| 摘要 |
<p>A method and apparatus for cleaning the orifice plates (37, 39) of multiple printheads (31, 33) of an ink-jet printer (10). The apparatus includes a multi-blade wiper (60) which is indexed automatically to permit each printhead (31, 33) to be wiped in sequence by a selected blade (61, 63). The desired cleaning is produced by dragging a printhead (31) across the selected wiper blade (61). The wiper mechanism (140) may also comprise a plurality of resilient blades (154, 156) each having an octagonal shape and rotatable about an axis. A cam (180) coupled to the printhead carriage (114) causes simultaneous pivoting of the wiper blades (154, 156) into contact with the printheads (131, 133), as well as rotation of the blades to facilitate cleaning thereof. In the method of this invention, ink is expelled from the printheads to rehydrate dried ink thereon to facilitate its removal. <IMAGE></p> |
