Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Seiichiro Kameda

Youichi Chikugo

Junichi Moteki

Takashi Fujita

Shinichiro Hosoi

Hiroaki Takagishi

Kozo Inoue

Satohisa Tateishi

Nobuto Kamiyama

Kenji Suzuki

Taiya Hirayama

Masashi Sawada

Shigeaki Takada

Daigo Matsuura

Kohei Koshida

Yoshikuni Ito

Ikuo Nakamoto

Kazuhiro Hasegawa

Yasuhiro Hayashi

Nobuaki Hara

Keigo Kaji

Makoto Jinzai

Hiroshi Komiyama

An image heating apparatus includes a control unit that executes a long grain feed mode of conveying a long grain recording sheet whose grain direction is in parallel with a conveying direction of the recording sheet and a short grain feed mode of conveying a short grain recording sheet whose grain direction is orthogonal to the conveying direction of the recording sheet, the control unit changing, in accordance to the long grain feed mode and the short grain feed mode, temperature of a first rotating body set by the heating unit and setting of at least either one changeable setting among settings of a pressure-contact mechanism and a driving mechanism configured such that the setting of at least one of them is changeable.

Image heating apparatus and image forming apparatus having plurality of image forming or conveying modes corresponding to the grain direction of a sheet

An image forming apparatus, including: a fixing device configured to fix a toner image onto a sheet by heating the sheet having the toner image formed thereon; a wire-shaped guide configured to guide the sheet having the toner image fixed thereto; and a holder, configured to hold the wire-shaped guide, to which the wire-shaped guide is fixed by using elasticity of the wire-shaped guide.

Image forming apparatus

A fixing apparatus comprising: a fixing member for fixing a toner image onto a recording material; a pressure member for pressing the fixing member to form a nip portion by which the recording material is nipped and conveyed; an external heating mechanism including an external heating belt for heating the fixing member by contacting an outer surface thereof; a retraction mechanism configured to retract the external heating mechanism from the fixing member; and a restricting portion for restricting the external heating belt so that the external heating belt is separated from the fixing member when the external heating mechanism is retracted from the fixing member by the retraction mechanism.

Fixing apparatus having an external heating belt not in contact with a fixing member when an external heating mechanism is retracted from the fixing member

An image heating apparatus includes a heating member for heating a toner image on a recording material in a heating nip, a pressing member for forming the heating nip and being in contact with the heating member, an abrading member for abrading a surface of the heating member, a contact-and-separation device for causing contact and separation of the abrading member with respect to the heating member, and a selecting device for selecting, depending on the basis weight of the recording material to be heated by the heating member, whether or not the contact-and-separation means brings the abrading member into contact with the heating member before a recording material is conveyed to the heating nip.

Image heating apparatus

An image heating apparatus includes a heating member for heating a toner image on a recording material in a heating nip, a pressing member for forming the heating nip and being in contact with the heating member, an abrading member for abrading a surface of the heating member, a contact-and-separation device for causing contact and separation of the abrading member with respect to the heating member; and a selecting device for selecting, depending on the basis weight of the recording material to be heated by the heating member, whether or not the contact-and-separation means brings the abrading member into contact with the heating member before a recording material is conveyed to the heating nip.

The present invention provides an image heating apparatus capable of holding an open/close unit at a normal position and capable of inexpensively avoiding conveyance failure and deterioration in image quality. An image heating apparatus includes a fixing an rollerand a pressing belt, a pressing mechanismwhich rotates a pressing belt unithaving a pressing beltto retract the pressing beltfrom a pressing contact position, a separation projectionwhich separates the sheet S from the pressing belt, and an open/close unitwhich rotates a separating unit (separation projection, division plate) to retract the separation projectionfrom a separating position. The pressing belt unitincludes a push-up memberwhich locks the separating unit located in the separating position when the pressing belt unitis in the pressing contact position.

The present invention provides an image heating apparatus which can easily attach and detach an external heating unit and easily perform a maintenance operation. The image heating apparatus has a fixing apparatus framewhich rotatably supports a fixing roller, a unit including a pressure springwhich urges an external heating rollertoward the fixing roller, a pressure guide shaftwhich holds the pressure spring, and a pressure staywhich slidably supports the pressure guide shaft, a screwwhich detachably fixes the unit to the fixing apparatus framevia the pressure stay, and a pressure releasing armwhich releases the force of the pressure springacting on the screwvia the pressure stayby sliding the pressure guide shaftrelative to the pressure stay

Image heating apparatus with detachable unit urging external heating member to rotational body

A registration unit includes a skew correction roller pair configured to rotate a sheet conveyed from a conveyance roller pair and to correct skew of the sheet. The registration unit sheet further includes a projectable swinging guide arranged between the conveyance roller pair and the skew correction roller pair to deflect the sheet. The skew correction roller pair corrects the skew of the sheet deflected by the swinging guide.

Sheet conveying apparatus and image forming apparatus

A sheet feeding apparatus according to an aspect of the invention includes conveying suction belts which have a function of rotating an adsorbed sheet and a function of conveying the sheet; a suction fanwhich adsorbs the sheet to the belts; CCDs which detect a position and an skew in a direction orthogonal to a sheet conveying direction while the sheet is adsorbed to the belts; and a control device for driving the belts to rotate the sheet according to signals of CCDs in order to correct an attitude of the sheet adsorbed to the belts.

Sheet feeding apparatus and image forming apparatus

A sheet conveying apparatus is provided which includes a first rotary member; a second rotary member configured to convey a sheet with the first rotary member and which is separable from and in contact with the first rotary member; a sheet detecting member which is movable by being pressed by the sheet; and a detecting sensor configured to detect a presence or absence of the sheet based on a position of the member. The sheet detecting member is movable between a detecting position for detecting a presence or absence of the sheet by the detecting sensor in which the sheet detecting member can be pressed by the sheet and a retreat position in which the sheet detecting member is retreated from a sheet conveyed, and the sheet detecting member is moved to the detecting position from the retract position in association with a movement of the second rotary member away from the first rotary member.

Fixing apparatus and image forming apparatus having the same

An air heating mechanism for heating the air which is blown from a loosening/separating nozzle toward the top sheet attracted to an attracting and conveying unit is provided. A control unit controls the air heating mechanism based on moisture content information from a sensor for detecting a moisture content of a sheet supported by the tray.

An image heating apparatus includes a heating rotatable member for heating an image on a recording material at a nip; an endless belt cooperative with the heating rotatable member to form the nip; a pressing pad for pressing the belt at the nip; and a lubricant application member for applying a lubricant on an inner surface of the belt, wherein the lubricant application member is away from the belt when the belt is at a position retracted from a position where an image heating operation of the apparatus is capable.

An image heating apparatus includes a rotatable heating member configured to heat an image on a recording medium at a nip, driving means configured to drive the heating member, an endless belt configured to form the nip with the heating member, and a driving roller configured to drive the endless belt. In the image heating apparatus, the following expressions are satisfied:&#x3bc;2&#x3c;&#x3bc;10.005&#x3c;&#x3bc;2&#x3c;0.3V1&#x3c;V2where &#x3bc;is a friction coefficient between the endless belt and the driving roller, &#x3bc;is a friction coefficient between the heating member and the endless belt, Vis a peripheral speed of the heating member, and Vis a peripheral speed of the driving roller.

When the conveying speed of a sheet by a first fixing devicedisposed on the upstream side of the conveying path of the sheet is defined as Vu, and the conveying speed of the sheet by pairs of conveying rollersandprovided between the first fixing deviceand a second fixing deviceis defined as Vm, and the conveying speed of the sheet by the second fixing devicedisposed on the downstream side is defined as Vl, Vu, Vm and Vl are set to the relation that Vu&#x3c;Vm&#x3c;Vl.

Image fixing apparatus and image forming apparatus

The present invention provides an external heating member abutment controller which can instantaneously adjust the quantity of heat provided by external heating members to the surface of a fixing member, to provide a fixing apparatus which can drastically increase productivity for cardboards and which can provide high-quality color images free from variations in gloss (gloss nonuniformity). Thus, a fixing apparatus according to the present invention comprises a first and second fixing rotating members that use nip portions to thermally fix a toner image on a recording material and a first and second heating members that abut against the first fixing rotating member to heat an outer surface of the first fixing rotating member. The fixing apparatus is characterized in that when a fixing operation is started, the first heating member and the second heating member are sequentially abutted against the first fixing rotating member.

Growing community of inventors

Abiko, Japan

Seiichiro Kameda