Liquid discharge apparatus, head drive control device, recording medium, and actuator drive control device

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2017225461-A1
Application number	US-201715422432-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Feb 1, 2017
Priority date	Feb 5, 2016
Publication date	Aug 10, 2017
Grant date	—

Abstract

A liquid discharge apparatus includes a liquid discharge head and a head drive controller. The liquid discharge head includes an actuator including an electromechanical transducer element. The head drive controller controls the liquid discharge head. The head drive controller includes a drive waveform generator and a voltage updater. The drive waveform generator generates a drive waveform to be applied to the electromechanical transducer element. The voltage updater updates a voltage value of the drive waveform to a larger value with an elapse of time. The voltage updater sets a time interval of update of the voltage value to be longer as a number of times of the update is greater.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A liquid discharge apparatus comprising:
a liquid discharge head including an actuator including an electromechanical transducer element; and a head drive controller to control the liquid discharge head, the head drive controller including:
a drive waveform generator to generate a drive waveform to be applied to the electromechanical transducer element; and
a voltage updater to update a voltage value of the drive waveform to a larger value with an elapse of time,
the voltage updater to set a time interval of update of the voltage value to be longer as a number of times of the update is greater.

2 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 1 ,
wherein the voltage updater sets the time interval of update of the voltage value to be exponentially longer as the number of times of the update is greater.

3 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 1 ,
wherein the voltage updater sets the time interval of update of the voltage value to be longer than a repeated time interval after the repeated time interval is repeated multiple times.

4 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 1 ,
wherein the head drive controller includes a correction measurement unit to measure an accumulated time of application time of the drive waveform, and the voltage updater updates the voltage time when the accumulated time reaches the time interval of the update.

5 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 4 ,
wherein the correction measurement unit measures, as the accumulated time, an accumulated time of application time of the drive waveform from an update timing to a next update timing.

6 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 4 ,
wherein the drive waveform generator generates, as the drive waveform, a waveform that changes relative to an intermediate potential as a reference potential, and wherein the correction measurement unit measures, as the application time, an application time of the intermediate potential.

7 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 1 ,
wherein the head drive controller includes a correction measurement unit to measure an integrated accumulated time of application time of the drive waveform, and the voltage updater updates the voltage time when the integrated accumulated time reaches an integration of the time interval of the update.

8 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 7 ,
wherein the correction measurement unit measures, as the integrated accumulated time, an integrated time of accumulated time of application time of the drive waveform from a start of use of the liquid discharge apparatus.

9 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 1 ,
wherein the electromechanical transducer element is a flexurally-deformable element.

10 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 1 , further comprising:
a table in which the time interval of the update and an update value of the voltage value of the drive waveform are associated.

11 . The liquid discharge apparatus according to claim 1 , further comprising:
a plurality of tables in which time intervals of the update and update values of the voltage value of the drive waveform are associated with environmental temperatures.

12 . A non-transitory storage medium storing a program for causing a computer to perform processing, the processing comprising:
controlling generation and output of a drive waveform to be applied to the electromechanical transducer element of the actuator of the liquid discharge head according to claim 1 ; updating a voltage value of the drive waveform to a larger value with an elapse of time; and setting a time interval of the updating of the voltage value to be longer as a number of times of the updating is greater.

13 . A head drive control device comprising:
a drive waveform generator to generate a drive waveform to be applied to an electromechanical transducer element of an actuator of a liquid discharge head, to drive and control the liquid discharge head; and a voltage updater to update a voltage value of the drive waveform to a larger value with an elapse of time, the voltage updater to set a time interval of update of the voltage value to be longer as a number of times of the update is greater.

14 . An actuator drive control device comprising:
a drive waveform generator to generate a drive waveform to be applied to an electromechanical transducer element of an actuator, to drive and control the actuator; and a voltage updater to update a voltage value of the drive waveform to a larger value with an elapse of time, the voltage updater to set a time interval of update of the voltage value to be longer as a number of times of the update is greater.

Assignees

• Kondo Naoya
• Kihira Takakazu
• Itoh Masahiro
• Ricoh Co Ltd

Inventors

• Kondo Naoya
• Kihira Takakazu
• Itoh Masahiro

Classifications

• B41J2/04581

  controlling heads based on piezoelectric elements · CPC title

• B41J2/04588 Primary

  using a specific waveform · CPC title

• B41J2/04553

  detecting ambient temperature · CPC title

• B41J2/0459

  Height of the driving signal being adjusted · CPC title

• B41J2/04593

  Dot-size modulation by changing the size of the drop · CPC title