Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Hidemasa Suzuki

Koji Masuda

Susumu Momma

Shigeaki Imai

Hiroyoshi Funato

Takeshi Ueda

Kazuya Miyagaki

A reflective optical sensor includes at least three light-emitting elements; a lighting optical system that guides light emitted from the light-emitting elements to a toner pattern; and at least three light-receiving elements that receive the beams of light reflected by the toner pattern. The lighting optical system has a lateral magnification m that satisfies m&#x2266;P/S, where S is the size of the light-emitting elements and P is the arrangement pitch of the light-emitting elements.

Reflective optical sensor and image forming apparatus

A fixing device that fixes a toner image carried on a transfer sheet onto the transfer sheet includes a fixing belt that relatively moves, with its surface being in contact with the toner image during the fixing operation, with respect to the transfer sheet, surface information detecting devices that determine surface information of the fixing belt, a surface condition changing roller that is arranged so as to be capable of coming into contact with and separating from the fixing belt and abrades the surface of the fixing belt in contact with the fixing belt, and a surface condition changing controller that controls the contact and separation of the surface condition changing roller with and from the fixing belt based on detection results obtained by the surface information detecting devices.

Fixing device and image forming apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes a charging device configured to uniformly charge a surface of a photoconductive element; an image writing device configured to write an image in the charged photoconductive element by light to form an electrostatic latent image; a developing device configured to visualize the formed electrostatic latent image as a toner image; a transfer device configured to transfer the toner image to a sheet recording medium; a fixing device configured to fix the transferred toner image onto the medium; and a surface information detecting device configured to detect surface information of a fixing member of the fixing device. The surface information detecting device radiates optical spots on a surface of the fixing member in a direction crossing a conveying direction, receives reflected light of each optical spot, and detects the surface information of the fixing device based on the detection results of the reflective lights.

Image forming apparatus and image forming method

A reflective optical sensor for detecting surface information on a moving element moving in a certain direction includes at least one light emitter, a light emitting lens provided between the light emitter and a surface of the moving element and formed to become conjugated with the light emitter in the moving direction of the moving element in a longer distance from the light emitter than in a vertical direction relative to the moving direction, at least one light receiver, and a light receiving lens provided between the light receiver and the surface of the moving element.

Reflective optical sensor, image forming apparatus, and surface information detecting method

A reflection type optical sensor that detect a surface condition of a moving body and that is used for an image generation apparatus which forms images on a recording media includes a light-emitting device which has a plurality of light emitter systems including at least two light-emitting members and a light-emitting optical system having a plurality of light-emitting lenses corresponding to a plurality of the light emitter systems and guiding light emitted from the light emitter systems to the moving body and a light-receiving device which has a light receiver system including at least two light-receiving members and a light-receiving optical system having light-receiving lenses corresponding to the at least two light-receiving members and guiding light reflected by the moving body to the light receiver system. The image generation apparatus has further a surface condition judging device in addition to the reflection type optical sensor.

Reflection type optical sensor and image generation apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes a fixing member, at least one reflective optical sensor, a heat shielding member, and a processor. The fixing member fixes an image on a recording medium moving in a first axis direction. At least one reflective optical sensor emits light toward the fixing member and receives light reflected by the fixing member. The heat shielding member is arranged between the fixing member and the at least one reflective optical sensor, has a light passing part through which light directed to the fixing member from the at least one reflective optical sensor and light reflected by the fixing member and directed to the at least one reflective optical sensor passes, and prevents heat transfer from the fixing member to the at least one reflective optical sensor. The processor is configured to obtain a surface state of the fixing member on the basis of an output signal from the at least one reflective optical sensor.

Image forming apparatus

A fixing apparatus for fixing a toner image borne on a sheet-like recording medium onto the sheet-like recording medium, including: a fixing member relatively moving in a first direction with respect to the sheet-like recording medium, and having a surface in contact with the toner image during a fixing operation; a surface-information-detecting device for obtaining surface information of the fixing member; a surface-condition-changing device arranged to abut on and separate from the fixing member, and abrading the surface of the fixing member in contact with the fixing member; and a surface-condition-change controller for controlling an abutting and separating of the surface-condition-changing device with respect to the fixing member according to a detection result of the surface-information-detecting device. The surface-condition-change controller controls the surface-condition-changing device according to the detection result of the surface-information-detecting device with a criteria which varies before and after the surface-condition-changing device abrades the fixing device.

Fixing apparatus and image-forming apparatus

An image forming apparatus comprises: a sensor that includes a light-emitting part for emitting light to a moving body and a light-receiving part; a light-incidence adjusting mechanism that is able to alternatively select from a first state where the light-incidence adjusting mechanism causes light which have been emitted from the sensor and then reflected by the moving body to enter the sensor and a second state where the light-incidence adjusting mechanism causes a reflected light of light emitted from the sensor not to enter the sensor; and a processing unit that causes the sensor to emit light, and corrects output of the sensor when the light-incidence adjusting mechanism is in the first state on the basis of output of the sensor when the light-incidence adjusting mechanism is in the second state.

Image forming apparatus, sensing method, and recording medium

According to an embodiment, provided is an image forming apparatus that forms an image on a moving body using toner. The image forming apparatus includes a pattern creating device that creates a first pattern for toner density detection and a second pattern for positional deviation detection on the moving body, the first pattern and second pattern being disposed to be arrayed in a main-scanning direction; a reflecting optical sensor including an emitting system that includes at least three light-emitting elements of which positions at least in the second direction are different and a light-receiving system that includes at least three light-receiving elements that receive light beams that are emitted from the emitting system and reflected from the first pattern and second pattern; and a processing device that obtains toner density information and positional deviation information simultaneously based on an output signal of the light-receiving system.

In a reflective optical sensor in an image forming apparatus, an output from each N number of light-receiving elements (N&#x2267;3), obtained when M number of light-emitting elements (M&#x2267;3) included in a light-emitting unit emit detecting light, is separated into an amount of specularly reflected light and an amount of diffusely reflected light. The toner density of a pattern, which is formed on a supporting member in the image forming apparatus, is calculated based on a sum of the amounts of specularly reflected light and a sum of the amounts of diffusely reflected light.

Toner-density calculating method, reflective optical sensor, and image forming apparatus

A velocity detecting device includes an image-pattern acquiring unit that includes a laser light source and an area sensor that acquires a one-dimensional or a two-dimensional image. The image-pattern acquiring unit includes a lens between a moving member and the area sensor, irradiates a beam emitted from the laser light source to the moving member to make a scattering light of the moving member scattered from the moving member on the area sensor by using the lens, and acquires an image pattern at a predetermined time interval in association with movement of the moving member. A velocity calculating unit calculates the velocity of the moving member by computing the image pattern acquired by the image-pattern acquiring unit. The lens is a reduced optical system that projects a reduced object onto the area sensor.

Velocity detecting device and multi-color image forming apparatus

A reflective optical sensor detects a position and/or a toner density of the toner pattern. The reflective optical sensor includes an illuminating system that has at least three light-emitting units, a light-receiving system that has at least three light-receiving units and receives light output from the illuminating system and reflected by the toner pattern, and an illuminating optical system that includes at least three illuminating condenser lenses individually corresponding to the at least three light-emitting units and that guides the light output from the illuminating system to the toner pattern. The at least three light-emitting units and the at least three light-receiving units are both arranged in equal distance with respect to one direction. Optical axes of the at least three illuminating condenser lenses are off-center in parallel to an axis passing through a center of and perpendicular to the corresponding light-emitting unit.

Growing community of inventors

Kanagawa, Japan

Hidemasa Suzuki