Kyocera Mita Corporation

Kyocera Document Solutions Inc.

Mita Industrial Co., Ltd.

Hiroshi Inui

Akinobu Nakahata

Takeshi Aoki

Masanobu Maeshima

Takahisa Nakaue

Akira Matayoshi

Mitsuhiro Hashimoto

Yoshiaki Tashiro

Naoki Mizutani

Mitsuhiro Goda

Koji Izumi

Chisato Hatakeyama

Shuji Osaki

Shinya Kawakami

Takeshi Watanabe

Kosuke Uchida

Naoyuki Ishida

Mitsutoshi Takemoto

Masahiro Hashizume

Kazuya Yamashita

Hironori Daigo

Michio Uchida

Hisahiro Kato

Takuya Eto

An end effector device includes a housing having an opening, a first gripper, and a second gripper. The first gripper includes a first finger and a second finger facing each other and configured to open and close. The second gripper includes a third finger and a fourth finger facing each other and configured to open and close in a direction intersecting the first gripper. The first finger, the second finger, the third finger, and the fourth finger each protrude from the opening.

End effector device and robotic device

An image forming apparatus () includes a frame () supporting an attached object () inserted into an apparatus body () and an attachment device () fixing the attached object () supported by the frame (). The frame () includes a leading end plate () facing to a leading end in an inserting direction of the attached object (). The attached object () includes a fixing pin () supported by the leading end plate () in advanceable/retreatable state along the inserting direction and formed connectable to the attached object (), a biasing member () biasing the fixing pin () toward the inserting direction and a locking member () restricting dropout of the fixing pin (). The attachment device () holds the attached object () being connected to the fixing pin () and receiving the biasing force of the biasing member () at a position gravitated to the leading end plate ().

Image forming apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes a multi-tray device and a relay device. The relay device includes a relay device cover that openably and closably covers a top side of the relay device. One of an edge portion at a side of the relay device in a lower end portion of the multi-tray cover and an edge portion at a side of the multi-tray device in a top surface portion of the relay device cover includes an inclined surface portion forming a shape by chamfering the edge portion. The inclined surface portion is formed so as to produce a component force in a direction to close the multi-tray cover when the top surface portion of the relay device cover bumps against the lower end portion of the multi-tray cover, while the relay device cover opens in a state where the multi-tray cover is opened.

Image forming apparatus that prevents damage of multi-tray cover and relay device cover

An image forming apparatus includes a protruding tray part. The protruding tray part is provided on the upper surface portion of a body casing part, extends in a paper discharge direction and has a convex shape which becomes convex at an upper side, and supports a part of a lower surface of a paper, which is discharged from a paper discharge port, from below, thereby forming a space between end portions of the paper and the upper surface portion of the body casing part. The paper conveying device is formed at a lower surface thereof with a guide recessed part. The guide recessed part has a concave shape corresponding to the convex shape of the protruding tray part, and is engaged with the convex shape to guide the paper conveying device when the paper conveying device is mounted in the in-body paper discharge space.

A toner collecting unit includes a housing, an inlet, a first fan, a lower duct, a first filter, and an oscillation motor. The inlet is provided in the housing. Toner flows into the inlet together with an air flow. The first fan is arranged in the interior of the housing and is configured to suck the air flow flowing from the inlet and to exhaust the air outside the housing. The lower duct guides the air flow upward from below. The first filter is arranged in an upper part of the lower duct so that its approach surface, which the air flow enters, faces downward.

Toner collecting device and image forming apparatus including the same

A toner collector includes a housing, an inlet port, a fan, a discharge port, a first upstream side filter, and a downstream side filter. The inlet port is opened in the housing. The fan is disposed in the housing, and intakes and discharges the airflow having flowed in through the inlet port. The discharge port is provided to the fan. The first upstream side filter is disposed on an upstream side of the fan in a direction of the airflow, and captures the toner and allows passage of the airflow. The downstream side filter is disposed on a downstream side of the discharge port in the direction of the airflow, and allows passage of the airflow discharged from the discharge port and captures the toner. The downstream side filter has a larger cross-sectional area of a cross section perpendicular to the direction of the airflow than the discharge port.

Toner collector and image forming apparatus including same

An image forming apparatus includes a housing having an opening, a cover portion that can be disposed so as to cover the opening, a first connecting portion that connects the cover portion with the housing so that the cover portion is pivotable about a first pivotal axis and can switch between a closed state in which the opening is covered and an opened state in which the opening is exposed, a decorative portion that is disposed to be aligned with the cover portion on a side to the first pivotal axis in the cover portion, and forms a predetermined outer face of the housing along with the cover portion in the closed state, and a second connecting portion that connects the decorative portion with the housing so that the decorative portion is pivotable about a second pivotal axis, which is substantially parallel to the first pivotal axis.

An transfer belt device includes a roller support supporting transfer rollers, a cam driving shaft having a cam, the cam having capability of swinging the roller support to move the transfer rollers toward and apart from color photosensitive drums to thereby switch a transfer belt and the color photosensitive drums between a state where the transfer belt is in contact with the color photosensitive drums and a state where the transfer belt is out of contact with the color photosensitive drums, a tension roller kept in contact with a surface of the transfer belt to exert tension on the transfer belt, and a pivotal axis on which the tension roller is swingably supported, the pivotal axis being common with the cam driving shaft.

Transfer belt device and image forming apparatus provided with the same

A sheet transport direction switching device includes: a rotary guide member having a single guide passage for passing a sheet to be transported, and a support shaft extending in a direction orthogonal to a transport direction of the sheet; and a posture changing mechanism for changing the posture of the rotary guide member. The rotary guide member is operable to change the posture thereof by pivotal movement about an axis of the support shaft so that an exit of the guide passage faces one of at least two discharge destinations. The posture changing mechanism has a stepping motor for pivotally moving the rotary guide member about the axis of the support shaft.

Sheet transport direction switching device, and image forming apparatus incorporated with the same

An image forming apparatus includes: an image forming section, provided in an apparatus body, for forming an image on a sheet; a sheet transport path for transporting the sheet to the image forming section; a closing member, openably and closably mounted to the apparatus body, for exposing the sheet transport path in an opened state thereof; a first guide unit and a second guide unit, disposed along the sheet transport path, for guiding the sheet, the first and the second guide units being operable to shift between a proximate position where the first and the second guide units are close to each other, and an away position where the first and the second guide units are away from each other; and a position shifting mechanism for shifting the position of the second guide unit in association with a shifting operation of the first guide unit.

Disclosed is an image forming apparatus, which comprises an intermediate transfer belt (), and a plurality of image-forming units () to () disposed along the intermediate transfer belt () and adapted to form toner images of different colors and sequentially transfer the toner images onto the intermediate transfer belt () in a superimposed manner so as to form a color toner image. The intermediate transfer belt () is laid across a drive roller (), a driven roller () and a tension roller (), in a tensioned condition. A rotation speed of the tension roller () adapted to apply a tension to the intermediate transfer belt () is detected to obtain a linear speed of the intermediate transfer belt (). In a process of color-misregistration correction, a write-start timing for each toner image of the colors is adjusted based on the linear speed of the intermediate transfer belt ().

A guide unitincludes an electrically conducting guide platedisposed upstream of the transfer unitthat transports toner image transfer sheets between the image carrierand the transfer unitan electrically insulating support memberthat supports the guide platean electrically conducting connecting memberinstalled on the support memberelectrically connected to a ground plateand a non-linear elementdirectly or indirectly electrically connected between the guide plateand the connecting memberFurther, if a voltage equal to or greater than a predetermined value is applied between the guide plateand the connecting memberthe resistance value is reduced.

Image forming apparatus and guide unit, transport unit used therein

An image forming apparatus includes: a transfer belt that is formed of an endless belt; a plurality of image forming units that are so arranged as to be aligned in a transfer belt conveyance direction; a plurality of toner supply containers that are detachably fitted, on one end side in the direction orthogonal to the transfer belt conveyance direction, in correspondence with the plurality of image forming units; an optical sensor that is provided in opposition to the transfer belt; and a cleaning member that is biased toward the one end side in the direction orthogonal to the transfer belt conveyance direction and that cleans a detection surface of the optical sensor in conjunction with replacement operation for one particular toner supply container among the plurality of toner supply containers.

Image forming apparatus having an optical sensor provided in opposition to a transfer belt formed of an endless belt

An image forming apparatus has a plurality of developing units for developing toner images of different colors, an intermediate transfer belt for transferring the toner images of the respective colors onto a surface of the belt or onto a recording sheet transported over the belt surface, a first or drive roller for driving the belt while the belt is wound around the first roller, a second or driven roller and a tension roller, which is driven along with the driving of the belt driven by the first roller. The image forming apparatus satisfies a relation defined by the following equation:2=1where Dis a belt-inclusive outer diameter of the first roller where the belt is wound, including the thickness t of the belt, Dis an outer diameter of the second roller, and N=n or 1/n where n is a positive integer.

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Osaka, Japan

Hiroshi Inui