Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Corporation

Yukinori Andou

Yuhi Yui

Kouichi Irihara

Keiji Kato

Yasuo Imai

Naoyuki Yamane

Katsuzo Uchida

Toshio Yamanaka

Masatsugu Nakamura

Hideaki Kadowaki

Hisashi Kunihiro

Hiroshi Kawahito

Masato Asanuma

Takashi Miyaji

Yoshikazu Nishikawa

Takashi Sugito

Miki Demoto

A developing unit includes a developing tank and a toner hopper. The developing tank is disposed to oppose a recording medium rotatably mounted to an image forming apparatus utilizing electrophotography. A developing member conveys a developer and attaches toner to an electrostatic latent image formed on the recording medium to develop the electrostatic latent image. The toner hopper has a toner supply port for supplying toner to the developing tank through a toner replenishing port formed in the developing tank. The developing tank is detachable in a direction of a rotating shaft of the recording medium, and is movable in a direction perpendicular to the direction of the rotating shaft of the recording medium so as to separate from or oppose the recording medium. The toner hopper has a shutter for opening/closing an opening of the toner supply port. A moving mechanism mounted on the developing tank simultaneously provides movement of the developing tank in the direction perpendicular to the direction of the rotating shaft of the recording medium and movement of the toner hopper shutter to open/close the toner supply port when manipulated.

Developing unit having interlocking mechanism

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

An image forming apparatus shown has a developing unit and a photoconductor unit both of which are disposed in a body. The developing unit and photoconductor unit are slidably mounted adjacent to each other within the body. The mounting and positioning of the units are such as to allow the developing unit and the photoconductor unit to be successively pulled out of the body. The apparatus further includes an urging member which allows the photoconductor unit to be urged toward the developing unit. The body includes upper and lower housings and is designed so that the upper housing can be swung upward about a fulcrum on one side of the body and thereby form an opening between the upper and lower housings on the other side of the body. The apparatus is designed and the components are configured such that when the developing unit is pulled out of the body the photoconductor unit moves toward the opening and the photoconductor unit can be replaced in a large open space near the opening.

Image forming apparatus with slidably mounted developing unit and

An electrophotographic apparatus comprising a power supply, a detection means, a voltage control means, and an exposure unit control means, whereby the provision of a special discharge unit can be omitted to allow the reduction in the size and cost of the apparatus. Also, carrier attraction and toner adherence to the photoconductor can be prevented when the photoconductor is stopped after completion of an image forming operation.

Electrophotographic apparatus

An image forming apparatus has a charger; developing device; transferring device; and cleaning device which are positioned around a photoreceptor, the cleaning device and charger being integrally formed. The charger has a control unit for controlling the surface potential of the photoreceptor to be at a predetermined level in accordance with the number of rotations, or the rotating time of the photoreceptor, and/or is designed such that a predetermined voltage is applied to the cleaning device. With the above arrangement, reproduced images having constant quality can be provided for long even if the photoreceptor is repeatedly used and discharging by the charger toward the photoreceptor can be stabilized. The advantages contribute to producing small-sized and low-priced image forming apparatus.

Image forming apparatus

A process cartridge in which at least a photosensitive member and a corona charger are mounted on a casing made of resin and the corona charger includes a shield casing and a support portion for supporting a discharge wire such that the shield casing and the support portion are molded integrally with the casing, while the corona charger is subjected, substantially at the shield casing, to an electrically conductive coating.

Process cartridge having an integrally molded shield casing for the

A robot for transporting a semiconductor wafer comprises a robot hand for engaging and retaining a semiconductor wafer, and at least one position sensor for detecting whether the semiconductor wafer is present at a predetermined position on the robot hand. The robot hand includes a first support plate for supporting the retained semiconductor wafer and a second support plate provided with the at least position sensor for supporting the first support plate.

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Nara, Japan

Yukinori Andou