×

Method and apparatus for assessing nozzle health

  • US 7,287,824 B2
  • Filed: 07/16/2004
  • Issued: 10/30/2007
  • Est. Priority Date: 07/16/2004
  • Status: Active Grant
First Claim
Patent Images

1. A method for assessing nozzle health of a printhead nozzle array in a swath-type inkjet printing system, comprising:

  • printing a swath portion of an image with the printhead nozzle array carried by a moving carriage of the printing system, wherein said image is an image printed by the printing system during a normal printing mode in which test patterns are not printed;

    optically scanning the printed swath portion to capture a scanned image, said optically scanning the printed swath portion comprises scanning the printed swath portion with an optical scanner carried by the moving carriage;

    comparing an expected image of the swath portion of the image with the scanned image;

    based on results of said comparing, assessing whether any nozzles of the nozzle array have malfunctioned.

View all claims
  • 1 Assignment
Timeline View
Assignment View
    ×
    ×