Konica Minolta, Inc.

Konica Minolta Business Technologies, Inc.

Katsuyuki Ikuta

Takeshi Tamada

Masahiro Kamiya

Akira Okamoto

Akifumi Isobe

Hiroyuki Futami

Shota Igo

Hideki Nakamura

Kenji Yamamoto

Hiroyuki Yoshikawa

Takahiro Tsujimoto

Yoshihito Sasamoto

Yuji Kobayashi

Akihiro Hayashi

Hiroaki Takatsu

Teruhiko Fujikura

Munehiro Natsume

Mutsuto Oe

Kenichi Hayashi

Katsunori Takahashi

Tatsuya Eguchi

Atsushi Takahashi

Kenji Izumiya

Toshio Tsuboi

Hiroshi Oyama

Kazutoshi Yoshimura

Hiroshi Eguchi

Yumiko Higashi

Tatsuhiro Noutomi

Tianhua Xu

Yasushi Hieno

A recording medium conveyance device includes a storage, a conveyer that conveys a conveyed object, an ultrasonic sensor that outputs a value indicating an attenuation amount of an ultrasonic wave caused by the conveyed object, and a hardware processor. The hardware processor executes a type detection process of detecting a type of the conveyed object based on output of the ultrasonic sensor and storing the type in the storage and an overlay detection process of detecting whether the conveyed object is in an overlay state in which a gap is present based on output of the ultrasonic sensor, and switches to either one of the type detection process and the overlay detection process. The hardware processor executes the type detection process when the type is not stored in the storage and executes the overlay detection process when the type is stored in the storage.

Recording medium conveyance device, recording medium conveyance method and non-transitory computer-readable recording medium encoded with recording medium conveyance instructions

An image forming apparatus, includes: a media sensor that detects a sheet type; a fixer that fixes the image on a sheet; a storage that stores a fixing temperature for each sheet type; and a hardware processor that controls power supplied to the fixer by pulse-width modulation (PWM) control and controls a temperature of the fixer to the fixing temperature corresponding to the sheet type detected by the media sensor.

Image forming apparatus and temperature control method

An image forming apparatus includes: a housing part that is capable of housing a plurality of recording materials in such a manner that one recording material is put on another; a transport part that transports a recording material from the housing part; and a hardware processor that detects a kind of the recording material transported by the transport part, detects an amount of the recording materials housed in the housing part, detects replacement of recording materials housed in the housing part, or addition of recording materials in the housing part, on the basis of a result of the detection by the hardware processor, and, on the basis of a result of the detection by the hardware processor, switches whether or not to execute, by the hardware processor, the kind detection of the recording materials housed in the housing part.

Image forming apparatus, and method for controlling the same

Disclosed is an image forming apparatus, which may execute a job including printing an image. The disclosed image forming apparatus may include: a printer; a detector that may detect a property of a printing paper sheet, the printing paper sheet being a paper sheet used by the printer in the printing; and a determinator that may, on the basis of the property detected by the detector and a situation of the job, determine conditions for executing the printing.

Image forming apparatus, condition determination method, and computer program

A control device that controls an image former, includes: a second power supply that performs power feeding to a detector during a power feeding suspension period during which power feeding from a first power supply to the image former and the detector is not performed, the detector detecting an environment variable around the image former, the environment variable affecting quality of an image formed by the image former; and a determiner that determines a control condition for the image former in accordance with a result of detection performed by the detector during the power feeding suspension period, when power feeding from the first power supply to the image former is started at an end of the power feeding suspension period and the image former enters an image formation ready state in which the image former can perform image formation.

Control device, image forming apparatus, and program

An excessive heating protection circuit to be connected to a first temperature sensor being configured to output less voltage with a rise in temperature and a second temperature sensor being configured to output more voltage with a rise in temperature. The excessive heating protection circuit includes: a multiplexer having a plurality of channels capable of receiving reference voltages predetermined for the first and second temperature sensors, the multiplexer being configured to output one of the reference voltages by selecting one of the channels with reference to input selection signals; a first comparator being configured to compare the output voltage of the first temperature sensor to the output reference voltage of the multiplexer and to output a comparison result; and a second comparator being configured to compare the output voltage of the second temperature sensor to the output reference voltage of the multiplexer and to output a comparison result.

Excessive heating protection circuit and image forming apparatus

A serial tandem image forming system is described which is capable of inhibiting both the degradation of image quality and the reduction of the productivity. This system consists mainly of the control units of upstream and downstream apparatuses. When a preceding sheet differs from the subsequent sheet in sheet type, a control unit for controlling the image forming system has the subsequent sheet stand by at a paper stop roller of the upstream apparatus, and performs the operation of switching the operating states of the upstream and downstream apparatuses in accordance with the sheet type of the subsequent sheet. Also, the control unit predicts the timing of finishing the switching of the operating state, and then re-starts the conveyance of the subsequent sheet, in advance of finishing the switching of the operating state, by controlling the paper stop roller on the basis of the predicted finishing timing.

Image forming system and control method for the same

An image forming apparatus includes first and second image-forming portions and an intermediate transporting portion. A control unit checks fixing units in the image-forming portions and determines whether or not the fixing unit in the first image-forming portion is a fixing unit for an envelope. If not, the control unit controls a manipulation and display unit to display guidance for urging a user to exchange the first fixing unit. If so, the control unit determines whether or not too fixing unit in the second image-forming portion is a fixing unit for an envelope. If not, the control portion controls a manipulation and display unit to display a guidance for urging a user to exchange the second fixing unit. If both of fixing units in the first and second image-forming portions are fixing units for the envelope, the control unit allows an envelope mode control operation.

Image forming apparatus

In a serial tandem image forming system having a plurality of image forming apparatuses, a double-side printing job can be performed in a way according to the needs of users by taking into consideration an adjustment operation. The serial tandem image forming system includes an upstream apparatusand a downstream apparatus, as the image forming apparatuses, each of which is capable of forming images on both sides of a sheet. When receiving a double-side printing job while one of the image forming apparatuses is performing the adjustment operation, a control unitdisplays information on a manipulation displaywhich prompts a user to select whether to immediately start the job by performing a single machine double-side printing process with the other image forming apparatus, or start the job by shifting to a tandem mode and performing a serial double-side printing process after the adjustment operation has finished.

Image forming system and method of controlling the same

An image forming system has a first image forming section to form an image on a sheet, wherein the first image forming section heats the sheet to fix the image on the sheet, a second image forming section to form an image to the sheet on which the image has been formed by the first image forming section, and a transporting section to transport the sheet from first image forming section to the second image forming section. The transporting section has a first transporting part to transport the sheet to a predetermined position, and a second transporting part to reverse a surface of the sheet which has been transported by the first transporting part as transporting the sheet from the predetermined position to an area below the predetermined position.

Image forming system

Disclosed is an image forming apparatus, which makes it possible to reduce the frequency of image defect occurrences to a level as lower as possible by detecting abnormalities generated with age on the photoreceptor member and/or in the cleaning section, so as to suppress an amount of spoiled paper sheets and material. The image forming apparatus includes: a light source that is disposed at a position located between a cleaning section and a charging section, to emit an inspection light, which is to be irradiated onto a photoreceptor member over a main-scanning direction thereof; a tight-contact type image sensor that has a line image sensor to receive the inspection light reflected from a surface of the photoreceptor member; and a control section to determine a status of a surface of the photoreceptor member, based on a result of analyzing the inspection light receive by the line image sensor.

Image forming apparatus with a photoreceptor

A mount damper comprises electrode plates placed on a motor side and a support body side respectively, a control unit for adjusting voltage between the electrode plates, and an electrostrictive polymer member for changing a distance between the electrode plates by the voltage therebetween. The electrostrictive polymer member is also an elastic body sandwiched between the electrode plates and has a hardness changeable with a change in the interelectrode distance. A motor is mounted through this mount damper. The control unit adjusts voltage applied between the electrode plates to a value different from a value causing resonance of the motor and the electrostrictive polymer member, thereby absorbing vibration of the motor during rotation thereof, irrespective of a rotation speed. Thus, the mount damper and the image forming apparatus using it can reliably prevent resonance and absorb vibration constantly even if a device selectively uses plural levels of the rotation speed.

Mount damper and image forming apparatus using the mount damper

The present invention is capable of changing the system speed quickly and highly accurately while using a CVT device with an advantage in its quietness to transmit a driving force to rotative parts. Specifically, in the case of using a sheet of thick paper as a recording sheet, the controller changes, for each of the pulleys, the distance between the pulley segments (S) while starting up the DC motor as the driving source (S). After that, the controller performs the feedback control on the rotation of the DC motor, based on a detection signal received from the encoder of the load shaft of the driven pulley, to achieve the target rotation speed of the load shaft (S: NO, S).

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Hamamatsu, Japan

Katsuyuki Ikuta