What is inkjet?
The Inkjet printer produces a digital image by dropping ink released from a nozzle onto paper, and are the most common consumer printers today mainly because of their reasonably low cost which caters to home and office users. It can range from consumer models to very large all-in-one units and specialty machines. History
The Siphon Recorder, invented by Lord Kelvin (William Thomson) in 1867 was the first recording device that used drops of ink emitted from a nozzle to record telegraph transmissions- Morse code. The apparatus was used for automatic recordings of telegraph messages.
Types of Inkjet Printers
1. Continuous Inkjet
Continuous inkjet printers were developed by IBM in the 1970s. It coats the page with ink very quickly but also waste a lot of ink since it deflects and controls the stream of charged drops that can be electronically deflected into a recycling system or allowed to pass and hit the paper or in reverse onto the printed.
2. Drop-on Demand Inkjet
In 1977 Siemens introduced the PT-80 serial character printer. This printer ejected ink droplets only where needed. There is no need for a deflection or recycling system.
Two different ways in which ink is released from the printing nozzle:
Thermal
It heats a resistor that forces a droplet of ink out of the nozzles by creating an air bubble in the ink chamber. The formation of the bubble forces a drop of ink out the nozzle.
Most consumer inkjet like Canon, Hewlett-Packard, and Lexmark uses thermal inkjet printing.
Piezoelectric
In piezo printing a ceramic piezo electric tile in the nozzle flexes into the ink reservoir in the print head forcing the drop from the nozzle.
This method allows a wider variety of inks than thermal inkjet as there is no requirement for a unstable component, and no issue with any buildup of ink residue but due to the use of piezoelectric material this type of printer costs more than the termal.
Epson and Brother