Minolta Camera Kabushiki Kaisha

Konica Minolta Business Technologies, Inc.

Hidekazu Nakagami

Nobuaki Nishioka

Shozo Kaieda

Atsuyuki Tanaka

Hiroaki Kojima

Masashi Sakamoto

Yukio Tadauchi

Hiroshi Ozawa

Yoshinori Tanaka

Kouji Matsushita

Fuminori Moro

Yasuhiro Suzuki

Akira Kiba

Tatsumi Makio

Tokuzi Kakiuchi

Naoki Matsui

Tokuji Kakiuchi

An image forming unit is provided with a regulating member placed in such a way as to surround a charging roller to regulate movement thereof. The regulating member has a pressing section inclined with respect to a straight line connecting the center of the charging roller to the axis of the photoconductor, as seen from the axial direction of the photoconductor. The pressing section is inclined farther away from the photoconductor toward upstream of rotation of the photoconductor. The regulating member allows the charging roller to electrically charge the photoconductor with a simplified structure and prevents adhering substances from accumulating on the contact portion between the photoconductor and the charging roller.

Image forming unit and image forming apparatus including elastically deformable charging roller

A toner cartridge and a process cartridge, individually, have a shutter which makes sliding movement by opening and closing their toner inlet and toner outlet. When those cartridges are attached to a color printer and fixed together by a fixing lever, the shutters of both cartridges and the fixing lever can move together as one. When they make sliding movement together, both of the shutters are opened and toner supply becomes available. There are thus realized a toner cartridge, a process cartridge, an imaging cartridge, and an image forming apparatus to which those cartridges are attachable, all of which can prevent toner leakage from both a toner housing portion and a process portion and enables even an unaccustomed user to attach each cartridge without making surroundings dirty.

Toner cartridge, process cartridge, image cartridge, and image forming apparatus to which those cartridges are attachable

An image forming apparatus provided with a toner replenishing device attachable to a position of any one of a plurality of developing units. The toner replenishing device replenishes toner to another developing unit through the space of a developing unit to which the toner replenishing device is interchangeably attached.

Image forming apparatus having toner replenishing device interchangeable

An image forming apparatus equipped with a sensor for detecting the requirement of replenishment and exchange of expendable supplies, parts and the like and an image forming structure capable of forming on the same sheet of paper a prewarning image in addition to a regular image formed corresponding to an original or image information to be copied. The image forming structure receives different control depending on whether or not the sensor is detecting the requirement of replenishment and exchange, wherein if the sensor is not detecting the requirement, it forms only a regular image while when the sensor detects the requirement, it forms a prewarning image together with a regular image thereby indicating the requirement of replenishment and exchange by the prewarning image on the same sheet on which a regular image is formed.

Image forming apparatus

An improved electrostatic image forming apparatus including a controller for controlling the supplied voltage on the grid electrode of the main charger which gives the charges on the photosensitive member. Voltage on the grid electrode is controlled so that the charged potential on the photosensitive member may be held virtually at zero potential after the completion of the image forming operation until the predetermined time.

Electrostatic image forming apparatus

An improved sheet stacking arrangement for use with a recording apparatus, which includes a sheet feed-out device, a tray provided with an inclined surface descending to a certain extent towards the recording apparatus, and a sheet leading edge restricting portion provided at a side of the recording apparatus beyond an intersection between the inclined surface of the tray and an imaginary line extending in the sheet feed-out direction of the sheet feed-out device so as to receive the leading edge of the sheet fed out by the sheet feed-out device and contacting the inclined surface of the tray, with tray distance between the sheet feed-out device and the tray being shorter than the length of the shortest sheet employed in the recording apparatus.

Sheet stacking arrangement

An image information output apparatus which includes a circuit for setting conditions for a '0' or a '1' level in an X direction, a circuit for setting conditions for a '0' or a '1' level in a Y direction with respect to each of respective image units over an entire output image plane divided into an X-Y matrix configuration, a circuit for generating an output timing signal for each of the image units, an AND circuit for ANDing two signals so as to output conditional signals at every generation of the output timing signal for each of the image units, one conditional signal being related to the X direction condition setting and one conditional signal related to the Y direction condition setting, a circuit for storing image information, and a circuit for outputting the stored image information, one image unit by one image unit, for each '1' level output signal of the AND circuit.

Image information output apparatus

An improved image reading apparatus which is so arranged that, by providing marks shaded to a predetermined density or darkness for setting a required reading area on an image reading surface, the start mark and end mark are detected by a solid state image sensor for supplying image signals within the required reading range into memory unit based on results of the on detection so as to reduce the memory capacity of the memory unit.

Growing community of inventors

Toyohashi, Japan

Hidekazu Nakagami