THERMAL INK TRANSFER PRINTER USING A MULTISTANDARD RIBBON

摘要

The thermal colour printer (1) has a thermal print head (6), and a transfer mechanism (2,3,5,10,11) to carry the printing surface (4) past the print head. An ink ribbon (8) is interposed between the print head and the printing surface. The ink ribbon presents a sequence of colours. The ink ribbon is displaced by a transport mechanism (9,13) controlled by a colour identification system (13). The colour identification system emits a beam of polychromatic light onto the ink ribbon, and a photodetector on the other side of the ink ribbon responds to the light beam to deliver a signal at a frequency that depends on the colour of the region of the ribbon exposed to the light. A microprocessor associates the frequency with colour.