Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Hiroyuki Uemura

Masaru Shimada

Hidehiro Mochizuki

Chiharu Nogawa

Akira Suzuki

Naoya Morohoshi

Yutaka Ariga

Tamotsu Aruga

Kakuji Murakami

Hiroki Kuboyama

Toshiyuki Kawanishi

Yoshihiko Hotta

Kiyofumi Nagai

Keishi Taniguchi

Shunji Katoh

Masaki Yoshino

Fumihito Itoh

Hirosato Amano

Takamichi Enomoto

Masanaga Imamura

Kunio Makino

In a developing device of the present invention for depositing toner on an image carrier to thereby develop a latent image formed thereon, a toner refilling device is configured to refill, when the toner is short, fresh toner at a position where the developing device is situated.

Toner refilling device and developing device using the same for an image forming apparatus

A sublimation thermal transfer recording material including a smooth and excellent heat resistant layer which has excellent feeding property and excellent image qualities even when used for n-fold speed mode multiple sublimation thermal transfer recording. The sublimation thermal transfer recording material comprises a substrate, an ink layer formed thereon and a heat resistant layer formed on the non-layered side of the substrate, wherein the heat resistant layer has a softening point of at least 200.degree. C. which is measured by a method based on JIS-K7196.

Sublimation thermal transfer recording method and recording material

A sublimation thermal image transfer recording medium has a substrate, a dye-containing layer formed on the substrate, containing a sublimable dye, and a top layer formed on the dye-containing layer, with the softening temperature of the top layer being at least 200.degree. C. which is measured in accordance with Japanese Industrial Standards JIS-K7196, and the coefficient of friction thereof being 0.2 or less which is measured in accordance with ASTM-D1894. In addition, there is provided a sublimation thermal image transfer recording method which includes the step of superimposing an image receiving sheet having a dye image receiving layer on the above-mentioned sublimation thermal image transfer recording medium, with imagewise application of heat thereto, with the dyeability of the top layer of the recording medium being controlled to be lower than that of the dye image receiving layer of the image receiving sheet.

Sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium and thermal

An image receiving sheet for sublimation transfer has a dye receiving layer formed on a substrate directly or through an intermediate layer. This dye receiving layer is mainly constructed by hardened resin. Further, a gel fraction of the dye receiving layer is equal to or greater than 70% by weight. In accordance with this construction, it is possible to improve a surface release property of the image receiving sheet used in combination with a thermally sublimating transfer recording medium. Further, when this image receiving sheet is applied to n-fold mode recording process, no image receiving sheet is stuck to a dye layer of recording medium.

Image receiving sheet for sublimation transfer

Thermal recording structure and a method of thermal recording wherein a desired sublimation dye image is formed on an information recording medium provided with a thermal recording layer having a sublimation dye accepting function on at least one surface of a base substrate. The transparency of the thermal recording layer is reversible depending upon temperature to which the medium is heated. At least the sublimation dye image portion of the medium is heated to a temperature sufficient to reverse the transparency of the transfer image.

Thermal recording structure and method

An image receiving sheet for sublimation transfer has a dye receiving layer formed on a substrate directly or through an intermediate layer. This dye receiving layer is mainly constructed by hardened resin. Further, a gel fraction of the dye receiving layer is equal to or greater than 70% by weight. In accordance with this construction, it is possible to improve a surface release property of the image receiving sheet used in combination with a thermally sublimating transfer recording medium. Further, when this image receiving sheet is applied to n-fold mode recording process, no image receiving sheet is stuck to a dye layer of the recording medium.

A sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium is composed of a support, a dye-containing layer formed on the support, containing a sublimable dye, and a top layer formed on the dye-containing layer, containing a hydrolyzed product of a silane coupling agent. This sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium may be composed of a support, at least two dye-containing layers formed on the support, containing a sublimable dye and an organic binder agent in which the sublimable dye is dispersed, and a top layer formed on at least the two dye-containing layers, containing a hydrolyzed product of a silane coupling agent. Alternatively, the above sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium may be composed of a support, a dye-supply layer formed on the support, containing a sublimable dye and an organic binder agent in which the sublimable dye is dispersed, a dye-transfer layer formed on the dye-supply layer, containing a sublimable dye and an organic binder agent in which the sublimable dye is dispersed and a low-dyeable resin layer formed on the dye-transfer layer, containing an organic binder agent and a hydrolyzed product of a silane coupling agent.

Sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium

An information recording medium is composed of a support; a thermosensitive recording layer provided at least on one side of the support, the thermosensitive recording layer being composed of a matrix resin and an organic low-molecular-weight material which is dispersed in the matrix resin, the transparency of the thermosensitive recording layer being reversibly changeable depending upon the temperature thereof; and a thermal transfer image receiving layer for thermal printing thereon by thermal transfer recording, which is provided at least on one side of the support, opposite to the thermosensitive recording layer. A printing method using the above information recording medium is also provided. The thermosensitive recording layer and the thermal transfer image receiving layer may be replaced by a single sublimable material receiving reversible thermosensitive recording layer which have the two functions of the thermosensitive recording layer and the thermal transfer image receiving layer.

Information recording medium and printing method using the same

An image receiving sheet for sublimation-type thermal image recording includes substrate; and a dye receiving layer which is formed on the substrate directly or through an intermediate layer, the dye receiving layer including a dyeable cured resin and having a gel percentage of 70 wt. % or more. A sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording method for recording images by use of this image receiving sheet and a sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium is disclosed.

Image receiving sheet for sublimation-type thermal image transfer

An image receiving medium for use in a sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording system, comprising a substrate, and a dye receiving layer formed thereon, comprising (a) a resin which can be dyed with a heat-sublimable dye, such as a copolymer of vinyl chloride and vinyl acetate, (b) a first silicone oil which is compatible with the resin, such as polyether-modified silicone oil, and (c) a second silicone oil which is not compatible with the resin, such as amino-modified silicone oil.

Image receiving medium for use in sublimation-type thermal image

A sublimation-type thermal color image transfer recording medium for transferring images onto an image receiving sheet by moving the sublimation-type thermal color image transfer recording medium with a speed of 1/n (n&gt;1) relative to the image receiving sheet with a speed of 1 is composed of at least one support, and an ink layer formed on the support. The ink layer includes at least one dye-supply layer formed on the support, which is composed of a resin binder agent and one sublimable dye dispersed therein, such as a yellow sublimable dye, a magenta sublimable dye, and a cyan sublimable dye; and a dye-transfer-contribution layer formed on the dye-supply layer, which is composed of a resin binder agent and a sublimable dye with substantially the same color as that of the sublimable dye in the dye-supply layer, wherein the total of the sublimable dye contained in the dye-supply layer and that in the dye-transfer contribution layer, M g/m.sup.2, and the value of M.multidot.1/n for each color ink section are in a predetermined relationship.

Sublimation-type thermal color image transfer recording medium

A sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium is composed of a support, a dye-containing layer formed on the support, containing a sublimable dye, and a top layer formed on the dye-containing layer, containing a hydrolyzed product of a silane coupling agent. This sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium may be composed of a support at least to dye-containing layers formed on the support, containing a sublimable dye and an organic binder agent in which the sublimable dye is dispersed, and a top layer formed on at least the two dye-containing layers, containing a sublimable product of a silane coupling agent. Alternatively, the above sublimation-type thermal image transfer recording medium may be composed of a support, a dye-supply layer formed on the support, containing a sublimable dye and an organic binder agent in which the sublimable dye is dispersed, a dye-transfer layer formed on the dye-supply layer, containing a sublimable dye and an organic binder agent in which the sublimable dye is dispersed and a low-dyeable resin layer formed on the dye-transfer layer, containing an organic binder agent and a hydrolyzed product of a silane coupling agent.

A sublimation type thermal image transfer image receiving medium is composed of a substrate and a dye receiving layer formed thereon, and the substrate is composed of a first laminated sheet on which the dye receiving layer is provided and a second laminated sheet, with an elastic adhesive layer or a plastic adhesive layer being interposed between the first laminated sheet and the second laminated sheet.

Sublimation type thermal image transfer image receiving medium

An image receiving medium for use in combination with a sublimation type thermal image transfer recording medium with a sublimation-type dye containing image transfer layer is composed of a substrate including a sheet made of a fibrous material and a polymeric material in the form of partcles or a porous resin, the polymeric material or the porous resin being located in the interstices within the fibrous material; and a dye receiving layer formed the substrate.

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Numazu, Japan

Hiroyuki Uemura