Minolta Company, Ltd.

Minolta Camera Kabushiki Kaisha

Yuusuke Morigami

Eiji Okabayashi

Hirokazu Matsuo

Tetsuro Ito

Takeshi Kato

Taizou Oonishi

Tomoyuki Atsumi

Takuma Ishikawa

Shinobu Seki

Wataru Hamakawa

Mitsuru Isogai

Toshio Sakata

Hiroyasu Nagato

Kazuhito Ozawa

Yoshihito Hirano

Shinji Wakamatsu

Yoshifumi Kosagi

Tadashi Kobayashi

Hiroyuki Yoshikawa

Hirofumi Tanahashi

Noboru Yonekawa

Satoru Yoneda

Masahiro Nonoyama

Keigo Tange

Takashi Yamada

Ryo Hirano

Kunihiko Kanou

Shigeo Honma

Ryo Kawamura

Misao Nishikawa

A fixing belt is applied to a fixing apparatus of an electronic photography type printer. The fixing belt consists of a belt base and an elastic layer having a thickness of 200 .mu.m or more formed on the belt base. The elastic layer consists of first, second and third elastic layers arranged in that order from the base side, and is deformable to conform to the surface shape of a recording paper so that all unfixed toner held on the recording paper can be pressed. The second elastic layer is a barrier layer for preventing releasing agent from permeating and the belt from swelling to suppress the thickening of the elastic layer as a whole and maintain the belt thickness within a range that does not cause any image noises.

Fixing belt, fixing apparatus equipped with fixing belt, and method of

A heating device comprises an endless rotary member, a resistance heating member, a current receiver member provided at the endless rotary member and a current supply member being in contact with the current receiver member. In a form, the current supply member is made of a sintered material containing copper and carbon, and a content of the copper in the sintered material is in a range from 55% to 80% by weight. In another form, a contact surface of the current receiver member is formed of a material harder than the current supply member. The contact surface of the current receiver member and the contact surface of the current supply member have surface roughnesses satisfying a relationship of (surface roughness of the current receiver member).ltoreq.(surface roughness of the current supply member). The surface roughness Ra of the current receiver member is in a range from 0.3 .mu.m to 5.5 .mu.m. The surface roughness Ra of the current supply member is equal to or smaller than 5.5 .mu.m.

Heating device

A finisher is disclosed which is connected to a copying machine and possessed of a stapler which effects a stapling treatment on the sheets discharged from the copying machine and a binder which inserts the discharged sheets into a cover and binds by adhesion the sheets and the cover for bookbinding. This finisher has a memory for memorizing the stapling treatment or the binding treatment as a treating mode in advance, a staple sensor for detecting the existence of the staple, and a cover sensor for detecting the existence of the cover. When either of the sensors detects the lack of staple or cover, a feasible treating mode other than the unfeasible treating mode due to the lack of staple or cover in the treating mode memorized in the memory is executed prior to the unfeasible treating mode.

Finisher

A heating device comprises an endless rotary member having a peripheral surface to be moved rotatively, a resistance heating member arranged at the peripheral surface of the rotary member and generating a heat when supplied with an electric current, a current receiver member arranged in a space inside the rotary member and electrically connected to the resistance heating member, and a current supply member being in contact with the current receiver member and to be electrically connected to a power source. A heating rotary member for the heating device comprising the endless rotary member, the resistance heating member, and the current receiver member.

Heating device and heating rotary member

A fixing device having a rotatable heating member heated by a heat source, a rotatable pressure member for pressing against the rotatable heating member, a heat-moving member formed of material having excellent thermal conductivity characteristics and constructed so as to freely make contact with at least one rotatable member among the rotatable heating member and the rotatable pressure member, and a drive unit to move the heat-moving member between a contact position and retracted position relative to at least one of the heating member and the rotatable pressure member. The heat-moving member changes either heat capacity or thermal conductivity or both heat capacity and thermal conductivity relative to the axial direction of the rotatable heating member or the rotatable pressure member.

Fixing device having a heat moving member

An induction heating fixing device is disclosed which is provided with a conducting sleeve, a coil for causing the sleeve to generate an induced current, and a high-frequency power source for feeding a high-frequency wave to the coil. This fixing device detects the switching cycle of the high-frequency power source and the electric power injected into the sleeve and, based on the detected switching cycle and the detected electric power, controls the amount of electric current to be fed from the high-frequency power source to the coil.

Apparatus and method for detecting a condition in an inductive heating

In a fixing apparatus having a flexible metal fixing sleeve provided around a holder, which holds a coil inside, and heated by induction current of the coil, and a pressure roller that pinches the fixing sleeve between it and the holder by pressing on the holder, the following relation is satisfied:

Apparatus for controlling the rotational motion of a fixing apparatus

A fixing apparatus for controlling an oil transfer apparatus to maintain a releasing agent holding layer such that it is not always saturated with the releasing agent. This makes it a compact, cost-effective unit with a long service life and provides a uniform, stable oil coating that eliminates image noise problems. In order to use a constant and minimum necessary amount of releasing agent, a releasing agent supply nozzle is incorporated with multiple protrusive or retrusive droplet growth assisting members at or near multiple releasing agent discharge ports. The supply nozzle used for supplying the oil has multiple discharge holes having approximately equal opening cross-sectional areas and an equalizing member which equalizes the amount of oil discharged from each discharge hole. The outer diameter D1 of the oil supply roller, the outer diameter D2 of the metal core and the distance P of adjacent through-holes formed on the periphery of the metal core satisfy a relation, 0.6&lt;D1.multidot.(D1-D2)/(D2.multidot.P)&lt;6. A quantifying apparatus is provided to equalize the amount of oil transferred by the oil pump when it is intermittently transferred. The quantifying apparatus contributes in achieving a constant amount of releasing agent coating. A releasing agent leakage prevention member is provided to prevent unnecessary oil leakage from the releasing agent supply nozzle and rollers. A specific correlation is established between the centerline average roughness of the oil supply roller surface and the amount of the releasing agent supply to the fixing roller by the oil supply roller. This makes it possible to achieve a uniform coating with excellent releasing capability and prevents adhesion of add particles.

Fixing apparatus including apparatus for controlling the supply of

A fixing apparatus that supports an endless belt by rollers, forms a nipping area with a pressuring roller contacting outside periphery of the belt, and fixes unfixed images on sheets that are transported into the nipping area, the fixing apparatus characterized in that transportation of the sheets into the nipping area is prohibited until the minimum belt temperature detected by a temperature sensor reaches a fixing approval temperature.

Fixing apparatus having a transport mechanism and a controller for

A heating device for use in an induction heating type fixing system is composed of a sleeve 12 made of an electrical conductive material and an electromagnet 13 with a coil 20 and a core 18. It is constructed so as to fulfill the following formulas (1), (2), and (3).

An image forming apparatus and a fixing device used therein capable of discriminating transport condition of a sheet in the fixing device without sheet sensors. The fixing device is provided with a fixing roller for heating unfixed toner borne on a sheet and fixing the toner onto the sheet. A temperature sensor is arranged for detecting the temperature of the fixing roller, which temperature sensor communicating with a controller of the image forming apparatus or the fixing device. The controller discriminates the transport condition of the sheet based on the temperature change of the fixing roller detected by the temperature sensor so as to execute varied control.

Apparatus discriminating the transport condition of a recording medium

A fixing apparatus which is equipped with a heat roller that has a resistance heating member generating heat by means of current supply and which is constructed such that current is supplied to the resistance heating member from the power source through a power supply member electrically connected to the resistance heating member, wherein abnormal temperature increases in the heat roller and in the power supply member can be prevented separately, as well as a control method for the fixing apparatus. The fixing apparatus detects the temperature of the heat roller and the temperature of the power supply member, and then stops the supply of current to the resistance heating member when the temperature of the heat roller is higher than a predetermined temperature for the heat roller or the temperature of the power supply member is higher than a predetermined temperature for the power supply member.

Fixing apparatus and control method thereof

A fixing device for heating and fixing an unfixed image to a record medium bearing the unfixed image, includes a heating roller provided with a core roller and at least two resistance heating members arranged at the core roller and controlled to be electrically powered independently of each other, the resistance heating members provide different heat distributions in a direction of a rotation axis of the heating roller.

Fixing device and image forming apparatus

A finisher comprising a non-sort tray disposed at an uppermost location, a stacking tray for stapling disposed at an intermediate location, and a large-capacity storing tray disposed at a lower location. In a non-sort mode, sheets discharged from a copying machine are first stored in the non-sort tray and, when the non-sort tray is occupied full, subsequent incoming sheets are stored in the storing tray. In a stapling mode, sheets are collected on the stacking tray and, after a stapling operation, they are stored in the storing tray.

Finisher with a stapling function

A finishing apparatus comprising a transport section for transporting sheets discharged from a copying machine, a tray for stacking sheets thereon, and a finishing section for transporting a set of collected sheets from the tray and for stapling the sheet set. Folding rollers for folding a sheet in two or centrally folding the sheet are provided in a sheet transport section. Sheets, in a two-folded condition or with a center fold line formed thereon, are discharged onto the tray. Sheets which have been centrally formed with the fold line are subjected to stapling on or along the fold line.

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Toyohashi, Japan

Yuusuke Morigami