The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 16, 2001
Filed:
Jul. 10, 2000
Keigo Tange, Okazaki, JP;
Minolta Co., Ltd., Osaka, JP;
Abstract
An image fixing apparatus is formed by a fixing roller which contacts an image surface of a recording mediums and performs fixing, a pressure roller which is urged against the fixing roller to thereby apply a necessary pressure needed for fixing of a toner image upon the recording medium, and an external heating roller which has an internal heat surface and when urged against the fixing roller, keeps a surface layer of the fixing roller at a predetermined temperature which is necessary for fixing. A heat transfer coefficient of the fixing roller is 20 W/m,·K to 100 W/m,·K. This guarantees a necessary fixing nip width which is needed for fixing of images without increasing the size of the apparatus or remarkably increasing a holding pressure at the fixing nip portion. Further, it is possible to stably maintain an appropriate fixing temperature without increasing the temperature gradient of the surface layer portion for adding a filler material to the surface layer. In an image forming apparatus using such an image fixing apparatus, stable and high-quality fixing of images one at a time not to mention, but also even continuously is realized.