Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Corporation

Naoyuki Yamane

Keiji Kato

Yasuo Imai

Katsuzo Uchida

Hisashi Kunihiro

Yukinori Andou

Takashi Sugito

Miki Demoto

Masaru Tsuji

Yoshinobu Tateishi

Toshihide Ohgoshi

Yuhi Akagawa

Hiroshi Kawahito

Masato Asanuma

Yoshikazu Kondoh

Mitsuyoshi Terada

Hiroshige Araki

Atsuyuki Kato

Hideki Gotoh

A toner image fixing device comprises a heat roller and a lamp heater. The lamp heater is formed from a nicrome wire stretched between clamp terminals, a silica tube and ceramic holders closely fitted to respective ends of the silica tube and which have an external diameter which is substantially the same as the diameter of the heating roller. The lamp heater is secured by a lamp holder and frame to the shaft of the heat roller. The heat roller is rotatably supported by a bearing and is driven by a driving gear.

Toner image fixing device having improved lamp heater

A toner hopper is arranged to feed the toner stored in itself to a developing unit and have a stirring roller and a feeding roller respectively supported rotatably, an interlocking mechanism for transmitting the force of rotation to the stirring roller, a manually rotating mechanism for manually rotating the stirring roller, and an interlocking restricting mechanism. The interlocking mechanism restricts the operation of the interlocking mechanism such that the force of rotation of the stirring roller is not transmitted to the feeding roller while the manually rotating mechanism supplies force of rotation to the stirring roller.

Toner hopper having stirring and feeding rollers

The object of the present invention is to provide a method of packaging a developer cartridge especially for use in the image-forming of the electrophotographic process, the method by which the operativity of users can be improved and the pollution due to the sealing member of the developer cartridge can be prevented. The object of the present invention is achieved by fixing a free end of the above sealing member held between the sealing portions of the packing bag when the packing bag is hermetically sealed. With this, the sealing member is pulled off in accordance with the developer cartridge being drawn out from the bag when it is used. When the whole part of the developer cartridge is drawn out, the sealing member is completely pulled off, and is left inside the packing bag.

Method of packing a developer cartridge

A developer cartridge is provided to prevent toner from overflowing a toner hopper into a development tank, and to prevent a toner supply roller from being deformed by heavy pressure. In order to achieve the object, the developer cartridge is provided with a seal member (8) in the toner hopper (2). The seal member has one end blocking a toner supply port (9) and the other end secured to a rotary shaft (7a) of an agitating member (7). The seal member is rolled up by rotating the agitating member when using the cartridge for the first time.

Developer cartridge

Growing community of inventors

Yamatokoriyama, Japan

Naoyuki Yamane