JP2008229582A - Inkjet head control device - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an inkjet head control device for supporting stable ejection having no ejection mistake without causing the ink drying of a plurality of head ejection ports densely arranged. <P>SOLUTION: The inkjet head control device comprises: a liquid pouring preliminary ejection unit 10 which has a drain function for head liquid pouring, air purge or periodic liquid discharge and a function of collecting misty ink discharged from the heads upon the preliminary ejection; a head cleaning unit 20 for performing the cleaning of an inkjet head ejection surface with a cleaning member; a head ejection state inspection unit 30 for inspecting the ejection state of the inkjet head before coating; a head unit loading/unloading unit 40 for loading and unloading the inkjet head unit from an inkjet coating device; and a control device 50 of performing movement of various kinds of units and an operational control in cooperation with the inkjet head unit. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2009,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to an ink-jet head management apparatus that is attached to an ink-jet coating apparatus used for forming a color pattern of a color filter.

  As a manufacturing method of a color filter (hereinafter referred to as CF) used for a color liquid crystal display, a photolithography method (hereinafter referred to as a photolithography method) has been generally used. In this method, a photosensitive resist is applied to a rectangular glass substrate, and a constant lattice-like color pattern can be obtained by repeating the steps of exposure, development, and drying a plurality of times.

However, in recent years, as the size of the substrate has increased, the cost reduction of CF has become more severe as the panel price has decreased.
Therefore, when constructing the next-generation CF production line exceeding 2m square by the photolithographic method, the cost of the device itself becomes higher than the current line, and the cost of the building increases due to the expansion of the footprint due to the size increase. Therefore, a significant increase in initial cost is expected.
Further, it can be expected that the running cost will further increase due to an increase in excess ink to be developed and an increase in the amount of materials used such as a developer, and it is difficult to satisfy the cost reduction requirement described above.

Therefore, an inkjet method has attracted attention as one of new CF manufacturing methods that can replace the photolithography method. In this method, multiple colors are applied simultaneously to the BM (black matrix) pattern using an inkjet head, so the steps required for the photolithographic method, such as exposure and development, can be reduced. Can be greatly reduced.
In addition, the coating material is also the minimum amount necessary, and further, the developing solution necessary for the photolithography method is not necessary, so that the running cost can be reduced.

  In the above-described ink jet system, the number of ink jet heads for ejecting ink is increased as the substrates mounted on the apparatus become denser as the substrate size increases, the tact up for improving productivity, and the color filters become more precise. It came to be arranged individually.

Ink jet is one of the factors that reduce the yield of products due to dryness of the head discharge surface and clogging of discharge ports due to ink aggregation due to drying.
In order to prevent these problems, the liquid is periodically discharged from the head, the head is driven to perform mist-like preliminary discharge, the function of periodically cleaning dirt adhering to the head discharge surface, and the head before coating. It is necessary to have a function of preventing defects in advance by inspecting the discharge state.
In order to maintain the inkjet head in the best state, a liquid extraction device that can effectively use space as a whole device by arranging a plurality of liquid extraction head maintenance units with high space efficiency has been proposed ( For example, see Patent Document 1).

In the worst case, when replacing a unit equipped with a plurality of arranged heads, it is necessary to replace a unit equipped with a plurality of arranged heads for backup as soon as possible. A detachable function is also required. Thus, in order to support the stable discharge of an inkjet head with an inkjet coating apparatus, it is necessary to install an inkjet head management apparatus.
JP 2004-202325 A

  The present invention has been devised in view of the above-described demands, and provides an inkjet head management device for supporting stable ejection without causing ejection errors without causing ink drying of a plurality of densely arranged head ejection openings. The purpose is to provide.

In order to achieve the above-mentioned problems in the present invention, the present invention is an apparatus for managing an inkjet head of an inkjet coating apparatus,
at least,
(A) a liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10 having a drain function for liquid flow through the head, air purge or periodic liquid discharge, and a function of collecting mist-like ink discharged from the head during preliminary discharge;
(C) a head cleaning unit 20 that cleans the inkjet head discharge surface with a cleaning member;
(B) a head discharge state inspection unit 30 for inspecting the discharge state of the inkjet head before coating;
(D) a head unit attaching / detaching unit 40 for attaching / detaching the ink jet head unit from the ink jet coating apparatus;
(E) A control device 50 configured to perform movement and operation control of the various units in cooperation with the ink jet coating device.

  By using the inkjet head management device of the present invention, it is possible to support stable ink ejection without ejection errors without causing ink drying of a plurality of densely arranged head ejection openings.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described.
FIG. 1 is a schematic configuration diagram of an inkjet head management device of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a schematic top view showing an embodiment of the inkjet head management device of the present invention, and FIG. 3 is an inkjet head management device of the present invention. The schematic side view of each is shown.
As shown in FIGS. 1 to 3, the inkjet head management apparatus 100 of the present invention has a drain function for liquid passing through the head, air purge, or periodic liquid discharge, and a mist discharged from the head during preliminary discharge. A liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10 having a function of collecting ink, a head cleaning unit 20 that cleans the inkjet head ejection surface with a cleaning member, and a head ejection that inspects the ejection state of the inkjet head before coating. A state inspection unit 30; a head unit attaching / detaching unit 40 for attaching / detaching an ink jet head unit to / from the ink jet coating apparatus; and a control device 50 for performing movement and operation control of the various units in cooperation with the ink jet coating apparatus; , Is composed of.

In the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, a discharge pot is provided to perform initial liquid passage of ink in the pipe, air bleed in the ink jet head, interval liquid discharge for preventing the head discharge port from being dried, and the like. A discharge pot is provided for each color, and a tank is provided below the discharge port.
The purpose is to collect the mist-like ink discharged from the inkjet head. The mist-like ink is exhausted (collected) by a blower or a vacuum generator in order to prevent the mist-like ink from reattaching to the head ejection surface or scattering to the surroundings. )I do.

  In the head cleaning unit 20, dirt on the head discharge surface is removed by pressing the head discharge surface with a pressing roller from below the sheet in the longitudinal direction of the head with a cleaning member drawn out from a roll.

  The head discharge state inspection unit 30 uses an image receiving film having ink permeability, discharges all the head discharge detection patterns onto the image receiving film, images the discharge detection patterns with a camera, and determines discharge defects.

In the head unit attaching / detaching unit 40, the ink jet head unit is attached to and detached from the ink jet coating apparatus by movement and lifting means provided in the attaching / detaching unit.
In addition, since the detachable unit is used less frequently, such as when the head unit is replaced or in an emergency, it has an independent travel axis, and is attached to and detached from the inkjet coating apparatus by lateral movement in the head direction and elevation.

The control device 50 includes a computer, a display, and the like, and performs movement and operation control of the various units in cooperation with the ink jet coating device.
When head management is required, movement control is performed so that each processing unit comes to a fixed position at the head position.

FIG. 4 is a schematic top view showing an embodiment of an inkjet coating apparatus incorporating the inkjet head management apparatus of the present invention.
The ink jet coating apparatus 200 includes a head unit 210 on which an ink jet head is mounted and a substrate suction stage 220. The substrate suction stage 220 scans under a head unit 210 at a fixed position to perform coating.
The inkjet head management apparatus 100 of the present invention is installed on both sides of the inkjet coating apparatus 200.

  The inkjet head management apparatus 100 is installed in parallel with the scan direction. Each unit equipped in the inkjet head management apparatus 100 moves to the bottom of the head unit 210 by a traveling mechanism as necessary, and performs various processes.

The inkjet head management apparatus 100 includes a liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, a head cleaning unit 20, a head discharge state inspection unit 30, a head unit attaching / detaching unit 40, and a control device 50.
The liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, the head cleaning unit 20, and the head discharge state inspection unit 30 are mounted on a common carriage and have a traveling axis. Further, the head unit attaching / detaching unit 40 has a traveling shaft alone, moves on the rail 230, and can be stopped at an arbitrary position by the control device 50.
Here, an example in which the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, the head cleaning unit 20, and the head discharge state inspection unit 30 are installed in a common carriage and the head unit attaching / detaching unit 40 is installed in a single carriage is shown. It is an example and the present invention is not limited to this.

  When the head unit attachment / detachment unit 40 is used, the attachment / detachment operation is performed after the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, the head cleaning unit 20, and the head discharge state inspection unit 30 are retracted to the left in FIG.

FIG. 5A is a schematic top view of the waste liquid pot of the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, and FIG.
) Is a schematic sectional view taken along line AA ′ of FIG. 5A, and FIG. 6 is a flow chart of waste liquid generated in the liquid discharge part 11 and the mist discharge part 12, respectively. The liquid discharger 11 periodically discharges ink for liquid flow to the head unit, air purge, and drying prevention. As shown in FIG. 6, the waste liquid is allowed to fall naturally into the drain tank 14.

  The mist discharge unit 12 performs preliminary discharge for the purpose of preliminary discharge before coating and prevention of drying. The distance between the head unit 210 and the mist discharging unit 12 is as close as possible to prevent mist scattering (a lifting mechanism is not shown). Exhaust (collection) is performed by the vacuum generator 13 in order to prevent re-attachment to the ejection surface or scattering to the periphery when the mist ink is ejected.

  In the case of preliminary discharge, connection is made with the exhaust line on the facility side. A trap tank 15 is provided between the facility side and the unit side so that the liquid ink does not flow into the facility side exhaust line as it is, and the liquid ink is trapped at a reduced flow rate. ON / OFF of the connection with the facility side exhaust line is performed by the open / close damper 16.

7 is a schematic configuration diagram showing an example of the configuration of the head cleaning unit 20 that cleans the ejection surface of the head unit 210, FIG. 8 is a schematic side view of the head cleaning unit 20, and FIG. FIG. 10 is an explanatory view showing the pressing mechanism of the pressing roller 24. FIG.
In the head cleaning unit 20, the cleaning member 21 impregnated with the cleaning liquid is pressed against the head discharge surface to remove the dirt on the head discharge surface. The unwinding portion 27 a that unwinds the cleaning member 21, and the cleaning When the cleaning member 21 that has been processed is wound, a winding portion 27b is provided, and the cleaning member 21 is fed and wound.
The unwinding part 27a uses, for example, a mechanical clutch brake, and the winding part 27b uses a servo motor or the like to enable adjustment of the feed rate. The feed amount is detected by a feed amount detection roller and detected by a pulse counter or the like connected to the roller tip.

There is a fixed cleaning liquid discharge roller 23 that discharges the cleaning liquid on the back side of the feeding head of the cleaning member 21. The cleaning liquid is discharged from the discharge port to the cleaning member 21, and the cleaning liquid is soaked into the cleaning member 21.
An ink permeation preventing member 22 is provided on the lower surface of the cleaning member 21, and has an unwinding portion 28 a and a winding portion 28 b, and is a mechanism that can be fed out.

  The ink permeation preventing member 22 is configured so that the liquid that has permeated the cleaning member 21 is turned around and does not adhere to or contaminate the elastic body. Under the ink penetration preventing member 22, there is a pressing roller 24 capable of pressing the cleaning member 21 and the ink penetration preventing member 22 against the heads of the head units 210 arranged in a plurality of rows.

  As shown in FIG. 10, the pressing roller 24 has a mechanism in which a slide shaft 24d stands on the lifting base 24a and can be moved up and down by a slide guide 24c in the pressing roller block 24b. The pressing pressure is given by the pressing spring 24e. Adjustment is possible with the pressing pressure adjusting screw 24f.

When a head cleaning command is issued, the cleaning unit 20 moves immediately below the head unit 210.
Simultaneously with the movement, the winding portion 27a of the cleaning member 21 is driven, and the cleaning member 21 having a specified feed amount is fed out by the feed amount detection roller. At that time, the cleaning liquid is discharged from the cleaning liquid discharge roller 23, and only the necessary portions are permeated into the cleaning member.

When the designated feed of the cleaning member 21 is completed, the pressing roller 24 is pressed by the lifting cylinder 25, and then the roller is shifted to the specified position by the shift cylinder 26 shown in FIG. return.

FIG. 11 is a schematic configuration diagram illustrating an example of a head discharge state inspection unit 30 for performing head discharge confirmation before inkjet coating.
The head discharge state inspection unit 30 has an unwinding portion 33a for unwinding the image-receiving film 31 with ink permeability and a winding portion 33b for winding, and the image-receiving film 31 with ink permeability is a nip roller 32. The tension controller is installed so as to keep constant regardless of the diameters of the nip roller 32 on the winding side and the winding side.

White light 320 is provided on the back side of the image receiving film 31 to ensure the brightness of the detection surface.
In the detection procedure, first, a necessary amount of the image receiving film 31 is fed together with an inspection command from the control device 50.

  Next, when the feeding of the image receiving film 31 is completed, the traveling carriage on which the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, the head cleaning unit 20, and the head discharge state inspection unit 30 are mounted moves at a constant speed toward the head unit 210.

Next, when the head discharge state inspection unit 30 approaches the head unit 210, a print command for a pattern for detecting all-color discharge is issued to the head unit 210.
As shown in FIG. 12, the detection patterns for all colors are printed on the image receiving film 31 while changing the ejection timing.

  Next, the traveling carriage is moved and stopped so that the detection pattern printed on the image receiving film 31 falls within the field of view of the camera 310.

Next, the camera 310 scans in the width direction of the image receiving film 21, counts the number of ejection detection patterns, and determines the ejection state of the head unit 210.
The determination of the discharge state is performed by using luminance instead. The discharge section has a lower brightness than the non-discharge section, and the head address having a discharge defect and the nozzle number of the head can be detected by setting a threshold value.
The series of operation control and determination is performed by the control device 50.

FIG. 13 is a schematic configuration diagram showing an embodiment of the head unit attaching / detaching unit 40, FIG. 14 is a side view of the head unit attaching / detaching unit 40, and FIG. 15 is a partial enlarged view showing the head unit attaching / detaching mechanism. Show.
The head unit attaching / detaching unit 40 is a mechanism for attaching / detaching a plurality of heads, and the head unit 210 is supported by four support pins 42 having a spherical top.

  The head unit 210 side has a spherical groove corresponding to the support pin 42. The support block 41 including the head unit support pin 42 is floated by an air bearing 44 shown in FIG. 15, and the support block 41 is supported in four directions from the inside by a positioning cylinder 43 in order to position the four support pins 42. Stretch.

Even if the position of the head unit 210 and the detachable unit is somewhat rough, the support pin 42 is positioned in a floating state, and the support pin 42 of the support block 41 is drawn into the spherical groove on the head unit 210 side.
The attaching / detaching operation of the head unit 210 is performed by retracting a traveling carriage equipped with the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10, the head cleaning unit 20, and the head discharge state inspection unit 30 to the left side shown in FIG.
The head unit attachment / detachment unit moves in the direction of the head unit 210 and performs attachment / detachment operation by a combination of lifter lifting, lateral movement, and lifter lowering.

  As described above, by using the ink jet head management apparatus of the present invention, liquid discharge / preliminary discharge of the head unit of the ink jet coating apparatus, head cleaning, head discharge state inspection, and attachment / detachment of the head unit can be easily and automatically performed. Therefore, stable ink ejection without ejection errors can be supported without causing ink drying of a plurality of head ejection ports arranged in a dense manner.

It is a schematic block diagram which shows one Example of the inkjet head management apparatus of this invention. It is a model top view of the inkjet head management apparatus of this invention. It is a model side view of the inkjet head management apparatus of this invention. It is a schematic top view which shows an example which incorporated the inkjet head management apparatus of this invention in the inkjet coating apparatus. FIG. 3A is a schematic top view of a waste liquid pot of the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10. (B) is a schematic cross-sectional view taken along line A-A ′ of (a). 4 is an explanatory diagram showing a flow of waste liquid generated in the liquid discharge unit 11 and the mist discharge unit 12 of the liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 10. FIG. It is a schematic block diagram which shows one Example of a head washing | cleaning unit. It is a model side view of a head cleaning unit. It is explanatory drawing which shows the function of the shift cylinder 26 which carries out the horizontal movement of the pressing roller 24 of a head washing | cleaning unit. It is explanatory drawing which shows the press mechanism of the pressing roller 24 of a head washing | cleaning unit. It is a schematic block diagram which shows one Example of a head discharge state inspection unit. It is explanatory drawing which shows an example of the discharge detection pattern of the head unit for test | inspecting a head discharge state. FIG. 3 is a schematic configuration diagram illustrating an example of a head unit attaching / detaching unit 40. 4 is a schematic side view of a head unit attaching / detaching unit 40. FIG. It is the elements on larger scale which show the attachment or detachment mechanism of a support pin and a head unit.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 ... Liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit 11 ... Liquid discharge part 12 ... Mist discharge part 13 ... Vacuum generator 14 ... Drain tank 15 ... Trap tank 16 ... Opening / closing damper 20 ... Head washing unit 21 ... ... Cleaning member 22 ... Ink penetration preventing material 23 ... Cleaning liquid discharge roller 24 ... Pushing roller 25 ... Elevating cylinder 26 ... Transition cylinder 27a, 28a ... Unwinding part 27b, 28b ... Winding part 30 ... ... head discharge state inspection unit 31 ... image receiving film 32 ... nip roller 33a ... unwinding part 33b ... winding part 40 ... head unit attaching / detaching unit 41 ... support block 42 ... support pin 43 ... positioning cylinder 50 ... Control device 100 ... Inkjet head management device 200 ... Inkjet coating device 210 ... Head unit 220 ... Substrate Wearing stage 230 ...... rail 310 ...... camera 320 ...... white illumination

Claims (1)

An inkjet head management apparatus that manages an inkjet head of an inkjet coating apparatus,
at least,
(A) A liquid discharge / preliminary discharge unit (10) having a drain function for head liquid flow, air purge or periodic liquid discharge, and a function of collecting mist-like ink discharged from the head during preliminary discharge When,
(B) a head cleaning unit (20) for cleaning the head unit discharge surface with a cleaning member; (c) a head discharge state inspection unit (30) for inspecting the discharge state of the head unit before coating;
(D) a head unit attaching / detaching unit (40) for attaching / detaching the head unit from the ink jet coating apparatus;
(E) A control device (50) configured to perform movement and operation control of the various units in cooperation with the ink jet coating device, and an ink jet head management device.

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