ALEXANDRIA, Va., Sept. 10 -- United States Patent no. 12,409,659, issued on Sept. 9, was assigned to RICOH COMPANY LTD. (Tokyo).
"Maintenance method and liquid discharge apparatus" was invented by Hiroyoshi Matsumoto (Kanagawa, Japan).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A maintenance method and a liquid discharge apparatus. The maintenance method is performed by a liquid discharge apparatus including a first liquid discharge head to discharge ink, a second liquid discharge head to discharge pretreatment liquid, and a liquid receiver into which the ink and the pretreatment liquid are discharged, and the maintenance method includes flushing the ink and the pretreatment liquid into the liquid receiver...