JP3417687B2 - Method of manufacturing recording electrode for image forming apparatus - Google Patents

Description

Description: BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method for manufacturing a recording electrode used in an image forming apparatus which can be used in a copying machine, a printer, a plotter, a facsimile, and the like. 2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, as one of image forming apparatuses, an electrode having a plurality of openings (hereinafter referred to as apertures) is used, and a voltage is applied to the electrodes based on image data. U.S. Pat. No. 3,689,935 discloses a method for applying an image and controlling the toner particles to be able to pass through the aperture so that an image is formed on a support by the passed toner particles. This image forming apparatus comprises a flat plate made of an insulator, a continuous reference electrode formed on one surface of the flat plate, and a plurality of insulated control electrodes formed on the other surface. An aperture electrode body in which at least one row of apertures is formed through the three electrodes for each of the control electrodes; a means for selectively applying a potential between the reference electrode and the control electrode; Means for supplying charged toner particles so that the flow of the toner particles passing through the aperture is modulated, and means for positioning the support in the particle flow path such that the support and the aperture electrode body can relatively move. It is composed of Also, for example, US Pat. No. 4,743,926.
Nos. 4,755,837, 4,780,733, and 4,814,796 disclose an image forming apparatus in which an aperture electrode body is arranged with a control electrode on a support side and a reference electrode on a toner supply side. I have. [0005] In contrast, US Pat.
In the above-mentioned U.S. Patent, the voltage applied to the control electrode when the aperture electrode is turned off by disposing the aperture electrode body with the reference electrode facing the support and the control electrode facing the toner supply side is disclosed in the above U.S. It is described that it can be suppressed to about １ ／ as compared with the image forming apparatus to be used. [0006] Here, the off-time means the time when the toner particles are not adhered to the support, that is, the time when a blank portion of the image is formed. At the time when a toner image is formed. [0007] However, the aperture electrode body used in the conventional image forming apparatus as described above is formed by forming a pattern of a copper film on an insulating sheet of polyimide or the like, and then forming an excimer laser. Drilling of apertures. Since this drilling process using an excimer laser utilizes ablation, an extremely clean hole can be formed. However, on the other hand, denatured substances such as polyimide and a sliding film adhere to the upper portion and the wall surface of the aperture due to the ablation by the excimer laser, which causes a short circuit between adjacent portions and a discharge. That is, at the time of excimer processing, a chemical bond of a polymer is cut by a photochemical reaction, and scattered fragments are attached, and copper and additives are evaporated and attached by thermal processing. As a countermeasure against this, the present inventors have tried various methods. As a first method, strong ultrasonic cleaning was performed with an organic solvent such as trichlene or acetone. However, with this method, it was practically impossible to sufficiently remove the deposits, which were a mixture of the materials. Further, when the cleaning was performed violently, there was a problem that the copper wire was peeled off from the polyimide of the base material, and the application was not possible. [0010] As a second method, plasma etching was performed. Although this method can surely remove the adhered substance, the surface of the resin film is modified by plasma, which causes problems such as toner adhesion. Therefore, it has not been possible to remove foreign matter in the holes and to have no adverse effect on printing by any of the methods. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve the above-described problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide a method of manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus having good printing characteristics without causing adjacent short-circuiting or the like. The purpose is. In order to achieve this object, a method of manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus according to the present invention controls the flow of charged toner, and controls the flow of charged toner on an insulating substrate. A method of manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus, comprising a conductor portion corresponding to an aperture, comprising: a first step of forming an aperture in the insulating substrate by laser processing ; A second step of removing the deposits generated and adhering to the insulating substrate by processing using free abrasive grains. In the method of manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus according to the present invention having the above-described structure, an aperture is first formed in an insulating substrate by laser processing in a first step.
Thereafter, in the second step, the deposits generated in the first step and adhering to the insulating substrate are removed by processing using free abrasive grains. Thus, it is possible to remove a metamorphosis or the like generated by the processing for forming the aperture without deteriorating the insulating substrate. Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a view showing an outline of an image forming apparatus using an electrode of the present invention. The image forming apparatus has a 1 mm gap above an aperture electrode body 1 as a toner flow control means.
A columnar back electrode roller 22 is rotatably disposed on a chassis (not shown), and is configured to be able to convey the support 20 inserted into the gap. Further, a toner supply device 10 is provided below the aperture electrode body 1 along the longitudinal direction of the aperture electrode body 1, and further, a support member conveyed by the back electrode roller 22. A fixing device 26 is provided at the destination of the traveling of the fixing device 20. Next, the components will be described in detail. The toner supply device 10 includes a toner case 11 also serving as a housing of the entire device, a toner 16 housed in the toner case 11, a supply roller 12 And a toner carrying roller 14 and a toner layer regulating blade 18. Here, the toner carrying roller 1
Reference numeral 4 denotes a member which carries the toner 16 and conveys the toner 16 toward the aperture electrode body 1. The supply roller 12 supplies the toner 16 to the toner carrying roller 14. The supply roller 12 and the toner carrying roller 14 are supported by the toner case 11 so as to be rotatable in the direction of the arrow shown in FIG. Further, the toner layer regulating blade 18
Is for adjusting the amount of toner 16 carried on the toner carrying roller 14 to be uniform on the roller surface and for uniformly charging the toner 16, and is pressed against the toner carrying roller 14. . As shown in FIG. 2, the aperture electrode body 1 is formed on a polyimide insulating sheet 2 having a thickness of 25 μm and has a diameter of 1 μm.
A plurality of apertures 6 of 00 μm are formed in one row, and a control electrode 4 of 1 μm thickness is formed on the upper surface for each aperture 6. The aperture electrode body 1 is pressed against the toner carrying roller 14 at the aperture position of the insulating sheet 2 with the control electrode 4 facing the support 20 as shown in FIG. Here, the positional relationship between the aperture 6 of the aperture electrode body 1 and the toner carrying roller 14 will be described in detail. As shown in FIG. Are arranged so as to pass through the uppermost portion of the peripheral surface and the central axis 32 of the toner carrying roller 14. According to this, each aperture 6
Based on the uppermost portion of the peripheral surface of the toner carrying roller 14,
By arranging the toner 16 uniformly on the left and right, the distribution of the toner 16 passing through each aperture 6 can be made uniform throughout the aperture. Also, the wall of the aperture 6 and the toner 16
Is in parallel with the flight direction, so that the toner can fly stably. Further, as shown in FIG. 3, the aperture electrode body 1 is
Are pressed to the left and right with the same angle around the center. As a result, the contact area between the aperture electrode body 1 and the toner carrying roller 14 can be increased, and the lower periphery of the aperture 6 can be uniformly pressed to the left and right, so that uneven toner concentration is minimized. Can be suppressed. A control voltage application circuit 8 is connected between the control electrode 4 and the toner carrying roller 14.
The control voltage application circuit 8 is configured to apply a voltage of 0 V or +50 V to the control electrode 4 based on an image signal. Further, a DC power supply 24 is connected between the back electrode roller 22 and the toner carrying roller 14.
A voltage of 1 kV can be applied. Next, the structure of a method for manufacturing an aperture electrode body, which is a main part of the present invention, will be described with reference to FIGS. 4 to 6 are a top view near the aperture and a cross-sectional view taken along the line AA ′ showing respective steps of the manufacturing method of the present invention. FIG. 4 is a top view and a cross-sectional view of the aperture electrode of the present invention when a circuit pattern is formed. The material is composed of an insulating sheet 2 and a conductive portion including the control electrode 4.
As the insulating sheet, among the above-mentioned materials, resin films such as polyimide and polyester are often used. The conductor portion has no problem as long as it is a conductor film, and various metal materials such as chromium, tungsten, and aluminum can be used as the material of the conductor portion. In the present invention, a commonly used metalloyal film (manufactured by Toyo Metallizing)
The process will be described with reference to FIG. 2. In this material, 8 μm copper is plated on a 25 μm thick polyimide substrate. The material is subjected to resist patterning. The material is entirely coated with a photosensitive resist by spin coating or immersion, and then exposed to ultraviolet light through an exposure mask corresponding to the electrode pattern. Thereafter, when the excess resist is removed with a stripping solution, a resist pattern corresponding to the electrode pattern is formed. The material on which the resist pattern has been formed is processed in an etching step. In the etching, the copper film having no resist film is subjected to oxidative corrosion treatment with an etching solution such as ferric chloride, so that the copper film can be left in a resist pattern. Thus, an electrode pattern is formed on the insulating sheet. Further, a sliding surface coat layer 7 is formed on the surface opposite to the pattern. The sliding surface coat layer 7 is configured by adding an additive such as carbon or silica to a binder. The material on which the pattern has been formed is first subjected to hole processing by an excimer laser. Excimer laser
It is powerful ultraviolet light that gives photochemical reactions to polymer materials,
Ablation processing can be performed. Theoretically, all the polymer can be blown off by ablation, but the deposit 5 is attached to the aperture wall. This deposit may be an impurity in the insulation sheet,
This is probably due to additives in the slide coat layer. Such a deposit causes a short circuit between the adjacent control electrodes or deteriorates the controllability of the electric field in the aperture. Next, the removal processing step, which is the second step, will be described. FIG. 6 shows the removal processing step. The removal processing step is performed using processing using free abrasive grains. Examples of the processing method using loose abrasives include sand blast processing, wet blast processing, lapping, polishing, and the like. Sand blast processing is desirable in terms of processing efficiency and cost. As an example of the processing conditions of the sand blast processing, alumina abrasive grain No. 1200 was used, and the injection pressure was 3
Good results were obtained when processing at kg / m2. If the size of the abrasive grains is large, the particles cannot pass through the aperture. By such processing, the deposits generated during the excimer laser processing can be removed. According to this sandblasting method,
Not only can deposits on the inner wall surface of the aperture or on the upper surface of the aperture be completely removed, but there is no particular change in physical properties of the surface. Therefore, good printing is possible without toner being attached at the time of recording described later. Further, since the respective portions of the aperture electrode are not damaged by the removing process, there is no problem in terms of manufacturing. Next, the operation of the image forming apparatus configured as described above will be briefly described. First, by rotating the toner carrying roller 14 and the supply roller 12 in the direction of the arrow shown in FIG. And is carried on the toner carrying roller 14. Carried toner 1
After the layer 6 is thinned and charged by the layer regulating blade 18, it is conveyed toward the aperture electrode body 1 by the rotation of the toner carrying roller 14. Then, the toner on the toner carrying roller 14 is supplied under the aperture 6 while being rubbed by the insulating sheet 2 of the aperture electrode body 1. Here, in response to the image signal, the control electrode 4 corresponding to the image portion is supplied from the control voltage application circuit 8 with +
A voltage of 50 V is applied. As a result, in the vicinity of the aperture 6 corresponding to the image portion, electric force lines from the control electrode 4 toward the toner carrying roller 14 are formed due to the potential difference between the control electrode 4 and the toner carrying roller 14. As a result, the negatively charged toner receives an electrostatic force in the direction of higher potential, passes through the aperture 6 from above the toner carrying roller 14, and is drawn out to the control electrode 4 side. The extracted toner 16 further flies toward the support 20 due to an electric field formed between the support 20 and the aperture electrode body 1 by the voltage applied to the back electrode 22, and To form pixels. A voltage of 0 V is applied from the control voltage application circuit 8 to the control electrode 4 corresponding to the non-image portion.
As a result, no electric field is formed between the toner carrying roller 14 and the control electrode 4, so that the toner carrying roller 1
The toner 16 on 4 does not pass through the aperture 6 because it does not receive the electrostatic force. Further, the support 20 is fed by one pixel in a direction perpendicular to the aperture row while one row of pixels is formed by the toner 16 on the surface thereof. Then, by repeating the above process, a toner image is formed on the entire surface of the support 20. Thereafter, the formed toner image is fixed on the support 20 by the fixing device 26. In such a recording process, since there is no attached matter near the aperture, good printing can be stably performed without causing a problem such as a short circuit. The present invention is not limited to the embodiment described in detail above, and various changes can be made without departing from the gist of the present invention. For example, in the above embodiment, the first processing and the second processing are performed in the same direction, but the second processing may be performed in the opposite direction to the first processing. As is apparent from the above description, the method of manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus of the present invention having the above-described structure firstly includes the steps of:
An aperture is formed by laser processing . Thereafter, in the second step, the deposits generated in the first step and adhering to the insulating substrate are removed by processing using free abrasive grains. Thus, it is possible to remove a metamorphosis or the like generated by the processing for forming the aperture without deteriorating the insulating substrate.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an embodiment embodying the configuration of an image forming apparatus using a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus manufactured according to the present invention. FIG. 2 is a perspective view illustrating a configuration of a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus manufactured according to the present invention. FIG. 3 is a diagram schematically illustrating a configuration of an aperture electrode body and a toner carrying roller used in the image forming apparatus of the present invention. 4A and 4B are a top view and a cross-sectional view at the time of finishing etching in a method of manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus according to the present invention. 5A and 5B are a top view and a cross-sectional view at the end of a first step in a method for manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus according to the present invention. FIG. 6 is a top view and a cross-sectional view at the end of a second step in the method for manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus according to the present invention. [Description of Signs] 1 Aperture electrode body 2 Insulating sheet 4 Control electrode 5 Deposit 6 Aperture 8 Control voltage application circuit 14 Toner carrying roller 22 Back electrode roller 24 DC power supply

Claims (1)

(57) [Claim 1] A method of manufacturing a recording electrode for an image forming apparatus comprising controlling an flow of charged toner and providing an insulating substrate with an aperture and a conductor corresponding to the aperture. And a first step of forming the aperture by laser processing on the insulating substrate, and using a free abrasive grain to attach a substance generated in the first step and adhered to the insulating substrate. And a second step of removing the recording electrode by a modified process.