.

Fig. 26 is a plan view of the front side of the printer of fig. 1.

Fig. 27 is a cross-sectional view taken along A-A of fig. 26.

Fig. 28 is a schematic view of the printer of fig. 1 with the cover just uncovered.

The reference numerals are as follows:

The printer 1, the housing 11, the housing 12, the base 13, the side cover 14 _、, the paper feeding rubber roller 15 _、 elastically presses the component 16 _、 support plate 17, the printing rubber roller 18 _、 printing head 21, the printing substrate 22, the ear plate 23, the ribbon cassette 3, the bottom plate 31, the unreeling cassette 32, the reeling cassette 33, the ribbon unreeling shaft 34, the ribbon 35, the power bin 4, the bin back 41, the bin cover 42, the box body 43, the ear plate window 44, the first power bin 45, the first motor 451, the first power transmission mechanism 452, the second power bin 46 _、, the second motor 461, the second power transmission mechanism 462, the transmission shaft 47, the jacking connecting rod plate 5, the support rod shaft 51, the eccentric cam 52, the driving end 53, the jacking end 54 _、 printing head electromechanical contact 61, the circuit board electromechanical contact 62, the elastic conductive column 63, the conductive column 64, the pressing spring 65, the conductive column 66, the conductive contact 67, the switch holes 71, 72, the elastic 73, the toggle 74, the moving plate 75, the lock tongue 76, the lock tongue 77, the reset spring 77, the reset window 78, the concave depression plate 82, the depression plate 81, the upper damping depression plate 85, and the upper damping depression plate 83.

Detailed Description

As shown in fig. 1 to 3 and fig. 6 to 13, the small thermal transfer printer 1 (hereinafter also referred to as printer 1) of the present invention which is convenient to carry and use on business trip has the external dimensions of length x width x thickness (220 mm to 320 mm) × (50 mm to 75 mm) × (40 mm to 57), preferably 317mm x 73.6mm x 51.5mm; the weight of the printing medium is 500g-1000g, preferably 800g, and the printing width of the printing medium is 220mm-260mm. Because the invention has the advantages of small size, light weight and large effective printing width, the width utilization rate is up to 82 percent (formula: printing width 260/outline dimension 317 x 100 percent of printing medium), and the width utilization rate of a small thermal transfer printer (see Chinese patent number: CN 202011054431.8) in the prior art is only 67 percent (formula: printing width 210/outline dimension 310 x 100 percent of printing medium), the printer is a printer 1 carried by people who often need to print blank printing medium on site during outgoing work.

The printing medium is paper label printing medium with self-adhesive paper or flexible plastic thin card type printing medium with easy-to-hang ribbon 35 or thin metal sheet/plate label type printing medium with easy-to-hang ribbon 35.

The small thermal transfer printer 1 is particularly suitable for printing required printing media such as a single label with self-adhesive paper, a single Zhang Lv plastic label or a single Zhang Biaopai when an outgo staff in the fields of electric power, communication, petrifaction and transportation makes and changes an electric power mark and a traffic mark at will.

The printer 1 of the present invention is an improvement over the small thermal transfer printer 1 of the prior art in that:

1. A paper feed rubber roller 15 is provided between the paper feed port of the printer 1 and the print head 21, which facilitates the entry of the printing medium into the paper feed path, and allows the printing medium entered into the paper feed path to be smoothly moved to the printing position at a constant speed with the traveling speed controlled.

2. The print head 21 is configured to be lifted by a small distance before the print medium is conveyed to the printing position, so that the ink ribbon 35 pressed downward by the heating wire of the print head 21 rebounds under the tension of the material of the ink ribbon 35 and moves away from the printing rubber roller 18 located below the print head 21 (preferably, the position of the ink ribbon 35 away from the printing rubber roller 18 is higher than the upper surface of the print medium before the printing position), thereby freeing up a height space for the print medium to smoothly enter the printing position (directly below the print head 21), i.e., the print medium to enter the printing position is not dependent on the printing rubber roller 18 (i.e., the "paper feeding rubber roller 15" mentioned in the background), the rolling of the ink ribbon 35 and the print head 21 to enter the printing position, but is easily pushed into the printing position by the paper feeding rubber roller 15 and the printing rubber roller 18 together without being obstructed above the print medium. The structure can effectively avoid the printing faults such as scraping or being carried out of the ribbon 35 caused by the sticking of the ribbon 35 due to the fact that a little adhesive glue oozes out from the front end edge (the position of the front inlet is the front position on the printing medium) or the irregular front end edge (the shape of the burr-carrying edge or the front end edge is slightly curved) of the printing medium.

When the printing medium smoothly enters the printing position, the printing head 21 falls down and presses the ink ribbon 35 and the printing medium against the printing rubber roller 18 for normal printing.

3. In order to make the printing medium travel in the paper feed path more smoothly, the front end edge thereof is prevented from being blocked (the blocking reason is the above-mentioned "sticking to" with the ink ribbon 35), the paper feed path is provided as a rigid paper feed path constituted by an upper limit plate and a lower limit plate made of hard materials.

4. The invention is provided with an independent paper feeding mechanism (namely a paper feeding rubber roller 15) and an independent printing head 21 lifting mechanism, so that the printing head 21 is not pressed on the printing rubber roller 18 when printing is not needed; when the independent paper feeding mechanism needs to print, a printing medium is sent to a printing position below the printing head 21, the printing head 21 falls down and then the color tape 35 needing to be printed is pressed against the printing medium and the printing rubber roller 18, the printer 1 drives the printing rubber roller 18 to finish printing the current color, then the printing head 21 is lifted and far away from the printing rubber roller 18, the paper feeding mechanism recycles the printing medium which is already printed and then sends the printing medium to the printing position again, the printing head 21 presses the color tape 35 needing to be printed against the printing medium and the printing rubber roller 18, the printing rubber roller 18 is driven to finish printing the other color, and multi-color overprinting can be realized through multiple times of reciprocation.

In addition, the multicolor overprinting task can be completed under the condition that the printing medium fed into the paper feeding channel is not fed out, specifically: when one color is printed, the print head 21 is lifted, the print medium retraction driving part is started to retract the print medium to the initial printing position, at this time, different colors on the same color ribbon 35 are positioned above the printing position, and the color ribbon 35 corresponding to the color is pressed against the print medium by the print head 21 to print the color.

The invention is described in detail below with reference to the attached drawing figures:

1. housing 11 of printer 1

As shown in fig. 1-3, the casing 11 is composed of a casing cover 12, a base 13 and left and right casing covers 14, as shown in fig. 2 and 6-9, a printing head 21, a ribbon cartridge assembly, a paper feeding rubber roller 15, a printing rubber roller 18, a main control circuit board, a power battery and a paper feeding channel are arranged in a cavity formed by enclosing the casing cover 12, the base 13 and the two casing covers 14, the casing cover 12 is connected to the base 13 in a single-side hinged manner, and the diameter of a hinged shaft is 0.8mm-2.5mm, preferably 2.0mm.

The power transmission mechanisms for controlling the lifting of the printing head 21, the winding of the ribbon cartridge 3, the rotation of the paper feeding rubber roller 15 and the printing rubber roller 18 are intensively arranged in the power bins 4 at the left side and the right side of the base 13 in the shell 11.

The paper feeding channel is horizontally arranged, compared with the inclined paper feeding channel in the prior art, the paper feeding rubber roller 15 and the printing rubber roller 18 can be arranged in the same plane, the space utilization rate in the shell is improved, a basis is provided for further miniaturization of the printer 1, a paper feeding port and a paper discharging port of the paper feeding channel are respectively arranged on the front side surface and the rear side surface of the shell 11 (the position of the paper feeding port is in front of the shell 11, the position of the paper discharging port is behind the shell 11), and the paper feeding port and the paper discharging port are preferably arranged at the joint position of the shell 12 and the machine base 13 after being buckled.

The housing 11 of the present invention is preferably made of plastic material or aluminum alloy material.

2. Paper feed rubber roll 15

As shown in fig. 6-9, the present invention preferably provides a paper feed rubber roller 15 at the paper feed port, above which is provided a resilient pressing member 16 that further assists the printing medium in rapidly entering the paper feed path, the resilient pressing member 16 being a freely rotatable upper roller, pressing plate or pressing shaft.

The driving part for driving the paper feeding rubber roller 15 can be a motor which is arranged independently, and can also be connected with the driving part for driving the printing rubber roller 18 through a gear transmission mechanism. The power transmission parts for driving the paper feeding rubber roller 15 and the printing rubber roller 18 to work are intensively arranged in the power bin 4.

3. Rigid paper feeding channel

In order to enable the printing medium with the self-adhesive or the ultrathin metal sheet/plate to smoothly reach the printing position, the invention sets the paper feeding channel as a rigid paper feeding channel, and specifically comprises the following steps: a channel formed by an upper limit plate and a lower limit plate made of hard materials is arranged between the ink ribbon 35 and the printing rubber roller 18 from the paper inlet of the printer 1 to the lower part of the printing head 21.

The upper limiting plate is preferably a bottom plate 31 of the ribbon cartridge 3, and the lower limiting plate is preferably a supporting plate 17 for supporting the printing medium in the paper feeding channel to travel.

The gap between the upper limiting plate and the lower limiting plate is 1.0mm-5.0mm.

The rigid paper feed path preferably extends from the paper feed opening to the paper discharge opening.

4. Ribbon cartridge assembly

The unreeling box 32 and the reeling box 33 are separated, the unreeling box 32 and the reeling box 33 respectively comprise a shell, a reel and unreeling color tapes 35 (which are new color tapes 35 with unprinted contents) or reeling color tapes 35 (which are recycling color tapes 35 with printed contents) which are wound on the corresponding reels, the unreeling box 32 and the reeling box 33 are horizontally arranged at intervals and respectively positioned at the front side and the rear side of the machine base 13, the color tapes 35 are recycled from the unreeling box 32 to the reeling box 33 through the lower part of the printing head 21, and a power transmission part for driving the reeling reels to rotate is arranged in the power bin 4.

In order to avoid slack in the unwind spool due to variations in linear velocity as it outputs ribbon 35, the present invention provides unwind damping members 81 on the unwind spool.

5. Printing rubber roller 18

A power transmission member disposed in the housing 13 below a neutral zone between the unreeling box 32 and the reeling box 33 to drive rotation thereof is disposed in the power chamber 4.

6. Printhead assembly

As shown in fig. 8-13, the printer comprises a printing substrate (also called a printing bracket) 22, a printing head 21 arranged on the printing substrate 22 and lug plates 23 arranged on the left side and the right side of the printing substrate 22, wherein the printing head 21 and a supporting plate 17 between a printing rubber roller 18 and a paper feeding rubber roller 15 form a certain included angle, the included angle is 8-15 degrees, a printing line (also called a heating line) is positioned at the bottom of the printing head 21, the lug plates 23 are in an inverted U shape, and when the printing head assembly is arranged in a shell 11, the left lug plate 23 and the right lug plate 23 are respectively clamped at the left end and the right end of a roller shaft of the printing rubber roller 18.

The lifting mechanism for driving the printing head 21 to lift is arranged in the power bin 4 and consists of a lifting connecting rod plate 5, a supporting rod shaft 51 and an eccentric cam 52, wherein the lifting connecting rod plate 5 is integrally formed and is approximately Z-shaped, and the lifting mechanism is arranged on the wall of the power bin 4 through the supporting rod shaft 51.

The lifting link plate 5 is bounded by a support rod shaft 51, the front side section thereof is a driving section, the rear side section thereof is a lifting section, the end of the driving section (referred to as a driving end 53) is preferably disposed near the paper feed port, and the end of the lifting section (referred to as a lifting end 54) is located below the end of the roller shaft of the printing rubber roller 18 and is vertically opposite to the ear plate 23.

The lifting link plate 5 is provided with a return spring which returns the lifting link plate 5 when the lifting end 54 falls, and the return spring can be a torsion spring or a tension spring, and preferably a torsion spring is used.

The eccentric cam 52 is arranged above or below the driving end 53, and the motor driving the eccentric cam 52 to rotate is arranged outside the power bin 4 and below the paper feeding rubber roller 15 in the machine base 13; the jacking end 54 is shaped as a double fork plate with a "U" shaped notch.

When the eccentric cam 52 drives the driving end 53 to move downwards, the double fork plate applies upward force to the ear plate which is buckled on the end of the roller shaft of the printing rubber roller 18 and pushes up the printing head 21 to be out of the abutting pressure of the ink ribbon 35.

7. Power chamber 4

As shown in fig. 1-5 and 14-18, the number of power chambers 4 is two, and the power chambers are respectively arranged at the left and right sides in the casing 11 and are respectively a first power chamber 45 and a second power chamber 46, and the print head assembly, the ribbon cartridge assembly and the printing rubber roller 18 are arranged between the two power chambers 4.

Each power chamber 4 of the present invention is preferably formed by combining a chamber back plate 41 and a chamber cover plate 42, wherein the inner side of the chamber back plate 41 (pointing inwards towards the inside of the casing 11 and pointing outwards towards the outside of the casing 11) and the outer side of the chamber cover plate 42 are buckled together to form a box body 43 with a hollow cavity.

The two power chambers 4 are preferably of an integral structure which is made by injection molding, and the bottom end face of the box body 43 is open; or the two power chambers 4 are formed by combining a chamber back plate 41 and a chamber cover plate 42 of separate pieces through buckling, screws or adhesive connection.

1. First power plenum 45

The first motor 451 drives the ribbon cartridge assembly and the printing rubber roller 18 to operate through the first power transmission mechanism 452, and the first power transmission mechanism 452 is centrally disposed in the first power chamber 45 and forms a standardized module, and the power transmission performance, operation reliability and stability of the standardized module can be independently detected before the standardized module is assembled in the printer 1.

The power input ends of the ribbon cartridge assembly and the printing rubber roller 18 are connected with the corresponding power output ends in the first power transmission mechanism 452 in a plug-and-play manner through clamping, gear engagement or male-female matching manner.

The paper feeding rubber roller 15 is also arranged on the paper feeding port side of the printer 1, the paper feeding rubber roller 15 and the printing rubber roller 18 synchronously rotate, and the power input end of the paper feeding rubber roller is connected with the corresponding power output end in the first power transmission mechanism 452 in a plug-and-play way through clamping, gear engagement or male-female matching way.

The first motor 451 is mounted on the inside face of the back plate 41 of the first power compartment 45, and a transmission gear set in the first power transmission mechanism 452 is mounted on the outside face of the back plate 41 of the first power compartment 45.

The ribbon 35 take-up spool in the ribbon cartridge assembly is connected to the corresponding power take-off in the first power transmission 452 via a clutch assembly. The clutch assembly may cause the ribbon 35 take-up spool to be in powered engagement with the first power transmission mechanism 452 when the print head 21 is printing on the print medium, and may cause the ribbon 35 take-up spool to be out of powered engagement with the first power transmission mechanism 452 when printing is completed and the print head 21 is raised. For a specific technical scheme of the clutch assembly, see national patent application filed by the inventor at 2024, 01 and 17 (name: thermal transfer printer 1 and ribbon 35 recovery driving mechanism assembled therein, application number: 202410069406.9).

The clutching section members of the clutching assembly are mounted within a box 43 of the first power compartment 45.

2. Second power plenum 46

The second motor 461 operates by a lifting mechanism for driving the print head 21 in the print head assembly up or down by the second power transmission mechanism 462 and driving means for driving the second power transmission mechanism 462 to operate (hereinafter, this driving means will be referred to as a second motor 461), and likewise, the second power transmission mechanism 462 is centrally disposed in the second power chamber 46 and forms a standardized module whose power transmission performance, operational reliability and stability can be independently checked before it is assembled in the printer 1.

The lifting mechanisms are respectively arranged in the box bodies 43 corresponding to the two power chambers 4, and the power transmission between the two lifting mechanisms is connected through the transmission shaft rod 47. The power input end of the lifting mechanism is connected with the corresponding power output end of the second power transmission mechanism 462 in a plug-and-play manner through clamping, gear engagement or male-female matching manner.

The second motor 461 is mounted on the inner side of the housing back plate 41 of the second power housing 46, and the second transmission gear set in the second power transmission mechanism 462 is mounted on the outer side of the housing back plate 41 of the second power housing 46 and is connected to the power output shaft of the second motor 461.

The first motor 451 and the second motor 461 are disposed opposite to each other and are respectively located in the installation space formed by avoiding the lower side of the bin cover plate 42 on the corresponding side.

The lifting mechanism consists of a jacking connecting rod plate 5, a supporting rod shaft 51 and an eccentric cam 52, wherein the jacking connecting rod plate 5 is of an integral structure, the jacking connecting rod plate is rotatably sleeved on the supporting rod shaft 51, and the supporting rod shaft 51 is arranged between the bin back plate 41 and the bin cover plate 42 in the corresponding box body 43.

The jacking link plate 5 is an integral structure, which can be divided into a driving section, a balancing section and a jacking section, wherein the end of the driving section is called a driving end 53, the balancing section is called a balancing plate, and the end of the jacking section is called a jacking end 54. The balance plate is connected to the support rod shaft 51, the driving end 53 and the lifting end 54 are respectively disposed on the front and rear sides of the balance plate, and a return spring capable of making the lifting end 54 drop is fastened on the lifting connecting rod plate 5. The eccentric cam 52 is disposed at the driving end 53 side and contacts with the driving end 53, the carriage plates 23 disposed at the left and right sides of the carriage of the print head 21 are disposed at the lifting end 54 side, and the driving end 53 and the lifting end 54 move in a direction of up and down under the rotation of the eccentric cam 52.

The top surface of the bin cover plate 42 is provided with an ear plate window hole 44, when the second motor 461 drives the eccentric cam 52 to rotate to the convex part to be upward through the two-way gear set, the driving end 53 moves upward under the action of the reset spring, at the moment, the printing head 21 descends, and the lower end of the ear plate 23 can pass through the ear plate window hole 44 to be erected at the roller shaft end part of the printing rubber roller 18 and is opposite to the lifting end 54 up and down; when the second motor 461 drives the drive end 53 downward, the lift end 54 moves upward and lifts the carriage plate 23, at which time the printhead 21 moves upward and out of abutment with the ink ribbon 35 therebelow.

The invention is preferable: the driving end 53 is located at one side of the paper feeding port, the eccentric cam 52 is disposed above the driving end 53, the lifting end 54 is a double fork plate with a "U" shaped notch, and the corresponding ear plate 23 is also preferably the same shape as the lifting end 54, i.e. is a double fork plate with a "U" shaped notch. When the lifting end 54 moves upward, the double fork plate of the lifting end 54 applies upward force to the ear plate 23 which is caught on the roller shaft end of the printing rubber roller 18 and lifts up the printing head 21.

A photoelectric sensor is also provided in the case 43 to detect the position of the lifting end 54 when it is lifted, and the lifting height of the lifting end 54 can be adjusted according to the arrangement.

The invention installs the first motor 451 and the first power transmission mechanism 452, the second motor 461 and the second power transmission mechanism 462 in the first power chamber 45 and the second power chamber 46 respectively to form a standardized module which can detect the power transmission effect, the operation reliability and the stability of the standardized module under the line, and can print a printing medium with wider width under the condition of the same width dimension compared with the prior art, such as a small thermal transfer printer 1 with the appearance width of 310mm in the prior art, the width of the printable medium is 210mm, the printable medium width of the standardized module reaches 260mm, and the width utilization rate is improved by 15% (82% -67% = 15%).

8. Electrical connection of printhead assembly and main control circuit board

As shown in fig. 1-3, 19-20 and 26-28, the present invention improves the structure of the main control circuit board assembly and the printhead assembly, which are often used in the small thermal transfer printer 1 in the prior art, at the bottom of the casing 11, to separate the main control circuit board assembly and the printhead assembly, one is disposed on the inner surface of the cover 12 of the printer 1, the other is disposed at the bottom of the casing 13 of the printer 1, and the ribbon cartridge assembly is disposed in the casing 11 and between the printhead assembly and the main control circuit board assembly when the cover 12 and the casing 13 are fastened together, and the printing rubber roll 18 is disposed between the ribbon cartridge assembly and the main control circuit board assembly.

The invention preferably arranges the print head assembly on the inner surface of the cover 12 of the printer 1, and arranges the main control circuit board and the power battery in the main control circuit board assembly on the bottom of the base 13 of the printer 1, thus fully utilizing the space in the housing 11, and being beneficial to the miniaturization of the printer 1.

When the two components are separately disposed, how to dispose the power line and the signal line (hereinafter, the power line and the signal line are collectively referred to as a harness) between the printhead assembly and the main control circuit board assembly becomes a problem of very injuring brain. Because the diameter of the wire harness is large, if the normal operation of some parts in the machine shell 11 is hindered by adopting the mode of connecting wires from top to bottom in the machine shell 11, if the wire harness is arranged at the position of the hinge shaft connected between the machine cover 12 and the machine base 13, the connecting mode of the wire harness cannot be adopted because the diameter of the hinge shaft is small (the diameter of the hinge shaft is 0.8mm-2.5mm, preferably 2.0mm because the printer is a small printer 1), and therefore, the mode of electrically connecting the printing head assembly and the main control circuit board adopts the following structure:

The printhead assembly includes one or more electrical printhead contacts 61 disposed beside the printhead, a printhead 21 harness connected to the printhead 21 is connected to the electrical printhead contacts 61, the main control circuit board assembly includes one or more electrical circuit board contacts 62 disposed beside or on the main control circuit board, and a circuit board harness connected to the main control circuit board is connected to the electrical circuit board contacts, and the number of the electrical printhead contacts 61 and the electrical circuit board contacts 62 are the same and correspond one to the other, and the electrical connection between one electrical printhead contact 61 and the corresponding electrical circuit board contact 62 is hereinafter referred to as a motherboard electrical circuit (also referred to as a conductive path).

In the invention, a plurality of printing head main board electric paths are preferably arranged on one side of the printer, and the rated on-current of the printing head main board electric paths can be the same or different; meanwhile, the main board electric paths of the printing head can be only power supply connecting channels for supplying electric energy to heating wires in the printing head assembly or electric signal transmission channels for supplying 5V power and/or control signals to sub-circuits in the printing head assembly, and can also be part of the electric signal transmission channels.

The invention preferably comprises two modules consisting of a plurality of printing head main board electric paths, which are respectively arranged at the left side and the right side of the printer.

When the print head 21 is crimped to the printing blanket cylinder 18 by the ink ribbon 35, the print head electromechanical contacts 61 are electrically connected to the corresponding circuit board electromechanical contacts 62 in elastically compressive contact.

To achieve the electrical connection in the manner of elastic compression contact, the printhead electromechanical contact 61 and the circuit board electromechanical contact 62 may adopt the following two structures:

1) The electrical contact 61 of the printer head and the electrical contact 62 of the circuit board are elastic conductive posts 63, the elastic conductive posts 63 are composed of conductive post cavities 64, pressing springs 65 and conductive posts 66, the pressing springs 65 are arranged in the conductive post cavities 64 and between the top ends of the conductive posts 66 and the top end surfaces in the conductive post cavities 64, and the conductive posts 66 are contacted with the inner walls of the conductive post cavities 64 and can move up and down in the conductive post cavities 64.

When the printer head electrical contact 61 is brought into contact with the circuit board electrical contact 62, the conductive posts 66 in the two resiliently abut together, thereby making an electrical connection.

2) One of the printer head electromechanical contact 61 and the circuit board electromechanical contact 62 adopts the elastic conductive column 63, the other is a fixed conductive contact 67, and the conductive contact 67 can be in a flat shape or a concave shape with an arc-shaped surface, and the invention is preferably a concave shape with an arc-shaped surface.

When the printhead electromechanical contacts 61 are brought into contact with the circuit board electromechanical contacts 62, the conductive posts 66 in one resiliently press against the conductive contacts 67 in the other, thereby making an electrical connection.

The invention is preferable: the printhead electromechanical contacts 61 are resilient conductive posts 63 and the circuit board electromechanical contacts 62 are conductive contacts 67. At the same time, it is preferable that: elastic conductive posts 63 are provided on the cover 12, and conductive contacts 67 are provided on the power chambers 4 on the left and right sides within the housing 11 of the printer 1.

Preferably: a cover pressing plate 82 is arranged on the inner surface of the cover 12 at a position which is opposite to the upper and lower parts of the box body 43, and the elastic conductive column 63 is arranged on the cover pressing plate 82; each power bin 4 is composed of a bin back plate 41 and a bin cover plate 42, the inner side of the bin back plate 41 and the outer side of the bin cover plate 42 are buckled together to form a box body 43 with a hollow cavity, and the conductive contacts 67 are arranged on the top panel of the bin cover plate 42. The circuit board wire harness passes through the box body 43 downwards from the box body 43 and is electrically connected with the main control circuit board.

The buckling and locking between the cover 12 and the base 13 of the invention preferably adopts the following structure:

Two ends of the cover 12 are respectively provided with a switch hole 71, the switch holes 71 are internally provided with elastic lock catches 73, corresponding lock holes 72 are formed in the bin backboard 41, lock bolts 76 of the elastic lock catches 73 fasten the cover 12 on the base 13 when being clamped into the lock holes 72, and meanwhile, the elastic conductive columns 63 are pressed into the corresponding conductive contacts 67.

The elastic lock catch 73 consists of a shifting handle 74, a moving plate 75, a lock tongue 76 and a reset pressure spring 77, wherein a chute is arranged at a position, which is positioned near the switch hole 71, on the inner surface of the cover 12, the shifting handle 74 is fixedly connected to the upper surface of the moving plate 75, the shifting handle 74 is arranged in the switch hole 71, the moving plate 75 is arranged on the inner surface of the cover 12 and can reciprocate left and right along the chute, the lock tongue 76 is arranged at the outer end part of the moving plate 75, the reset pressure spring 77 is sleeved on a short shaft arranged at the inner end part of the moving plate 75, and a limit baffle 78 for limiting the reset pressure spring 77 is arranged on the inner surface of the cover 12.

When the handle 74 is moved inward by hand, the lock tongue 76 moves from the lock hole 72, and at the moment when the lock tongue 76 moves out of the lock hole 72, the cover 12 is ejected upward to open the cover 12 by the opening side of the cover 12 under the action of the pressing spring 65 in the elastic conductive column 63.

Due to the use of the elastic conductive posts 63, the present solution does not require the provision of a special elastic member for opening the cover 12.

9. Damping structure of ribbon releasing shaft of ribbon cartridge

As shown in fig. 20-25, the present invention is to provide a damping member 81 on the ribbon unwind shaft 34 at the supply end of the ribbon 35 of the ribbon cartridge 3 so that the ribbon 35 passes between the printhead 21 and the print medium in a straight line during unwinding.

As shown in fig. 1 to 3, a power bin 4 is provided on both sides of the casing 11 of the thermal transfer printer 1 to which the ribbon cartridge 3 is applied, a concave portion 85 is provided on the top surface of the bin cover plate 42 of the power bin 4, a cover pressing plate 82 is provided on the inner side of the cover 12 of the thermal transfer printer 1 at a position vertically opposite to the bin cover plate 42, and an upward concave portion 84 is provided on the cover pressing plate 82 at a position vertically opposite to the concave portion 85.

The damping member 81 is preferably a torsion spring disposed in the housing 43 of the power cartridge by a fulcrum, and when the ink ribbon cartridge 3 is mounted in the housing 11, the end of the ink ribbon discharge shaft 34 is defined in a shaft limiting hole defined by an upper concave portion 84 and a lower concave portion 85. The concave wall of the concave position 85 is provided with a window hole 83 communicated with the inside of the box body 43, one torsion arm of the torsion spring is propped against the outer shaft wall of the ribbon paying-off shaft 34, and the ribbon paying-off shaft 34 always has an elastic force to generate resistance, so that when the ribbon 35 is pulled by the ribbon 35 winding shaft, the traveling ribbon 35 does not have wrinkles or curls. Preferably the upper ends of the torsion arms are resiliently exposed above the aperture 83 when the cassette 3 is removed.

Claims

1. The utility model provides a convenient business trip carries and small-size thermal transfer printer who uses, includes print head (21), ribbon cartridge (3) and printing rubber roll (18) that set up in casing (11), its characterized in that: a paper feeding rubber roller (15) is arranged between a paper feeding port of the printer (1) and the printing head (21), and before a printing medium entering a paper feeding channel does not reach a printing position, the printing head (21) is driven by a lifting mechanism to lift and enable a color ribbon (35) pressed by the printing head (21) to be far away from the printing rubber roller (18) below the printing head (21); when the print media line reaches the print position, the print head (21) descends and presses the ribbon (35) against the print media.

2. The compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips of claim 1, wherein: a rigid paper feeding channel which is formed by an upper limit plate and a lower limit plate made of hard materials and is used for enabling a printing medium to smoothly travel to the position below the printing head (21) is arranged between the ink ribbon (35) and the printing rubber roller (18) from a paper feeding port of the printer (1) to the position below the printing head (21).

3. The compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips of claim 2, wherein: the paper feeding rubber roller (15) is arranged at the paper feeding opening, and an elastic pressing part (16) which helps the printing medium to stably enter the paper feeding channel is further arranged above the paper feeding rubber roller (15).

4. A compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips as in claim 3, wherein: the elastic pressing component (16) is an upper rolling roller, a pressing plate or a pressing shaft rod which can rotate freely.

5. The compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips of claim 4, wherein: the upper limiting plate is a bottom plate (31) of the ribbon cartridge (3), and the lower limiting plate is a supporting plate (17) for supporting printing media to travel in the paper feeding channel.

6. The compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips of claim 5, wherein: the gap between the upper limiting plate and the lower limiting plate is 1.0mm-3.0mm.

7. The compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips of claim 6, wherein: the lifting mechanism consists of a lifting connecting rod plate (5), a supporting rod shaft (51) and an eccentric cam (52), wherein the lifting connecting rod plate (5) is of an integrated structure, the lifting connecting rod plate is installed on a rack in a machine shell (11) through the supporting rod shaft (51) and consists of a driving end (53) and a lifting end (54) which are respectively arranged on two sides of the supporting rod shaft (51), the eccentric cam (52) is arranged on the side of the driving end (53) and contacts with the driving end (53), the lifting end (54) is arranged below an ear plate (23) of a printing head (21) bracket, and the driving end (53) and the lifting end (54) move in opposite directions under the rotation of the eccentric cam (52).

8. The compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips of claim 7, wherein: the driving end (53) is positioned at one side of the paper inlet, and the eccentric cam (52) is arranged above the driving end (53); the lifting end (54) is a double fork plate with a U-shaped notch, and when the eccentric cam (52) drives the driving end (53) to downwards move, the double fork plate applies force upwards to the lug plate (23) buckled on the end part of the roller shaft of the printing rubber roller (18) and lifts the printing head (21) to be separated from the pressing of the ink ribbon (35).

9. The compact thermal transfer printer for easy carrying and use on business trips of claim 8, wherein: the printing medium is a printing medium with a paper or card easy-to-stick ribbon (35) with self-adhesive; or the printing medium is an ultrathin metal plate or a label-like easy-to-hang ribbon (35) with self-adhesive.