Kyocera Document Solutions Inc.

Kyocera Mita Corporation

Mita Industrial Co., Ltd.

Kyocera Mita Coporation

Masaki Kadota

Ai Takagami

Masahito Ishino

Yosuke Saito

Takahiko Murata

Shigeki Tsukahara

Maki Ike

Shinki Miyaji

Hiroka Itani

Yoshitaka Imanaka

Nobuyuki Hayashi

Koichi Hayashi

Minoru Wada

Masaru Hatano

Yuji Kamiyama

Keisuke Isoda

Hisashi Mukataka

Atsushi Ishizaki

Masataka Okada

Tamotsu Shimizu

Hiroshi Kobayashi

Masashi Fujishima

Yasuhiro Tauchi

Koji Suenami

Tetsuro Kawashima

Akira Matayoshi

Norio Kubo

Kouji Uno

Yuji Toyota

Asami Sasaki

Norio Tomiie

Hidetoshi Miyamoto

Keiji Ban

Masanori Yamaoka

Akane Tokushige

Kazuaki Fujiwara

The image forming apparatus includes an image carrier, a charging unit, an exposure unit, a developing unit, a transfer unit, a cleaning blade, and a controller. The controller detects printing-coverage rates on a basis of plural areas divided in the longitudinal direction of the image carrier. Upon occurrence of a difference exceeding a specified threshold value among the coverage rates of the plural areas, the controller executes, for a duration of specified aging time, aging process in which the image carrier is driven into rotation in its charged state.

Image forming apparatus

The image forming apparatus includes an image carrier, a charging unit, an exposure unit, a developing unit, a transfer unit, a cleaning blade, and a controller. The controller detects printing-coverage rates on a basis of plural areas divided in the longitudinal direction of the image carrier. At a specified timing, the controller executes aging process in which the image carrier in a charged state is driven into rotation under light irradiation by the exposure unit. For the aging process, the controller sets a condition that a light quantity of the exposure unit for an area of larger coverage rate is larger than a light quantity of the exposure unit for an area of smaller coverage rate.

An image forming apparatus includes an image carrier, a charging device, an exposure device, a developing device, a transfer portion, a cleaning blade, and a control section. The control section detects a charging current amount of the image carrier and, when an integrated current amount obtained by integrating values of the charging current amount in a prescribed length of time is lower than a prescribed threshold value, performs an aging process in which the image carrier is driven to rotate in a charged state.

A toner conveying device includes a toner conveying passage through which toner is conveyed, a conveying screw, and a brush member. The conveying screw includes a rotary shaft rotatably arranged inside the toner conveying passage and a helical blade formed on the outer circumferential face of the rotary shaft. The brush member has a number of brush bristles that swing while in contact with the outer circumferential face of the conveying screw and that are planted at a predetermined interval along the axial direction of the conveying screw. On the brush member, the blush bristles planted at one place are composed of one to three fibers, and the blush bristles are planted parallel to each other at a predetermined interval of 0.5- to 3 mm.

Toner conveying device, and cleaning device and image forming apparatus therewith

A cleaning device includes a housing, a cleaning blade, a toner conveyance path, a conveyance screw, and a first flicker. The conveyance screw includes a rotary shaft and a helical vane. The first flicker includes a first base portion and first contact pieces and uses the first contact pieces to press the conveyance screw in a first direction away from a bottom part of the toner conveyance path. The first base portion includes a secured portion and a blade opposed portion. A reinforcement member is stacked on the blade opposed portion.

Cleaning device and image forming apparatus including the same

A cleaning device includes a housing, a cleaning blade, a toner conveyance path, a conveyance screw, a first flicker, and a second flicker. The conveyance screw includes a rotary shaft and a helical vane. The first flicker includes a first base portion and a plurality of first contact pieces. The second flicker includes a second base portion and a plurality of second contact pieces. An inclination angle &#x3b8;1 has a value between an inclination angle &#x3b8;2 and an inclination angle &#x3b8;3.

Cleaning device capable of preventing solidification of toner and image forming apparatus including the same

A cleaning device includes a housing, a cleaning blade, a toner conveyance path, a conveyance screw, and a first flicker. The conveyance screw includes a rotary shaft and a helical vane. The first flicker includes a first base portion and a plurality of first contact pieces and uses the first contact pieces to press the conveyance screw in a first direction away from a bottom part of the toner conveyance path. The first base portion includes a secured portion and a blade opposed portion. The first contact pieces are connected to an upper end part of the blade opposed portion. An elastic member is disposed between the cleaning blade and the blade opposed portion.

A developing device includes a case, a stirring screw, a discharge port, a restriction portion, and a control portion. The case stores developer. The stirring screw circulates the developer inside the case while stirring the developer. The discharge port is an opening for discharging the developer from the case. The restriction portion is disposed between the stirring screw and the discharge port and restricts the movement of the developer toward the discharge port depending on the drive speed of the stirring screw. The control portion drives the stirring screw such that, during a discharge period other than a development process period in which a development process using the developer is performed, the mean drive speed of the stirring screw per unit time is less than the mean drive speed during the development process period to move the developer toward the discharge port through the restriction portion.

Developing device, image forming apparatus, and development control method

A developing device includes a developer container, a developer carrier, and first and second stirring/conveying members. The developer container includes a first partition wall partitioning between the two conveying chambers longitudinally, a first communication portion for passing developer from the first to the second conveying chamber, a second communication portion for passing developer from the second to the first conveying chamber, a developer supply port for supplying developer in, a developer discharge portion for discharging excessive developer, a second partition wall arranged, adjacent to the regulating portion, downstream of the second communication portion to partition between the first conveying chamber and the regulating portion, and a shield portion connected to the two partition walls to bridge between them to shield a top part of the second communication portion. A gap is formed between an upper end part of the shield portion and the inner surface of the developer container.

Developing device and image forming apparatus therewith

A first supply mode is a mode for supplying power so that printing can be performed by a printing unit, and more power is supplied in the first supply mode than in the second supply mode or the third supply mode. More power is supplied in the second supply mode than in the third supply mode. In the specified period, the power supply circuit switches from the power supply in the first supply mode to the power supply in the second supply mode when a first transition condition is satisfied. The power supply circuit maintains the second supply mode without performing switching from the power supply in the second supply mode to the power supply in the third supply mode.

Image forming apparatus and method for controlling image forming apparatus

This electrophotographic photosensitive body () comprises a supporting body () and a photosensitive layer () that is formed on the surface of the supporting body (). The surface of the photosensitive layer () has an arithmetic mean roughness Ra within the range of from 20 nm to 100 nm (inclusive), a ten-point average roughness Rz within the range of from 0.2 &#x3bc;m to 1.0 &#x3bc;m (inclusive) and a mean spacing of profile irregularities Sm of 20 &#x3bc;m or less in the initial stage of use.

Electrophotographic photosensitive body and image forming apparatus provided with same

An image forming includes an apparatus main body, a photoreceptor drum, a charging apparatus, a developing device, a transfer apparatus, a charging bias applying unit, a developing bias applying unit, a bias adjusting unit, and a print density measurement unit. The bias adjusting unit forms a non-charged area on a circumference surface of the photoreceptor drum and applies a developing bias constituted of a first electric potential to a developing roller to form a first toner image by an electric potential difference between the non-charged area and the developing roller. The charging bias applying unit forms a second toner image by an electric potential difference between the electric potential area and the developing roller. The charging bias applying unit decides a value of a charging bias corresponding to a target electric potential from measurement results of print densities of the first toner image and the second toner image.

Image forming apparatus that ensures setting surface potential of photoreceptor drum with simple constitution

An image forming apparatus includes an apparatus main body, a photoreceptor drum, a charging apparatus, a developing device, a transfer apparatus, a charging bias applying unit, a developing bias applying unit, a bias adjusting unit, and a print density measurement unit. The bias adjusting unit controls the charging bias applying unit to form a plurality of electric potential areas of electric potentials with different magnitudes. The bias adjusting unit applies a predetermined developing bias corresponding to a target electric potential to the developing roller, so as to form a plurality of toner images by electric potential differences between the developing bias and the plurality of electric potential areas. The bias adjusting unit decides a value of a charging bias corresponding to the target electric potential from measurement results of print densities of the plurality of toner images measured by the print density measurement unit.

An image forming apparatus includes an apparatus main body, a photoreceptor drum, a charging apparatus, an exposure apparatus, a developing device, a charging bias applying unit, a developing bias applying unit, an image condition adjusting unit, and a print density measurement unit. The image condition adjusting unit forms a second electric potential region by applying the charging bias where a first differential electric potential is subtracted from a first tentative charging bias on a circumference surface of a photoreceptor drum, and forms a second toner image by an electric potential difference between the second electric potential region and a developing roller by applying the target electric potential. The image condition adjusting unit decides value of the charging bias corresponding to the target electric potential from measurement results of print densities of a first toner image and the second toner image measured by the print density measurement unit.

Image forming apparatus that sets surface potential of photoreceptor drum to target electric potential with simple configuration

An image forming apparatus includes an image carrying member, a driving device, a charging member, a cleaning member, a voltage applying device, a torque detector for detecting the torque of the driving device, a storage for storing a predetermined torque value Tc, and a control portion. The control portion obtains as Ton the torque when the charging voltage is applied to the charging member and obtains as Toff the torque when no charging voltage is applied to the charging member. Let the torque observed when no charging voltage is applied at an early stage of use of the image carrying member be represented by Toff(0), then, when the relations Toff(0)&#x3c;Toff and Tc&#x3c;Ton/Toff hold, the control portion determines that the degree of smoothness of the surface of the image carrying member is equal to or higher than a predetermined degree of smoothness.

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Osaka, Japan

Masaki Kadota