Thermal head apparatus

Claim 2

A thermal head apparatus comprising a support, a heating block having an electrically and thermally insulative substrate located on said support and a plurality of heating elements disposed on said electrically and thermally insulative substrate along a straight line, said plurality of heating elements being divided into a plurality of groups having a common connection for each group, a plurality of diode groups corresponding to said plurality of heating element groups, said plurality of diode groups including a plurality of diodes of identical polarity arranged along a straight line, an insulating substrate located on said support and having a group of conductors thereon for matrix-wiring said heating elements through said diode groups, and a film carrier provided with conductors for connecting said heating element block to the terminals on one side of said diode groups and the terminals on the other side of said diode groups to said group of conductors.

Claim 3

A thermal head apparatus as defined in claim 1, in which said film carrier is an insulating film which is common to said groups of heating elements and is provided with said conductors, said insulating film has openings at portions corresponding to said heating elements and said diode groups, said conductors are projected at their ends into said openings, said conductor substrate is arranged in parallel to the direction of the arrangement of said heating elements in such manner that said conductors being at least equal in number to said heating elements in respective groups of said heating elements are common to all said groups of said heating elements, and said conductors of said film carrier which are connected at respective one ends with said diode group are connected at the respective other ends with said in parallel arranged conductors.

Claim 4

A thermal head apparatus as defined in claim 1, in which said film carrier is used to connect between said groups of said heating elements and said diode groups and between said diode groups and respective one ends of the conductor groups on said conductor substrate, said conductor groups on said conductor substrate are equal in number to said heating element blocks and each of said conductor groups has conductors equal in number to the heating elements included in said heating element group, respective ends of said conductor groups which are connected with said diode groups are arranged in a direction crossing the direction of the array of said heating elements while the respective other ends of said conductor groups are arranged in parallel to the direction of the array of said heating elements, said conductor groups are provided independently of each other by the number equal to that of the heating element groups, said conductors in each of said groups being equal in number to the heating elements in said heating element groups and being arranged in parallel to each other, and said matrix-wiring film carrier which has openings at the portions corresponding to said respective other ends on said conductor substrate thereby to expose the conductors serves to connect commonly the conductors disposed at the same and corresponding positions in the respective conductor groups on said conductor substrate.