Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba

Doryokuro Kakunenryo Kaihatsu Jigyodan

Asahi Fiber Glass Company, Limited

Yutaka Kikuchi

Masanobu Kanoto

Naoki Asano

Hideo Saito

Yasuyoshi Hayakawa

Koichi Miyamoto

Yoshinori Sugiura

Seiji Sagara

Hitoshi Ishihama

Yuji Takahashi

Kazuaki Takahashi

Tadashi Ishikawa

Nao Nagashima

Kazuyuki Morinaga

Hideshi Kawaguchi

Nobukazu Adachi

Shigeru Okamura

Ryukichi Inoue

Takao Sameshima

Hisayuki Tomura

Sumitoshi Sootome

Yuzo Isoda

Junji Ichikawa

Tadashi Yagi

Fumio Asano

Hitoshi Fujino

Shin Komori

Kiichi Yamatsuta

Shoji Goto

Kenichi Horikoshi

Ichiro Ohsawa

Kazuhiro Nomoto

Noboru Endo

Kazuo Takeuchi

Yasunori Kawakami

Akihito Nagayama

Hidetaka Fukiharu

Yoshifumi Endo

Hideki Sato

Junko Kiso

An image forming apparatus includes a main assembly including an image forming station, a conveying unit for conveying a recording material on which the image forming station forms an image, the conveying unit including a recording material inlet, recording material feeding device and a recording material discharging outlet, and being supported on the main assembly for movement toward and away from the main assembly. The image forming station is at least partly disposed adjacent the conveying unit and is exposed when the conveying unit is moved away from the main assembly. When mounted to the main assembly, the convening unit constitutes a passage for conveying the recording material substantially in a vertical direction through the image forming station, and the conveying unit is separable, substantially along the conveying passage, from the main assembly.

Image forming apparatus with improved jam clearance operation

An image forming apparatus includes a main assembly and a detachable process cartridge mountable to the main assembly. The main assembly has a rotatable image transfer roller for transferring a toner image onto a recording sheet and the process cartridge has a rotatable photosensitive member, a device to form an image on that photosensitive member, a driving force receiving unit provided in the photosensitive member for receiving a driving force from the main assembly so as to rotate the photosensitive member and a driving force outputting unit provided in the photosensitive member for outputting the driving force back to the main assembly to rotate the image transfer roller in the main assembly.

Image forming apparatus with detachable process cartridge

An image forming apparatus has an apparatus body and an optional cassette feeder unit which is detachably mounted on the apparatus body. The optional cassette feeder unit stores sheets and feeds sheets to the image forming section of the body. The image forming apparatus is provided with locking sections which engage with leg sections provided at the lower surface of the apparatus body in order to connect the body to the optional cassette feeder unit.

Image forming apparatus with locking mechanism for detachable feeder unit

A process cartridge is detachably mountable on an image forming apparatus and has as its components a frame, a photosensitive member inside the frame, a charging device, a developer for supplying developer to the photosensitive member and a cleaning device for removing residual matter from the photosensitive member. When the process cartridge is mounted to the main assembly a light path extending substantially horizontally is formed for permitting external light corresponding to image information to reach the photosensitive member. The light path is formed between the developer container and the residual matter container.

Image forming apparatus with detachably mounted cartridge and image

An image forming apparatus includes a main assembly including an image forming station, a conveying unit for conveying a recording material on which the image forming station forms an image, the conveying unit including a recording material inlet, recording material feeding device and a recording material discharging outlet, and being supported on the main assembly for movement toward and away from the main assembly. The image forming station is at least partly disposed adjacent the conveying unit and is exposed when the conveying unit is moved away from the main assembly. When mounted to the main assembly, the conveying unit constitutes a passage for conveying the recording material substantially in a vertical direction through the image forming station, and the conveying unit is separable, substantially along the conveying passage, from the main assembly.

The present invention provides a sheet supplying apparatus having a sheet stacking device for stacking and supporting sheets, a sheet supply roller having different radial dimensions along a periphery thereof to feed out the sheets from the sheet stacking device, and a separation unit having a feed rotary member rotated in a sheet feeding direction and a reverse rotary member rotated in a direction opposite to the sheet feeding direction to separate the sheets fed out by the sheet supply roller one by one.

Sheet supplying apparatus

An image fixing device includes a fixing roller having bearings at each end, a backup roller held in pressure contact with the fixing roller, and a frame receiving the fixing roller and backup roller and having an abnormal temperature rise prevention element. The fixing roller and the backup roller are insertable into the frame in directions perpendicular to the axes of these rollers. The bearing at one end of the fixing roller holds its entire circumference while the other bearing supports only part of the circumference of the fixing roller and the abnormal temperature rise prevention element is set at a predetermined positional relationship to the heating roller as a result of insertion of the heating roller.

Removable rollers in an image fixing device

A fixing apparatus having a heating member maintained at a predetermined fixing temperature and an electric supply device for supplying an electric current to the heating member, wherein the electric supply device supplies an electric current at a second duty cycle larger than a first duty cycle after an electric current is supplied at the first duty cycle from the time the supply of the electric current is started to the heating member until a fixing temperature is reached.

Fixing apparatus for changing the duty cycle of electric current supply

A passage ticket is conveyered while being sandwiched between conveyer belts, and brought into contact with a rolling element. The passage ticket is held stationary by a stopper whose top end portion is positioned at a conveyer path. A solenoid is operated based on a command for releasing the-holding state, so that the rolling element is rolled. Therefore, the stopper is removed from-the conveyer path, and a pressing roller coupled to the rolling element is pressed onto the conveyer belts. As a result, the passage ticket is surely conveyed as being sandwiched between the conveyer belts when the holding state is released. Therefore, even if erroneous data is contained in the passage ticket issued at an entrance gate, erroneous data can be rapidly corrected at an exit gate.

Passage ticket processing apparatus

The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus in which a sheet material is fed from a sheet feeding unit to an image forming unit for image formation on the sheet material, and the sheet material is transported and discharged to a sheet discharge unit after image formation. The image forming apparatus includes a substantially horizontal sheet feeding unit provided at either of an upper position and a lower position of the image forming unit at the center, and a substantially horizontal sheet discharge unit provided at the other of the positions; and a sheet path extending substantially vertically from the sheet feeding unit through the image forming unit to the sheet discharge unit.

Image forming apparatus with sideways U-shaped sheet path

The present invention provides a sheet feeding apparatus with a sheet support for supporting sheets, a supply roller for feeding out the sheets from the sheet support, and a separator for separating the sheets fed from the supply roller one by one, the separator including a fixed frictional separating pad, a rotary member mounted for movement in contact with and in separation from the frictional separating pad, and a bias mechanism for biasing the rotary member to it urge against the frictional separating pad. The sheets fed from the supply means are separated one by one by passing the sheet through a contact area between the rotary member and the frictional separating pad.

Sheet feeding apparatus with reduced vibration separator

The present invention provides a sheet feeding apparatus having a sheet supporting tray removably mountable within the sheet feeding apparatus and adapted to stack and support sheets, a regulating device provided on the sheet supporting tray and adapted to regulate and position lateral edges of the sheets stacked in the sheet supporting tray, an urging mechanism for urging with a predetermined urging force the sheets stacked in the sheet supporting tray against the regulating device, and an urging force adjusting mechanism for adjusting the urging mechanism so that the urging mechanism can urge the sheets against the regulating device with greater force during insertion of the sheet supporting tray into the sheet feeding apparatus.

Sheet feeding apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes an image bearing member; a device for forming an image on the image bearing member; a transfer device for transferring the image from the image bearing member onto a recording material, the transfer device is in the form of a roller contactable to the image bearing member in its longitudinal direction; and a guiding member for guiding the recording material to a neighborhood of the image bearing member; wherein a positional relationship between the transfer device and the guide member is fixed, and wherein the transfer device is swingable toward and away from the image bearing member.

Image forming apparatus with transfer roller with guide means which

A laser beam printer having a deflector for deflecting a laser beam modulated in accordance with information to be recorded and a photosensitive member which is scanned by the deflected laser beam. A frame is provided to position both the deflector and the photosensitive member, the frame having a positioning portion for positioning the photosensitive member. The frame is mounted on a printer base, the frame being supported on the base at three points wherein one of the three points is located adjacent the deflector and the other two points are disposed adjacent the positioning portion of the photosensitive member.

Laser beam printer having three-point support system

A sheet feeding apparatus with a sheet containing tray adapted to support a plurality of sheets and being shiftable between a sheet supplying position and a waiting position, a sheet supply roller for feeding out the sheet supported by the sheet containing tray at the sheet supplying position, a driving force transmitting device connected to the sheet supply roller and adapted to transmit a driving force from a drive source, and a holding device connected to the driving force transmitting device so that the sheet containing tray is shifted to the sheet supplying position by the driving force transmitted to the sheet supply roller and capable of holding the sheet containing tray at the sheet supplying position while the plurality of sheets are being supplied by the sheet supply roller.

Growing community of inventors

Kawasaki, Japan

Yutaka Kikuchi