Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Akihiko Nakazawa

Takashi Kusaba

Atsushi Tanaka

Hiroyuki Kobayashi

Tsunenori Ashibe

Hidekazu Matsuda

Yuji Sakurai

Akira Shimada

Manabu Ohno

Shunji Suzuki

Nobuyuki Okubo

Hiroyuki Suematsu

Minoru Shimojo

Masayoshi Kato

Kenji Okado

Toshio Takamori

Makoto Kanbayashi

Ryoichi Fujita

Ryota Kashiwabara

Hidehiko Matsuda

The electrophotographic belt of the present invention is characterized that, in the electrophotographic belt composed of the thermoplastic resin composition containing thermoplastic resin, with respect to a flake-shaped portion having an arc length of 5% of the inner peripheral length of the electrophotographic belt, when the thickness of the flake-shaped portion is measured at intervals of 1 mm in the peripheral direction, the difference between the maximum value and the minimum value of the measured value is 2% or more and 20% or less of an arithmetic average value.

Electrophotographic belt, production method of electrophotographic belt, and electrophotographic apparatus

An electrophotographic endless belt containing a polyamide resin, carbon black and a filler, characterized in that the polyamide resin is at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyamide 610, polyamide 612, polyamide 11 and polyamide 12, the filler is at least one filler selected from the group consisting of an oxide, a hydroxide, a carbonate and a silicate, and weight (A) of the polyamide resin and total weight (B) of the carbon black and the filler is in a ratio (A:B) of from 90:10 to 50:50. Also disclosed are an electrophotographic apparatus having the electrophotographic endless belt, and a process for producing the electrophotographic endless belt.

Electrophotographic endless belt, electrophotographic apparatus having electrophotographic endless belt, and process for producing electrophotographic endless belt

In an electrophotographic belt member comprising a resin composition, the resin composition contains from 30% by weight to 90% by weight of a thermoplastic resin, from 2% by weight to 30% by weight of a compound selected from the group consisting of a polyether-ester amide, a polyether ester and a polyether amide, from 0% by weight to 5% by weight of an electrolyte, and from 2% by weight to 50% by weight of an insulating filler. Also disclosed are a process for producing the electrophotographic belt member, and an electrophotographic apparatus having the electrophotographic belt member.

Electrophotographic belt member, process for producing electrophotographic belt member, and electrophotographic apparatus

In an electrophotographic endless belt having a resin layer formed of a resin composition containing a polyamide, the resin composition further contains a copolymer obtained by copolymerization of an olefin and an oxygen-containing heterocyclic compound, a curve (T-log&#x3b7; curve) showing the relationship between temperature T (&#xb0; C.) and common logarithm log&#x3b7; of melt viscosity &#x3b7; (Pa&#xb7;s), of the resin composition has, in the range of log&#x3b7; of from log1,000 to log8,000, a gently inclined region the inclination &#x394; log&#x3b7;/&#x394;T of which is from &#x2212;0.02 to 0, and the gently inclined region has a temperature range of 10&#xb0; C. or more, and the resin layer has a thickness the maximum thickness of which is 115% or less of the average value of the thickness of the resin layer and the minimum thickness of which is 85% or more of the average value of the thickness of the resin layer. Also disclosed is a process for producing the above electrophotographic endless belt.

Electrophotographic endless belt, process for producing electrophotographic endless belt, and electrophotographic apparatus

An electrophotographic endless belt has a beltlike substrate and a meandering-preventive member attached to the inner peripheral surface of the beltlike substrate via a pressure-sensitive adhesive, double-coated tape. The pressure-sensitive adhesive, double-coated tape is a pressure-sensitive adhesive, double-coated tape having i) a reinforcing base material and ii) pressure-sensitive adhesive layers on both sides of the reinforcing base material. The reinforcing base material has a thickness of from 25 &#x3bc;m or more to 200 &#x3bc;m or less, and the pressure-sensitive adhesive layers on both sides each have a thickness of 200 &#x3bc;m or less and at least one of the pressure-sensitive adhesive layers has a thickness of from more than 100 &#x3bc;m to 200 &#x3bc;m or less, and the meandering-preventive member has a hardness of from 15&#xb0; or more to 70&#xb0; or less. Also disclosed are a process cartridge and an electrophotographic apparatus which have the electrophotographic endless belt as an intermediate transfer belt.

Electrophotographic endless belt, process cartridge, and electrophotographic apparatus

In an electrophotographic endless belt having a beltlike substrate, a meandering-preventive member and a position detection member, the meandering-preventive member is disposed on the inner-periphery side of one end portion of the beltlike substrate, the position detection member is disposed on the outer-periphery side of the other end portion of the beltlike substrate, and the meandering-preventive member and the position detection member are 200 mm to 250 mm away from each other in the width direction of the electrophotographic endless belt. The beltlike substrate contains a thermoplastic resin as a binder resin, and the beltlike substrate has a 25 &#x3bc;m&#xd7;25 &#x3bc;m surface total current value of from 300 nA to 2,000 nA at the time of application of 100 V as measured by SPM.

Electrophotographic endless belt comprising meandering-preventive member, and process cartridge and electrophotographic apparatus having such an endless belt

An endless belt for electrophotography is disclosed which is obtainable continuously by melt extrusion from a circular die. The endless belt has a layer containing a thermoplastic resin having a diphenyl sulfone structure represented by the following Formula (1)Also disclosed are a process for producing the endless belt and an image forming apparatus having the endless belt.

Endless belt electrophotography, process for producing the endless belt, and image forming apparatus having the endless belt

A process cartridge which is detachably mountable to a main body of an electrophotographic apparatus, includes an electrophotographic photosensitive member to carry a toner image; an intermediate transfer belt having a contact part with the photosensitive member, and a primary transfer unit to primarily transfer the toner image at the contact part from the photosensitive member to the intermediate transfer belt, being integrally supported in one body. After the contact part is formed by the photosensitive member and the intermediate transfer belt is brought into contact with under a linear pressure of 0.5 N/cm and is left for 10 hours in an environment of 45&deg; C./95% RH, differences in the dark portion potential and the light portion potential of the photosensitive member between the contact part and the non-contact part of the photosensitive member are respectively less than 20%, and no crack having a length of not less than 1 mm occurs in any of the surfaces of the photosensitive member and the intermediate transfer belt. An electrophotographic apparatus having the process cartridge is also disclosed.

Process cartridge and electrophotographic apparatus having an intermediate transfer belt

A process cartridge integrally supports therein a cylindrical latent-image-bearing member on which a toner image is formed and an intermediate transfer belt to which the toner image is primarily transferred and from which it is secondarily transported to a transfer medium. To prevent the latent-image-bearing member from being unwantedly triboelectrically charged during transportation, the cartridge satisfies any of requirements that A) the latent-image-bearing member has a surface potential Vt of &minus;200 V&lE;Vt&lE;200 V when the intermediate transfer belt and the latent-image-bearing member are rubbed with each other, B) a spacer member is provided between the intermediate transfer belt and the latent-image-bearing member, and the latent-image-bearing member has a surface potential Vt of &minus;200 V&lE;Vt&lE;200 V when the former and the latter are rubbed with each other, and C) the cartridge has a device for lowering contact pressure of the intermediate transfer belt against the latent-image-bearing member.

Process cartridge, image forming apparatus and intermediate transfer belt

A process cartridge detachably mountable on the main body of an electrophotographic apparatus, integrally supports a photosensitive drum for bearing toner images, and an intermediate transferring belt having a contact part with the photosensitive drum. The moisture amount of the intermediate transferring belt at 23&deg; C./50% RH is less than 1% by weight and the sum of the surface roughness Ra of the photosensitive drum and the surface roughness Ra of the intermediate transferring belt is less than 0.8 &mgr;m. The present invention also provides an electrophotographic apparatus having the process cartridge and an image forming method using the electrophotographic apparatus.

Image forming apparatus having process cartridge with intermediate transfer belt

An electrophotographic seamless belt containing a thermoplastic fluorine resin, which contains 3 to 40 parts by weight of a polyether-ester amide or polyether amide and 0.02 to 10 parts by weight of a fluorine-atom-containing surface-active agent or halogenated alkali metal salt, based on 100 parts by weight of the thermoplastic fluorine resin. Also disclosed is an electrophotographic apparatus having the electrophotographic seamless belt.

Electrophotographic seamless belt, and electrophotographic apparatus having the electrophotographic seamless belt

A process cartridge detachably mountable to the electrophotographic apparatus main body, integrally including an electrophotographic photosensitive member to carry a toner image; an intermediate transfer belt having a contact part with the photosensitive member; primary transfer member to primarily transfer the toner image from the photosensitive member to the intermediate transfer belt; and electric charge member to give electric charges in polarity opposite to the polarity of the toner at the time of the primary transfer to the toner on the intermediate transfer belt to return the toner on the intermediate transfer belt to the photosensitive member at the contact part to clean the intermediate transfer belt, wherein the intermediate transfer belt has an average glossiness of 30 to 90; glossiness deviation within 10; average film thickness of 40 to 200 &mgr;m; and film thickness unevenness within &plusmn;20% relative to the average film thickness. Also, an electrophotographic apparatus having the process cartridge and an image forming method using the electrophotographic apparatus are disclosed.

Process cartridge, electrophotographic apparatus and image forming method

A process cartridge integrally supports an electrophotographic photosensitive member, an intermediate transfer belt, primary transferer for transferring a toner image primarily from the member to the belt, a charge provider for providing the toner on the belt with electric charges having a polarity reverse to the polarity the toner has at the time of the primary transfer and returning the toner on the belt to the member at a contact zone to clean the belt, and an electrophotographic-photosensitive-member cleaner. The cartridge is dividable into an electrophotographic photosensitive member unit and an intermediate transfer belt unit and has a joining unit which joins the two units. The peripheral length and average thickness of the belt and the diameter of at least one of rollers over and around which the belt is placed satisfy specific conditions.

Process cartridge, electrophotographic apparatus and image-forming method

An intermediate transfer member suitable for full-color image formation by electrophotography is formed by an elastic base layer and a fibrous core member embedded with the base layer. The core member is formed of fibers which are disposed within the base layer at a spacing between adjacent fibers of 50-3000 &mgr;m. As a result, the intermediate transfer member is reinforced to exhibit improved superposed transfer performance free from color deviation while retaining good transfer performance.

Fiber-reinforced intermediate transfer member for electrophotography, and electrophotographic apparatus including same

A transfer belt having a long service life and an image forming apparatus provided with the belt are provided. A serpentine motion preventing member ( ,) provided on at least one side portion of an inner circumferential surface of an endless belt body ( ) on which a toner image formed on an image bearing member is transferred on an outer circumference and retained by a retainer groove (R ) formed on a roller serpentine motion preventing member ( ) away from the belt body ( ). Accordingly, damage to the belt body ( ) is prevented.

Growing community of inventors

Shizuoka, Japan

Akihiko Nakazawa