Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd.

Fuji Photo Film Company, Limited

Satoru Itoh

Seizo Suzuki

Yoshinori Hayashi

Mitsuo Suzuki

Taku Amada

Takao Yamaguchi

Hiroyuki Suhara

Magane Aoki

Kenichi Takanashi

Takeshi Ueda

Tatsuya Ito

Taira Kouchiwa

Koji Hirakura

Tomohiro Nakajima

Kazuyuki Shimada

Naoki Miyatake

Hiromichi Atsuumi

Takashi Ozawa

Daisuke Ichii

Kensuke Masuda

Nobuyuki Torisawa

Akihisa Itabashi

Hiroyuki Kataoka

Mutsuo Takenouchi

Yoshio Arai

Isao Suzuki

Masahiro Soeda

Syoji Wako

A light-amount detecting device includes: a light source which emits a light beam; a branching optical element which divides the light beam emitted from the light source into a first light beam traveling in a predetermined direction and a second light beam traveling in a direction different to the predetermined direction; a light-condensing element which condenses the second light beam; a light-receiving element having a light-receiving surface which receives the second light beam condensed by the light-condensing element; and a detector which detects a light-amount of the second light beam received by the light-receiving element, and at least one of a direction of reflected light of the second light beam reflected from the light-receiving surface of the light-receiving element and spread of the reflected light of the second light beam reflected from the light-receiving surface of the light-receiving element is adjusted to control a light-amount of the reflected light of the second light beam returning to the light source.

Light-amount detecting device, light source device, optical scanning unit and image forming apparatus

An optical scanning characteristic control method is applied to an optical scanning system in which a beam is deflected, and the deflected beam is converged and directed toward a scanning surface, so that optical scanning of the scanning surface is performed by an optical spot formed thereon by the deflected beam. The method comprising the steps of a) disposing a beam deflection control device on the light path of the beam before it is incident on the scanning surface; and b) controlling a beam deflection amount of the beam deflecting device provide to an incident beam so as to control a scanning characteristic of the optical scanning.

Image forming system employing effective optical scan-line control device

Each light detecting sensor, which is installed corresponding to each photoconductor drum, and to which the plurality of light beams passing through the scanning optical system are incident while moving in a main scanning direction includes a light-receiving device having a first light-receiving unit and a second light-receiving unit, which have different intervals from each other in the main scanning direction depending on a position of a sub-scanning direction, all the sizes of the first and the second light-receiving units being sizes covering an overall virtual area in a quadrangular shape surrounding a plurality of light spots in the light-receiving surface.

Laser scanning apparatus having a photodetector having first and second light receiving units

An optical scanning apparatus scans a surface to be scanned in a main scanning direction by simultaneously using a plurality of optical spots formed of a plurality of optical beams emitted from an illuminant, comprising: a light path deflecting part deflecting a light path of at least one of the optical beams, wherein the light path deflecting part is provided in light paths of the optical beams wherein the light path deflecting part may use a liquid crystal deflecting element formed of a liquid crystal element being controllable by an electronic signal to deflect the light path of the one of the optical beams.

Optical scanning apparatus, illuminant apparatus and image forming apparatus

An optical scanning lens is used in a scanning and image forming optical system which gathers a light flux deflected by a light deflector in the vicinity of a surface to be scanned. The lens is formed by plastic molding of polyolefin resin, and the following condition is satisfied: 0&#x3c;|&#x394;n(x)&#x2212;min[&#x394;n(x)]|&#x3c;34&#xd7;10, where &#x394;n(x) denotes a refractive-index distribution existing inside the lens, in a range which the light flux passes through, in the lens, and min[&#x394;n(x)] denotes the minimum value of the &#x394;n(x).

Optical scanning lens, optical scanning device and image forming apparatus

An optical scanning apparatus is provided, in which the optical scanning apparatus includes: a light source emitting an optical beam; an optical deflection unit deflecting the optical beam emitted from the light source; a scanning optical arrangement scanning a scanned surface by the optical beam in a main scanning direction; and an optical beam detection unit detecting the optical beam moving in the main scanning direction. The optical beam detection unit includes a first photodetector and a second photodetector, and the first photodetector including a first part and a second part that are electrically connected, wherein a first gap is formed between an edge of the first part and a first edge of the second photodetector, a second gap is formed between an edge of the second part and a second edge of the second photodetector, and the first gap and the second gap are not parallel to each other.

Optical scanning apparatus for accurately detecting and correcting position of optical beam in subscanning direction, and the method

In an optical scanning device and image forming apparatus according to the present invention, a light source emits a light beam, and a scanning optical unit deflects the light beam from the light source and focuses the deflected light beam to form a light spot on a scanned surface, the scanned surface being scanned by the light beam from the scanning optical unit. A temperature detection unit detects a temperature of the scanning optical unit and its neighboring locations. A temperature compensation unit adjusts a focal-point position of the light beam on the scanned surface in accordance with a change in the temperature detected by the temperature detection unit, the temperature compensation unit adjusting the focal-point position of the light beam by directly varying a focusing effect of a corrector lens on the light beam from the light source by a controlled amount of movement of the corrector lens along its optical axis that corresponds to the temperature change.

Optical scanning device having a temperature compensation unit

Mounting trays for storing therein sheet-shaped recording materials are used to record thereon images. A laser exposing unit forms a latent image of an image on the recording material in an exposure process by irradiating laser. A heat development unit performs a heat development process for the recording material on which the latent image has been formed. The mounting trays the laser exposing unit and the heat development unit are disposed along upper/lower directions of an image recording apparatus in this order of image processing operations for the recording material. A length of a transport path for a recording material is short within this image recording apparatus to shorten processing time.

Image recording apparatus

An optical scanning lens which is used in a scanning and age forming optical system which gathers a light flux deflected by a light deflector in the vicinity of a surface to be scanned. The lens is formed by plastic molding of polyolefin resin, and the following condition is satisfied: 0&#x3c;|&#x394;n(x)&#x2212;min[&#x394;n(x)]|&#x3c;34&#xd7;10, where &#x394;n(x) denotes a refractive-index distribution existing inside the lens, in a range which the light flux passes through, in the lens, and min[&#x394;n(x)] denotes the minimum value of the &#x394;n(x).

An optical scanning device includes a plurality of scanning optical systems arranged in a main scanning direction. Each of the scanning optical systems includes a plurality of light sources emitting light beams, a light source driving circuit modulating the emitted light beams separately, and a deflector causing the light beams to perform scanning. At least one of the scanning optical systems includes a light source selection part selecting one of the light sources of the one of the scanning optical systems.

Image formation with a reduced recording position deviation between scanning optical systems

An optical scanning lens is used in a scanning and image forming optical system which gathers a light flux deflected by a light deflector in the vicinity of a surface to be scanned. The lens is formed by plastic molding of polyolefin resin, and the following condition is satisfied: 0<&verbar;&Dgr;n(x)&minus;min&lsqb;&Dgr;n(x)&rsqb;&verbar;<34&times;10 , where &Dgr;n(x) denotes a refractive-index distribution existing inside the lens, in a range which the light flux passes through, in the lens, and min&lsqb;&Dgr;n(x)&rsqb; denotes the minimum value of the &Dgr;n(x).

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Kanagawa, Japan

Satoru Itoh