JP2016206582A - Image formation device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To perform dehumidification control corresponding to humidity information at least in a power saving mode.SOLUTION: An image formation device 100 comprises: a dehumidification unit 6 placed right under a paper placement unit 4; a control unit 7 for obtaining a humidity value from an air conditioner 8 connected via communication means 812 and 714; and the control unit 7 for performing control so that the dehumidification unit 6 is turned on if the received humidity value is a reference value or more.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 2

Description

  The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus that transfers a toner image onto a sheet fed from a sheet placing portion.

  2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, there is known an image forming apparatus that feeds out sheets placed on a sheet placing unit one by one and transfers a toner image onto the sheet. In this case, if the paper is in a moisture-absorbing state, the transfer efficiency and the transfer performance are lowered, and the paper is weakened, so that it is easy to cause separation failure and jamming after double feeding and transfer. Therefore, it is preferable to dehumidify the loaded paper.

  Patent Document 1 describes a configuration in which a heater for dehumidifying a placed sheet is controlled on and off according to an output of a humidity sensor provided near the cassette while the main switch is off. Further, Patent Document 2 describes an image forming apparatus in which a heater is operated by a driving unit when humidity measured by a dehumidification sensor disposed in the vicinity of a paper placement unit reaches a certain value or more. .

  By the way, the image forming apparatus consumes a large amount of power even in a standby period because of on-demand correspondence. Therefore, in recent years, from the viewpoint of power saving, in addition to the normal operation mode, an image forming apparatus equipped with a power saving module that turns off the power of each functional unit when the image forming apparatus is not used for a predetermined time is known. It has been.

JP 58-62664 A JP-A-9-211917

  In the image forming apparatus equipped with the power saving module as described above, on / off control of the heater for dehumidification is performed during the normal operation mode, while the monitoring process of the humidity sensor is not performed during the standby period. In general, the heater is uniformly turned on. Patent Document 1 relates to dehumidification control in a state where the main switch is turned off at night, and Patent Document 2 relates to humidity control in a normal operation mode, both of which are normal. It is not related to dehumidification control in the operation mode and the power saving mode. In the conventional mode in which the utilization of the humidity sensor differs depending on the mode, there is a certain limit to the dehumidification control.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above, and provides an image forming apparatus that enables dehumidification control based on humidity information in a power saving mode in addition to a normal operation mode.

  The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus for transferring a toner image onto a sheet fed from a sheet placing unit, from a dehumidifying unit disposed in the vicinity of the sheet placing unit and an air conditioner connected via a communication unit. Information acquisition means for acquiring humidity information and dehumidification control means for controlling the operation of the dehumidifying unit according to the received level of the humidity information are provided.

  According to the present invention, the information acquisition unit acquires humidity information from an air conditioner separate from the image forming apparatus, and the dehumidification control unit controls the operation of the dehumidifying unit according to the level of the acquired humidity information. The For example, if the humidity is equal to or higher than a predetermined reference value, it is considered that the amount of moisture absorbed by the paper stacked on the paper placement unit is large, and the operation of the dehumidification unit is turned on. Promotes drying. Therefore, even when the image forming apparatus is not equipped with a humidity sensor, or even when the image forming apparatus is equipped with the humidity sensor, it is possible to perform dehumidification control by arranging the air conditioner at a close position.

  In addition, the dehumidifying control means determines whether the operation mode or the power saving mode, and operates in the power saving mode. According to this configuration, it is possible to perform dehumidification control in the power saving mode even for an apparatus in which the measurement operation of the humidity sensor is stopped in the power saving mode. Therefore, the dehumidification control during the power saving mode saves power compared to the conventional case where the dehumidifying unit is always turned on. Further, even when a user operation such as printing is instructed during the power saving mode, the dehumidified paper is used.

  In addition, the dehumidifying control unit is configured to force the dehumidifying unit to operate when the control of the operation of the dehumidifying unit according to the level of the humidity information acquired by the information acquiring unit is stopped in the power saving mode. It is characterized by switching. According to this configuration, even when the dehumidification control is stopped for some reason in the power saving mode, the dehumidifying unit is operated at least as in the related art, so that the paper can be dehumidified.

  In addition, the information acquisition unit transmits a request signal to the air conditioner at a predetermined period, and receives a response signal including humidity information from the air conditioner in response to the request signal. According to this configuration, since a response signal including humidity information is requested from the image forming apparatus side at a predetermined period, humidity control with high responsiveness according to humidity is possible.

  The information acquisition means transmits a request signal to the air conditioner at a predetermined cycle, receives a response signal including humidity information from the air conditioner in response to the request signal, and the response signal is It is determined whether or not the dehumidifying unit has been continuously received the predetermined number of times, and the dehumidifying control unit determines that the operation control of the dehumidifying unit has been stopped when the response signal is not continuously received the predetermined number of times. Is switched to forced operation. According to this configuration, since the dehumidifying unit is switched to the forced operation when the response signal to the request signal is not continuously received a predetermined number of times, it is possible to continue the dehumidification control as much as possible.

  Further, by employing a heating element as the dehumidifying unit, drying of the laminated paper is promoted. According to this, drying of paper is effectively promoted by heat generation.

  According to the present invention, dehumidification control according to humidity information can be performed at least in the power saving mode.

1 is a front view showing an outline of an image forming apparatus according to a first embodiment of the present invention. It is a block of a part related to dehumidification processing. It is a circuit diagram which controls ON / OFF of a heater. It is a functional block diagram of a control part. It is a flowchart which shows an example of the dehumidification process which a control part performs.

  In FIG. 1, an image forming apparatus 100 includes an image forming unit 1, a sheet conveying unit 2, a document reading unit 3, and a sheet placing unit 4, and an automatic document conveying device 5 is mounted on the upper surface. Further, although not shown in the figure, an operation unit for receiving various instructions is arranged at the top. The image forming apparatus 100 performs electrophotography on a sheet fed from the sheet loading unit 4 by the sheet conveying unit 2 based on image data captured from the document reading unit 3 that optically reads a document image or an external device (not shown). An image forming process according to the method is performed.

  The image forming unit 1 includes a photosensitive drum 11, and includes a charging device 12 that uniformly charges the drum surface from the upstream side in the rotation direction, a developing device 13, a transfer unit 14, and a cleaning unit 15 across an exposure area. Have. The exposure unit 16 scans the exposure area of the photosensitive drum 11 with a light beam that is light-modulated with image data. The developing device 13 reveals the toner by transferring the toner to the electrostatic latent image formed by the scanned light beam. The fixing unit 17 melts and fixes the toner image transferred to the sheet by the transfer unit 14.

  The paper placement unit 4 is prepared for each paper size. In the example of FIG. 1, the paper placement units 41, 42, and 43 are arranged in the vertical direction. The sheet placing unit 4 may be of any known tray type or cassette type. On the paper feed end side (right side in FIG. 1) of each of the paper placement units 41 to 43, the paper feed unit of the paper transport unit 2 is correspondingly arranged, and the selected size paper is imaged one by one. It is carried out toward the forming unit 1. The paper transport unit 2 discharges the paper that has passed through the fixing unit 17 to the paper discharge unit.

  A dehumidifying unit 6 is disposed in the vicinity of the sheet placing unit 4. The dehumidifying unit 6 is, for example, plate-shaped heaters 61 and 62 made of ceramics, and is laid at a position immediately below the sheet placing unit 4 in this example. The dehumidifying unit 6 generates heat upon receiving power supply, and promotes dehumidification (drying) of the sheets stacked on the sheet mounting unit 4. Note that the dehumidifying unit 6 may be laid corresponding to each of the paper placement units 41, 42, 43. In addition to the plate shape, a preferable form in terms of dehumidification efficiency can be employed. The dehumidifying unit 6 may be a mode of spraying warm air or a mode of radiating heat rays in addition to a heating element.

  In FIG. 2, the dehumidification control unit 7 is a circuit configuration unit for dehumidification control, and includes a control board 71, a control board 72, and a dehumidification circuit part 73. Moreover, the air conditioner 8 purifies air, for example.

  First, the air conditioner 8 will be briefly described. Since the air conditioner 8 is well-known and will not be shown in detail, generally, the air conditioner 8 has a housing of a predetermined size, and is connected to an air inlet and an air inlet through an internal ventilation hole, and It has a blower fan. The air conditioner 8 includes a dust collection filter, a deodorizing filter, an ion generator, and the like, and purifies the air sucked from the intake port and sends it out from the air supply port. The cleaning control is performed by a control unit 811 configured by, for example, a microcomputer mounted on the control board 81. The air conditioner 8 includes various sensors for monitoring the environmental atmosphere necessary for cleaning control. For example, in addition to the temperature / humidity sensor 82, a dust sensor, an odor sensor, a fine particle sensor, and an ion sensor as necessary. Etc. The control board 81 of the air conditioner 8 includes a wired or wireless communication unit 812 that enables communication with the outside.

  The control board 71 of the dehumidification control unit 7 is equipped with a control unit 711 configured by a microcomputer, and the control unit 711 is connected to the storage units 712 and 713. The storage unit 712 stores a control program for dehumidification processing, and the storage unit 713 stores various data necessary for execution of the control program. The control unit 711 includes a communication unit 714 that communicates with the communication unit 812 of the air conditioner 8. The control unit 711 controls all known processes including the image forming process, and controls the operation mode, the power saving mode, and the dehumidification process. Details of the charge removal processing by the control unit 711 will be described later with reference to functional block diagrams and flowcharts of FIGS. 4 and 5.

  The communication units 714 and 812 can employ, for example, serial communication of the RS232C communication standard. The communication unit 714 acquires at least humidity information from the air conditioner 8 and passes it to the control unit 711. In response to the response request from the communication unit 714, the communication unit 812 takes in the information of the temperature / humidity sensor 82 via the control unit 811 and transmits it to the communication unit 714.

  A control unit 721 configured by a microcomputer is mounted on the control board 72, and the control unit 721 is connected to the storage unit 722 and the switching block 723 and to the control unit 711 of the control board 71. The control unit 721 controls the power supply system and the drive system, and the storage unit 722 stores a control program for that purpose. Further, the control unit 721 switches the output level between the operation mode and the power saving mode as described later. The switching block 723 will be described in detail with reference to FIG.

  The dehumidifying circuit unit 73 includes a power supply substrate 731, a heater switch 732, and a heater substrate 733. The power supply substrate 731 generates and supplies power for driving the dehumidifying unit 6, here heating. Details of the circuit will be described with reference to FIG.

  In FIG. 3, the switching block 723 includes an AND circuit 724. The AND circuit 724 has a control unit 711 connected to one input terminal and a control unit 721 connected to the other input terminal. The output side of the AND circuit 724 is connected to the relay drive power source E via the relay switch 736. The operation will be described later.

  A power supply substrate 731 of the dehumidifying circuit unit 73 is electrically connected to the dehumidifying unit 6 via a heater switch 732 and a relay 735. The heater switch 732 is disposed at an appropriate position of the image forming apparatus 100 and can be operated by the user. The heater substrate 733 includes a relay unit 734, and the relay unit 734 includes a relay 735 and a relay switch 736. The relay 735 is connected between the power supply board 731 and the dehumidifying unit 6, and performs power supply (on) and cutoff (off) to the dehumidifying unit 6. The relay switch 736 constitutes a magnetic field generator with a coil and a magnetic body connected between the relay drive power source E and the output side of the AND circuit 724. The movable piece of the relay 735 is in the connection state shown in FIG. 3 by the generated magnetic field.

  That is, when the output side of the AND circuit 724 is at a low level, a current flows through the relay switch 736 to generate a magnetic field, and the relay 735 connects the power supply board 731 and the dehumidifying unit 6 (static elimination is turned on). On the other hand, when the output side of the AND circuit 724 is at a high level, no current flows through the relay switch 736 and no magnetic field is generated, so the relay 735 shuts off the power supply substrate 731 and the dehumidifying unit 6 (static elimination off).

  4, the control unit 711 functions as an image formation processing unit 7110, a mode determination unit 7111, a communication processing unit 7112, a dehumidification control unit 7113, and a forced dehumidification unit 7114 by executing a control program.

  The image formation processing unit 7110 is a processing unit that controls the overall image formation processing described above. The mode determination unit 7111 determines whether the image forming apparatus 100 is equipped with a power saving function, which is a normal operation mode or a power saving mode. In this type of image forming apparatus 100, even when the main power is turned on, for example, when the image forming apparatus is not used for a long time, when a predetermined condition is satisfied, the mode is shifted to the power saving mode. On the other hand, when the user operates the operation unit, the power saving mode returns to the normal mode. During the power saving mode, power supply to the image forming unit 1, the document reading unit 3, the display unit of the operation unit, the image processing unit, and the like is turned off.

  The communication processing unit 7112 obtains dehumidification information by communicating with the connected air conditioner 8 by a predetermined method.

  The dehumidification control unit 7113 outputs the control signal to the switching block 723 according to the process of acquiring the humidity information from the air conditioner 8, the humidity level of the acquired humidity information, and in this embodiment, a high level or low level signal. A mode signal is output to the control unit 721 in accordance with the mode discrimination result. The control unit 721 outputs a high level to the AND circuit 724 at least during the power saving mode. Accordingly, the dehumidifying operation of the dehumidifying unit 6 is turned off while the high level signal is output from the control unit 711, and the dehumidifying operation of the dehumidifying unit 6 is turned on while the low level signal is output from the control unit 711. Is done.

  The forced dehumidifying unit 7114 instructs a predetermined dehumidifying operation, for example, a fixed forced on operation, when the flag for enabling the dehumidifying control is not set or when the humidity information cannot be acquired from the air conditioner 8. Note that the forced on operation may be an operation of turning on and off intermittently at a preset cycle in addition to the constant on.

  In the flowchart executed by the control unit 711 shown in FIG. 5, when the main power supply is turned on, this flow starts. When the main power supply is turned on, the automatic control for dehumidification is set to be effective by the control unit 711 or by the user in hardware, that is, with a switch or the like. Note that this flow may be either in the normal operation mode or in the power saving mode, but in the present embodiment, it will be described below as processing in the power saving mode.

  First, in step 1, it is determined whether or not automatic control for dehumidification of the dehumidifying unit 6 is set as valid, and if not set, the process proceeds to step S25 and an instruction for forced control of the dehumidifying unit 6 is performed. .

  On the other hand, when it is determined that automatic control for dehumidification of the dehumidifying unit 6 is valid, the retry counter N is reset (step S3). The retry counter N counts the number of times to retry when communication with the air conditioner 8 is not successful. Next, the timer is reset and started (step S5).

  When the timer measures a preset T time (tens of seconds to several tens of seconds, for example, 30 seconds) (Yes in step S7), it communicates with the air conditioner 8 (step S9). In step S9, a transmission request signal is transmitted to the connected air conditioner 8. Next, for example, the presence / absence of a response is determined for a predetermined time (step S11). If there is a response, that is, if humidity information has been transmitted, the retry counter N is reset (step S13).

  On the other hand, if there is no response, the retry counter N is incremented by 1 (step S21), and it is determined whether or not the retry counter N has reached the value K (step S23). The value K defines the number of retries, for example, several times. If the retry counter N has not reached the value K, the process returns to step S5 and the same processing up to step S11 is repeated. On the other hand, if the retry counter N reaches the value K, for example, it is determined that the communication with the air conditioner 8 is poor, the air conditioner 8 is stopped, and the forced control of the dehumidifying unit 6 is instructed. (Step S25).

  When the humidity information is acquired from the air conditioner 8 in step S11, it is determined whether or not the acquired humidity is a preset reference value, for example, 80% or higher (step S15). If the acquired humidity is equal to or higher than a preset reference value, the operation of the dehumidifying unit 6 is turned on (step S17). On the other hand, if the acquired humidity does not reach the preset reference value, dehumidification is performed. The operation of the unit 6 is turned off (step S19).

  By performing such dehumidification control, it is possible to automatically control dehumidification regardless of the mode. Also, among the modes, the image forming apparatus that performs the dehumidification automatic control by the control board 72 in the operation mode, but forcibly controlled in the power saving mode, for example, always on is also applied in the power saving mode. Thus, automatic control of such dehumidification can be realized. In this case, in the operation mode, for example, the control unit 711 outputs a high level signal, while the control unit 721 controls the dehumidifying operation, uses humidity information from the temperature / humidity sensor 82, or the image forming apparatus 100. Is used to output a low level signal to the AND circuit 724 when the humidity is equal to or higher than a reference value by using humidity information from a temperature / humidity sensor in the vicinity of the paper placement unit 4 (not shown). If the value does not reach the value, a high level signal may be output to the AND circuit 724.

  In the above embodiment, for example, serial communication of the RS232C communication standard is applied as the communication units 714 and 812. However, as the second embodiment, a method of communicating directly or via an access point by a wireless LAN (Local Area Network), or A connection method using a USB (Universal Serial Bus) cable may be used. In the case of a wireless system, the air conditioner 8 is not particularly limited to one unit, and if a plurality of units can be connected, the humidity information acquisition rate is increased.

  In the above embodiment, the control boards 71 and 72 provided with the control units 711 and 721, respectively, have been described. However, as the third embodiment, a single control unit configured by a microcomputer is used. But you can. Further, the dehumidification control of the flowchart of FIG. 5 may be performed regardless of the operation mode and the power saving mode.

  The above description of the embodiment is to be considered in all respects as illustrative and not restrictive. The scope of the present invention is shown not by the above embodiments but by the claims. Furthermore, the scope of the present invention is intended to include all modifications within the meaning and scope equivalent to the scope of the claims.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 100 Image forming apparatus 4,41,42,43 Paper mounting part 6,61,62 Dehumidification part 711 Control part (dehumidification control means)
714 Communication unit (information acquisition means)
72 Control board (dehumidifying part)
73 Dehumidification circuit part (dehumidification part)
8 Air conditioner 82 Temperature / humidity sensor

Claims (6)

In an image forming apparatus for transferring a toner image to a sheet fed from a sheet loading unit,
A dehumidifying portion disposed in the vicinity of the paper placement portion;
Information acquisition means for acquiring humidity information from an air conditioner connected via communication means;
An image forming apparatus comprising: a dehumidifying control unit that controls the operation of the dehumidifying unit according to the level of the received humidity information. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the dehumidifying control unit determines whether the operation mode is a power saving mode, and operates in the power saving mode. The dehumidifying control unit switches the dehumidifying unit to a forced operation when the control of the operation of the dehumidifying unit according to the level of the humidity information acquired by the information acquiring unit is stopped in the power saving mode. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein: The said information acquisition means transmits a request signal to the said air conditioner with a predetermined period, and receives the response signal containing the humidity information from the said air conditioner which responds to the said request signal. The image forming apparatus according to any one of? The information acquisition means transmits a request signal to the air conditioner at a predetermined cycle, receives a response signal including humidity information from the air conditioner in response to the request signal, and the response signal continues. To determine whether it has been received a certain number of times,
The dehumidifying control unit switches the dehumidifying unit to a forced operation, assuming that the operation control of the dehumidifying unit is stopped when the response signal is not continuously received a predetermined number of times. The image forming apparatus according to any one of 1 to 3. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the dehumidifying unit is a heating element.

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