| 摘要 |
<p>At one location within an ink jet printer maintenance station, a printhead carrying translatable carriage (16) is moved to bring a cap (46) into sealing engagement with the nozzle containing face (23) of the printhead. A vacuum pump (58) is connected to the cap by flexible hose (62,63) with a separator (64) intermediate the cap and vacuum pump. Priming is conducted when the carriage, with the cap sealed to the nozzle face of the printhead, is moved to another location to actuate a pinch valve (66) which squeezes the flexible hose closed. When the carriage is removed from that location, the hose returns to its original open state, thereby providing no crevices to collect ink. The flexibility of the hose and the built in flexibility of the pinch valve combine to eliminate the need for high positional tolerances in the carriage. <IMAGE></p> |
