Patent Grant
9383678
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus, and a developer accommodating container to be used in the image forming apparatus, and a process cartridge.
The image forming apparatus forms an image on a recording material (medium) by using, e.g., an electrophotographic image forming process and may include, e.g., an electrophotographic copying machine, an electrophotographic printer (such as an LED printer or a laser beam printer), an electrophotographic facsimile machine and the like. The cartridge is prepared by integrally constituting at least a developing means and a developing device accommodating a developer and is made detachably mountable to an image forming apparatus main assembly, or the cartridge is prepared by integrally constituting the developing device and a photosensitive member unit including at least a photosensitive member and is made detachably mountable to the image forming apparatus main assembly.
Further, a developer accommodating container is accommodated in the image forming apparatus or the cartridge, and includes a flexible container for accommodating the developer.
In a conventional electrophotographic image forming apparatus, a process cartridge type in which an electrophotographic photosensitive member and a process means actable on the photosensitive member are integrally assembled into a cartridge and the cartridge is made detachably mountable to an electrophotographic image forming apparatus main assembly has been employed.
In such a process cartridge, as shown in
As in JP-A Hei 4-66980, in a constitution in which the deformable inside container and an elastic member are used, filling of the developer from the opening for permitting discharge of the developer involves many problems in manufacturing, and further it takes much cost in some cases.
A principal object of the present invention is to provide a developer accommodating container and the like capable of easily filling a developer from an opening and having a high reliability of a filling step during filling of the developer.
According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a developer accommodating container for accommodating a developer for image formation, comprising: a first flexible member having a three-dimensional shape; a second flexible member for forming a space for accommodating the developer by covering a part of the first flexible member; wherein the developer accommodating container is constituted by bonding the first flexible member and the second flexible member to each other, and an injection opening, provided between the first flexible member and the second flexible member, for permitting injection of the developer into the developer accommodating container, wherein an adjacent side, which is of sides constituting an outer configuration of the three-dimensional shape and which is adjacent to the injection opening, has an angle of less than 90 degrees with respect, to an injection direction of the developer at the injection opening.
These and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent upon a consideration of the following description of the preferred embodiments of the present invention taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
Parts (a), (b) and (c) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
Parts (a), (b) and (c) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
With reference to the drawings, embodiments of the present invention will be described specifically below.
In the following description, a developer accommodating container at least includes a flexible container and a sealing member, provided to the flexible container, for sealing an opening for permitting discharge of a developer.
<Embodiment 1>
(Structure of Image Forming Apparatus)
In image formation, a sheet S (image forming material or medium) is fed by a feeding roller 7 from a sheet cassette 6 mounted at a lower portion of the image forming apparatus main assembly B, and in synchronism with the sheet feeding, a latent image is formed on a photosensitive drum 11 by effecting selective light exposure from an exposure device 8. A developer is supplied to a developing roller 13 (developer carrying member) by a sponge-like developer supplying roller 23, and is carried in a thin layer at a surface of the developing roller 13 by a developing blade 15.
By applying a developing bias to the developing roller 13, the developer is supplied depending on the latent image to develop the latent image into a desired developer image. This developer image is transferred onto the sheet S by bias voltage application to a transfer roller 9 (image transfer means). The sheet S is conveyed to a fixing device 10 and is then subjected to image fixing, and thereafter is discharged onto a discharge portion 3 at an upper portion of the image forming apparatus main assembly by a discharging roller 1.
Incidentally, a photosensitive drum 11 is provided, in a cleaning unit 24, and a developing roller 13, a developer supplying roller 23 and a developing blade 19 are provided in a developing (device) unit 38. Further, the cleaning unit 24 and the developing unit 38 constitute a process cartridge A.
(Structure of Process Cartridge)
The process cartridge includes an image bearing member and process means actable on the image bearing member. Here, as the process means, there are, e.g., a charging means for electrically charging a surface of the image bearing member, a developing device for forming an image on the image bearing member, and a cleaning means for removing a developer (containing a toner, a carrier and the like) remaining on a surface of the image bearing member.
The process cartridge A in this embodiment includes, as shown in
(Structure of Developing Unit)
Next, a structure of the developing unit 38 will be described.
As shown in
Incidentally, in this embodiment, the developer accommodating container 30, the developing roller is and the developing blade 15 are provided in the frames 17 and 18, but the developer accommodating container 30 may also be provided in a frame which is a separate member from the frames 17 and 18. In this case, the developing unit 38 is constituted by a developer accommodating unit (not shown) in which the developer accommodating container 30 is provided, the developing roller 13, the developing blade 15 and the developer supplying roller 23. The developer accommodating unit includes at least the developer accommodating container 30 and a frame for accommodating the developer accommodating container 30.
(Structure of Developer Accommodating Container)
As shown in
(Structure of Developer Accommodating Member)
As shown in
The accommodating portion 34a is formed by subjecting a sheet-like material to thermal molding, such as a vacuum molding, air-pressure molding, vacuum air-pressure molding, blow molding, injection molding, compression molding or transfer molding.
In the molding of the accommodating portion 34a, by using these molding methods, it is possible to subject the flexible material to high-speed processing, and in addition, it becomes possible to provide an in-line molding step in an assembling step (process).
As the material for the accommodating portion 34a, it is preferable that a single-layer material of ABS, PMMA, PC, PP, PE, HIPS, PET, NY, EVA, PVC or the like and a composite multi-layer material of these resins are used. Further, a thickness of five accommodating portion 34a may preferably be about 0.1-1 mm as a sheet-like thickness before the molding, but may only be appropriately selected depending on a cost, product specifications, a manufacturing condition and the like.
As shown in
As shown in
A shape of the accommodating portion 34a is a shape along the inside wall of the frames 17 and 18.
By shaping the accommodating portion 34a by the molding method, the following effects are obtained.
That is, a gap is not formed between the developer accommodating member 34 and the frame 17, so that a developer accommodating space can be created effectively. Further, the developer accommodating member 34 can be formed in a shape which does not interfere with the frame 17 and therefore the developer accommodating member 34 can be easily incorporated into the frames. This is because there is no need to push the developer accommodating member 34 into the frames to adjust the shape during assembling.
Incidentally, the injection opening for permitting injection of the developer will be specifically described later.
(Structure of Sealing Member)
As shown in
The sealing portion 19a is a region where the sealing member 19 seals the plurality of openings 35a and connecting portions 35b of the developer accommodating member 34. By the sealing portion 19a, the developer 99 is prevented from being leaked from the inside of the developer accommodating member 34 until before use of the process cartridge A.
As shown in
Incidentally, on the unsealing member 20, an urging member 21 is fixed, and when the unsealing member 20 is rotated, the urging member 21 urges the developer accommodating member 34, so that the developer can be discharged efficiently.
(Injection of Developer)
Parts (a), (b) and (c) of
As shown in (a) of
That is, the developer accommodating member 34 of the developer accommodating container 30 includes the injection opening 39 for permitting injection of the developer and the openings 35a for permitting discharge of the developer.
At first, the developer accommodating container 30 has not been yet filled with the developer.
Next, as shown in (b) of
Next, as shown in (c) of
Then, when the bonding of the bonding portion 39a of the injection opening 39 is completed, the filling of the developer is completed.
Incidentally, a position and a size of the injection opening 39 for permitting the filling of the developer are determined correspondingly to the filling device of the developer 99, the shape of the process cartridge A, and the like.
In this way, each or the openings 35a and the injection opening 39 of the developer accommodating container 30 is sealed and therefore the accommodated developer is not leaked out to the outside, so that the developer can be treated as a single unit. Further the sealing member 19 is provided with holes as the portion-to-be-engaged 19b to be engaged with the unsealing member 20, thus being engagable with the unsealing member 20.
(Sealing of Injection Opening)
In the state of (a) of
(Insertion of Filling Nozzle)
Insertion of a filling nozzle will be described with reference to
Incidentally, an adjacent side 34h adjacent to the injection opening 39 in
The insertion of the tilling nozzle for filling the developer will be described with reference to
Of sides constituting the developer accommodating member 34, the adjacent side 34h adjacent to the injection opening 39 has an angle θ0 of 90 degrees with respect to a developer injection dissection at the injection opening 39 ((a) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
(Inclined Structure of Adjacent Side)
Next, the developer accommodating member 34 having an inclined structure in the adjacent side 34h will be described with reference to
Of sides constituting the developer accommodating member 34, the adjacent side 34h adjacent to the injection opening 39 has an angle of less than 90 degrees with respect to a developer injection direction at the injection opening 39 ((a) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
A principal reason therefor is as follows,
When the injection opening 39 is changed from a plane to a three-dimensional shape, in the case where the adjacent side 34h which is the plane is changed in shape along the plane, the adjacent side 34h cannot maintain its plane and is inclined in a direction in which the whole adjacent side 34h approaches the injection opening 39. in the case where as shown in (a) of
Although the shaping of the accommodating portion 34a, which is the flexible container of the developer accommodating member 34, by subjecting the sheet-like material to the vacuum molding, the air-pressure molding, the vacuum air-pressure molding, the press molding or the blow molding is described above, it can be assumed that as a draft (tapered angle) of the molding in the molding method, 0 to 2 degrees can be used.
Accordingly, when the draft is taken into consideration, in order to substantially obtain the effect of the present invention, it is preferable that the side is inclined of an angle exceeding the draft of the molding, and therefore it can be said that the case where the adjacent side has an angle θ of less than 88 degrees fails under the concept of the present invention.
<Embodiment 2>
Another embodiment of the present, invention will be described with reference to
Part (a) of
Part (b) of
Part (c) of
In either case, similarly as in Embodiment 1, when the injection opening 39 is deformed, it is possible to control a direction of deformation of the adjacent side 34h so that the adjacent side 34h is deformed downward in the figures.
<Embodiment 3>
Another embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to
Part (a) of
In this embodiment, the close side 37h is defined as “a side (except for the adjacent side 36), of sides constituting the developer accommodating member 34, opposing the injection opening holding portion 70a during the developer filling”.
Part (b) of
Parts (a) and (b) of
Similarly as in Embodiment 1, when the injection opening 33 is deformed, it is possible to control a direction of deformation of the close side 37h so that the close side 37h is deformed downward in the figures.
The present invention is applicable to an image forming apparatus such as a printer.
According to the present invention, an outside adjacent side of the three-dimensional shape adjacent to the injection opening is provided so as to be inclined to have the angle of less than 90 degrees with respect to the developer injection direction. For this reason, even in the case where the holding jig or the like is used at the injection opening, the holding jig (device) and the developer accommodating container do not interfere with each other and thus it is possible to perform the filling step with reliability.
While the invention has been described with reference to the structures disclosed herein, it is not confined to the details set forth and this application is intended to cover such modifications or changes as may come within the purpose of the improvements or the scope of the following claims.
This application claims priority from Japan Parent Application No. 199352/2012 filed Sep. 11, 2012, which is hereby incorporated by reference.
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|---|---|---|---|
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