Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Mitsubishi Paper Mills Limited

Riken Vitamin Co., Ltd.

Kazuyoshi Kondo

Kaoru Tada

Genta Hagiwara

Ryoh Idehara

Nobuhiko Kita

Yuusuke Furuichi

Sei Onuma

Tomoyoshi Yamazaki

Hiroshi Fujiwara

Haruyuki Honda

Toshikane Nishii

Kazuyoshi Matsumoto

Mizuna Tanaka

Makoto Kikura

Tadashi Okano

Norikazu Yanase

Gaku Hosono

Yuuzoh Obata

Yoshinori Uchino

Masafumi Takahira

Ippei Kimura

Yasuo Matsuyama

Shigetoshi Hiraishi

Yasuhide Ohkubo

Ikuo Fujii

Mitsuru Fuchigami

Toru Hanashima

Naomasa Koike

Masashi Ohnishi

Kenji Nakamura

Tomohiro Kubota

Tamotsu Ikeda

Yoshiyuki Shimizu

Satoru Yoshida

Daisuke Nakamura

Satoshi Ueno

Kenzo Tatsumi

Tomofumi Yoshida

Tohru Watanabe

Hirobumi Ooyoshi

Yoshihiro Kawakami

Yutaka Naitoh

Chikara Hiraoka

Suguru Masunaga

Haruo Hashimoto

Tomoaki Nakano

Masateru Ujiie

Tsuguyori Kemma

Kimihiro Tanaka

Fumio Okumura

Yuuki Shiga

Takamitsu Ikematsu

Yoshimitsu Ogura

Shingo Masaoka

Naoki Saitoh

Tadayasu Enomoto

Yuuichiroh Tsujiguchi

Akinori Okada

Toshihisa Nakamura

Ryouhei Ohi

Seiya Ogawa

Namio Ogihara

Yasukazu Kitamura

Yuzo Obata

Takao Otsuka

Takashi Banba

Shu Kanno

Yusuke Furuichi

Isao Matsuse

Tada Yasu Enomoto

Tsuyoshi Shibata

A liquid discharge apparatus includes a body and a carriage disposed inside the body. A head is mounted on the carriage. The head discharges ink onto a recording medium and generates ink mist. An ink mist collector includes a fan that generates an air current that circulates in an air flow direction inside the body. A filter collects the ink mist generated by the head. At least one duct adjusts the air flow direction. An encoder is mounted on the carriage. The encoder is disposed downstream from the fan and disposed upstream from the head in the air flow direction.

Liquid discharge apparatus

Provided are carotenoid-containing particles having, for preventing exudation of carotenoid at the time of tableting and during storage, a structure in which a carotenoid is dispersed in an agar gel containing a cyclodextrin and/or a plant protein.

Carotenoid-containing particles

An image forming apparatus includes an image forming unit and a conveyance unit. The image forming unit forms an image on a print medium. The conveyance unit has a belt member to convey the print medium in a state in which an end of the print medium in a width direction perpendicular to a conveyance direction of the print medium is placed outside an end of the belt member in the width direction.

Image forming apparatus including reading unit to read back surface of print medium opposing belt member

An image forming apparatus includes a media roll, art image forming device, and a feeder. In the media roll, a printing medium having an adhesive face is wound in a roll shape. The image forming device forms an image on the printing medium. The feeder feeds the printing medium. The feeder includes a protection belt and a pair of rotary bodies. The protection belt presses against and protects the adhesive face of the printing medium. The pair of rotary bodies sandwich and press the printing medium and the protection belt between the pair of rotary bodies. An approach angle of the printing medium is within a range from 0&#xb0; to 30&#xb0; and is formed by the printing medium drawn from the media roll and approaching to between the pair of rotary bodies and an opposing face of the protection belt opposing the image forming device.

Image forming apparatus configured for rolled printing media having adhesive face

An image forming apparatus includes an apparatus body, a sheet feeder to load a roll body including a recording medium wound around, an image forming unit to form an image on the recording medium, and a conveyance unit including a conveyance belt to convey the recording medium drawn out from the roll body so as to oppose the recording medium to the image forming unit. The sheet feeder and the conveyance unit are integrated as a sheet feed conveyance unit. The sheet feed conveyance unit is configured to load the roll body in at least the sheet feeder and be drawable from the apparatus body to a position at which the conveyance belt is visible.

Image forming apparatus and method of setting print media

An image forming apparatus includes, an image forming device, a transporting device, a first medium holding device, and a second medium holding device. The image forming device forms an image on a print medium unwound from a roll. The transporting device is configured to transport the unwound print medium on a transport path facing the image forming device. The first medium holding device is disposed upstream of the image forming device in a medium transporting direction, and configured to hold the print medium on the transport path and retract to an open position for opening the transport path. The second medium holding device is disposed downstream of the image forming device in the medium transporting direction, and configured to hold the print medium on the transport path and retract to an open position for opening the transport path.

Image forming apparatus with medium holding devices retractable to access transport path

An image forming apparatus includes an image forming unit, a conveyance unit, and an adhesive-surface guide unit. The adhesive-surface guide unit includes a second rotary body and an adhesive-surface guide member. The second rotary body is disposed at a position downstream from a first rotary body of a pair of rotary bodies of the conveyance unit in a conveyance direction. The adhesive-surface guide member is wound around the first and second rotary bodies to guide an adhesive surface of a print medium. The adhesive-surface guide unit is configured to press the adhesive-surface guide member against the adhesive surface, sandwich the print medium and the second rotary body between the pair of rotary bodies, move the print medium and the second rotary body together, and separate the adhesive-surface guide member from the adhesive surface at a side of the adhesive-surface guide unit at which the second rotary body is disposed.

Image forming apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes a roll body including a print medium wound around, the medium having an adhesive face, an image forming unit to form an image on the adhesive face, a conveyance unit having a pair of a conveyance rotor and an opposed rotor to convey the medium with the medium interposed between the conveyance rotor and the opposed rotor and an adhesive face guide unit to guide the medium when the conveyance unit returns the medium in a return direction opposite a conveyance direction of the medium. The adhesive face guide unit has a downstream rotor disposed downstream from the opposed rotor in the return direction and an endless adhesive face guide member wound around the opposed rotor and the downstream rotor. The adhesive face guide member is configured to receive and guide the adhesive face of the medium returned, in a separable state.

Image forming apparatus forming an image on adhesive face of print medium

An image forming apparatus includes an outside air inlet created between a cover and a body plate, through which outside air is taken in. A vent is created between the body plate and the cover. The outside air taken in through the outside air inlet travels through an air current channel upward to the vent in an outside air traveling direction. At least one hot air outlet is produced through the body plate at a position between the outside air inlet and the vent in the outside air traveling direction. Hot air is discharged into the air current channel through the at least one hot air outlet. The outside air taken in through the outside air inlet is mixed with the hot air discharged through the at least one hot air outlet and is exhausted through the vent.

Image forming apparatus with natural ventilator

An image forming apparatus includes an image forming device, a conveyance unit, a correction unit, and an attitude controller. The image forming device forms an image on a printing medium. The conveyance unit is disposed opposing the image forming device to convey the printing medium. The correction unit corrects an attitude of a leading edge of the printing medium sent out from the conveyance unit. The attitude controller controls correction of the attitude of the leading edge of the punting medium performed by the correction unit. The attitude controller determines whether or not the correction of the attitude of the leading edge of the printing medium is to be performed, and causes the correction unit to perform the correction when the attitude controller determines that the correction is to be performed.

An image forming apparatus includes a media roll, an image forming device, a conveyance unit, and a controller. In the roll, a printing medium having an adhesive face and no separation sheet on the adhesive face is wound in a roll shape. In pulling back the medium to the roll, the controller sets a linear velocity of the roll to be not lower than a linear velocity of a conveyance rotator of the conveyance unit. The controller controls a velocity difference between the roll and the rotator to be Va from a start of pulling back the medium to when a separation point of the medium from the roll reaches a tangent line of the roll in an area between the roll and the rotator. When the separation point reaches the tangent line, the controller switches the velocity difference from Va to Vb that is smaller than Va.

An image forming apparatus includes an apparatus body, a print medium, a conveyance unit, art image forming unit, a cutter unit, a holding unit, a sensor, and a controller. The print medium has an adhesive face with no separation sheet. The cutter unit cuts the medium having an image formed into a print medium piece. The holding unit is configured to hold the piece in a state in which the piece is drawable from outside of the body. The holding unit has a surface separatable from an adhesive face of the piece to hold the adhesive face of the piece. The sensor detects presence or absence of the piece held by the holding unit. After the sensor detects that the piece is drawn out, the controller controls the conveyance unit to convey the medium to the holding unit and controls the holding unit to hold the medium.

An image forming apparatus includes a spool that holds a roll of print medium; an image forming device that forms an image on the medium; a transporting device including a transport rotary member that transports the medium to the image forming device, and a drive source that generates drive force; and a drive force transmission device which transmits the drive force to the spool when the transport rotary member rotates in a medium rewinding direction, and which includes a first gear train for rotating the spool in the same direction as the transport rotary member when the transport rotary member and the spool rotate in the same direction during the transport of the medium and a second gear train for rotating the spool in an opposite direction to the transport rotary member when the transport rotary member and the spool rotate in opposite directions during the medium transport.

An image forming apparatus includes a recording unit, a conveyance unit, a protection member, and at least one rotor pair. The recording unit forms an image on a print medium having an adhesive face. The conveyance unit conveys the print medium. The protection member presses against the adhesive face of the print medium to protect the adhesive face. Each of the at least one rotor pair includes rotors to sandwich and press the print medium and the protection member therebetween. The conveyance unit is configured to rotate the at least one rotor pair to convey the print medium and the protection member together to an image forming position at which the recording unit is configured to form the image on the print medium. The protection member is configured to separate from the adhesive face before discharge of the print medium to an outside of the image forming apparatus.

Image forming apparatus and image forming method

An image forming apparatus includes an outer cover in which an air intake and an exhaust outlet are formed, an image forming unit, a fixing device to fix an image on a recording medium and including a fixing casing in which a sheet inlet and a first exhaust opening are formed, and a thermal shield disposed above the sheet inlet of the fixing device and between the fixing device and a component adjacent to the fixing device, an air channel to guide air sucked in through the air intake to the exhaust outlet, defined by the thermal shield as well as the fixing casing. The first exhaust opening formed in the fixing casing communicates with the air channel formed by the thermal shield and the fixing casing to merge the hot air discharged from the fixing device into the air flowing in the air channel.

Growing community of inventors

Osaka, Japan

Kazuyoshi Kondo