Toshiba Tec Kabushiki Kaisha

Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba

Yukie Kobayashi

Takashi Ikeda

Takafumi Amano

Susumu Nomura

Tetsuo Kato

Michiteru Oono

A developing unit has first and second partition walls and which divide the inside of a developer reservoir into first to third chambers parallel to the developing roller, and first to third mixers which are disposed in the first to third chambers. The first mixer supplies developer to the developing roller by stirring and carrying from one end side to the other end side. The second mixer feeds by stirring and carrying the toner replenished from a replenish device and developer fed from the first chamber to one end side of the first mixer. The third mixer feeds the toner collected from a collection mechanism to one end side of the first mixer by stirring and carrying at a speed lower than the second mixer.

Image forming apparatus and image forming method

A control circuit of a digital copying machine sets a total current to a charger at a high level in a printing operation, sets the total current to the charger at a low level when turn-off of power to the digital copying machine has been instructed to initiate a finishing operation, and turns off the total current to the charger when the finishing operation has been completed.

An image forming device is proposed in which a photoreceptor can be replaced easily, and in which it is unlikely that an image problem is caused by a grounding failure of a photoreceptor. The image forming device includes a driving unit including a first coupling member having a groove or a projection for transmitting a rotating force, the driving unit being made of a conductive material, electrically grounded, and rotatable; and a photoreceptor assembly as a driven section rotated by said driving unit, the photoreceptor assembly including a photoreceptor and a second coupling member, and being attachable to/detachable from said driving unit, the second coupling member having a projection or a groove for engaging with the groove or the projection of the first coupling member, rotation of said driving unit being transmitted to the photoreceptor by the engagement of the first coupling member and the second coupling member. When the photoreceptor is being rotated by the driving unit, the projection or the groove of the second coupling member and the groove or the projection of the first coupling member are electrically connected by pressured contact with each other, thereby grounding said photoreceptor with an electrical resistance value of 1,000 &OHgr; or less.

Image forming device having grounded photoreceptor

A peeling member for peeling magnetic waste toner scraped off from a photosensitive drum by a cleaning blade and conveyed to a waste toner recovery position by a magnetic developer carry-out roller is faced to the developer carry-out roller in a non-contact state. As waste toner on the developer carry-out roller is peeled off leaving a thin layer of waste toner in a thickness equivalent to the gap, a conveying amount of waste toner by the developer carry-out roller increases.

Growing community of inventors

Yokohama, Japan

Yukie Kobayashi