JP4862702B2 - Toner cartridge - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a toner cartridge, and more particularly to a toner cartridge containing a replenishing toner for replenishing a predetermined amount of toner toward a developing unit.

  An electrophotographic image forming apparatus such as a copying machine or a printer is provided with a toner cartridge containing replenishing toner in order to replenish toner corresponding to the amount of consumption to the developing unit. In order to keep the toner replenishment amount constant, it is necessary to provide a toner metering unit. In recent years, this metering unit has been installed inside a toner cartridge as a replacement part in response to a request for downsizing of an image forming apparatus. Yes.

  For example, in Patent Document 1, a cylindrical toner metering unit having a supply port formed at the bottom is provided inside the toner container main body, and the toner is conveyed by rotating the screw through the metering unit. There has been proposed a toner replenishing device designed to stabilize the amount of toner to be replenished.

By the way, in the toner replenishing device, since the toner may solidify due to long-term storage or the like, the toner stored in the large-capacity storage part of the container body is measured while being stirred by the rotation of the stirring and conveying blade. It is comprised so that it may send in to the part side. However, the bulk density of the toner before measurement is changed by the agitating and conveying blade, and the toner having the changed bulk density is conveyed to the measurement unit as it is, so that the object of stabilizing the toner replenishment amount cannot be achieved. Yes.
JP 2005-77572 A

  SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a toner cartridge capable of preventing the toner having a changed bulk density from being conveyed to the measuring unit as it is and stabilizing the toner replenishment amount.

In order to achieve the above object, the present invention provides a toner cartridge containing replenishing toner for replenishing a predetermined amount of toner toward the developing unit.
A storage unit for storing toner;
A metering unit for metering a predetermined amount of toner stored in the storage unit for replenishment;
A transport member having a transport blade for transporting toner to the measuring unit;
An agitation member for agitating the toner in the storage unit and sending the toner to the conveying member side;
With
The measuring part has a tubular part having an inner diameter substantially the same as the outer diameter of the conveying blade, and a replenishing port is formed at one end of the tubular part,
In the vicinity of the inlet of the metering unit, the conveying member and the stirring member are partitioned, and a wall portion formed substantially the same height or higher as the conveying blade is provided,
A film material is attached to the stirring member, and the film material is formed with a slit that divides a portion that slides on the wall portion from other portions,
It is characterized by.

  In the toner cartridge according to the present invention, a wall portion that partitions the conveying member and the agitating member is provided in the vicinity of the inlet of the measuring portion, and the wall portion is provided at substantially the same height or higher as the conveying blade. Thus, the toner whose bulk density has been changed is not conveyed to the measuring unit as it is, and the toner replenishment amount to the developing unit is stabilized. Furthermore, since the film material attached to the stirring member is formed with a slit that divides the portion that slides the wall portion from other portions, the film material portion that slides the wall portion retains flexibility, An increase in the rotational load of the agitating member can be prevented in advance, the toner agitating action is stabilized, the accuracy of the replenishing amount is improved, and the enlargement of the toner replenishing device is avoided.

  Embodiments of a toner cartridge according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

(Overall configuration of copier)
FIG. 1 shows a schematic configuration of a copying machine to which a toner cartridge according to the present invention is detachable. This copying machine forms a color image in a tandem manner by an electrophotographic method, and generally includes a copying machine main body 1 and an image reading unit 2.

  The image reading unit 2 is a well-known one, and optically reads an image of a document placed on a platen glass (not shown) or an image of a document conveyed by a document conveyance mechanism (not shown), and converts them into RGB primary colors. Decompose and convert to electrical signal. This electric signal is transferred to the control unit 3 and subjected to various data processing, and is also converted into YMCK (yellow, magenta, cyan, black) reproduction colors. Further, image data is transferred to the control unit 3 from a personal computer or the like.

  The copying machine main body 1 includes an imaging unit 30 (30Y, 30M, 30C, 30K) including a photosensitive drum 31, a laser scanning optical unit 32, a developing unit 33, a charger (not shown), a cleaning device for residual toner and residual charge, and the like. It is juxtaposed directly below the intermediate transfer belt 10. In each imaging unit 30, the laser scanning optical unit 32 receives the transfer of image data from the control unit 3, forms a latent image on the photosensitive drum 31, and forms a toner image of each color by the developing unit 33. Such an image forming process is well known, and a description thereof will be omitted.

  The intermediate transfer belt 10 is stretched endlessly on various rollers and is driven to rotate in the direction of arrow A. In addition, a sheet feeding cassette 20 that stores a plurality of sheets stacked is installed in the lower stage of the copying machine main body 1. The sheets are fed one sheet at a time from the sheet feeding cassette 20 by the sheet feeding roller 21 and the separating roller 22 and conveyed to the secondary transfer unit 18 by the timing roller 23.

  The toner images formed on the respective photosensitive drums 31 are sequentially primary-transferred and synthesized on the intermediate transfer belt 10, and this synthesized image is applied to the paper by an electric field applied from the transfer roller 19 in the secondary transfer unit 18. Secondary transferred on top. Thereafter, the sheet is conveyed to the fixing unit 25 where the toner is heated and fixed, and is discharged from the discharge roller 26 to the sheet discharge unit 4 on the upper surface of the copying machine main body 1.

  In the copying machine main body 1 configured as described above, the toner cartridge 50 containing the replenishing toner is detachably juxtaposed on the upper stage portion of the copying machine main body 1 corresponding to each imaging unit 30. The replenishment toner filled in each toner cartridge 50 is discharged downward from each replenishment port 67a based on the toner replenishment signal and is conveyed to each developing unit 33.

(Configuration of toner cartridge)
Next, an example of the toner cartridge according to the present invention will be described. The toner cartridge 50 includes a cartridge main body 51 (see FIG. 3) having a long cylindrical body extending from the front side to the back side of the copying machine main body 1. The cartridge body 51 includes a main storage unit 55 that stores toner, a measurement unit 65 that measures a predetermined amount of toner for replenishment, and a secondary storage that communicates with the main storage unit 55 from above to the side of the measurement unit 65. Part 60.

  The bottom portion of the main storage portion 55 has an arc shape in cross section (see FIG. 4A), and a stirring member 56 is installed on the bottom portion so as to be rotatable in the direction of arrow a. The stirring member 56 is composed of a blade member 56a having a cross-sectional shape in cross section, and a polyester film 57 is attached to one of the blade members 56a. The film 57 has a predetermined width and the same length as the blade member 56a.

  The measuring unit 65 is located at one end of the main storage unit 55 and has a conveying member 66 arranged in parallel to the main storage unit 55 and an inner diameter substantially the same as the outer diameter of the conveying blade 66a that forms a spiral shape of the conveying member 66. It is comprised with the tubular part 67, and the supply port 67a (refer FIG. 3 (B)) is formed in the end of the tubular part 67. As shown in FIG. The conveying member 66 is disposed in a conveying part 68 (see FIGS. 3B and 4A) having a circular arc cross section formed parallel to the main storage part 55, and one end thereof is inserted into the tubular part 67. Has been.

  The stirring member 56 and the conveying member 66 are connected by gears 71 and 72 (see FIG. 3) provided at one end of each, and a rotational driving force is transmitted from a coupling member 73 attached to the other end of the conveying member 66. The conveying member 66 is rotationally driven in the direction of arrow a ′, and conveys toner in the direction of arrow c. The agitating member 56 is rotationally driven in the direction of arrow a, and agitates the toner in the main storage unit 55 and sends it to the conveying member 66 side.

  By the way, the sub-storage unit 60 has an inclined surface 61 (see FIGS. 2 and 4A) from which the toner can fall from above the measurement unit 65 to the bottom, and the bottom is coaxial with the stirring member 56. The conveyance member 62 provided in the is disposed. The conveyance member 62 has a helical conveyance blade 62a, and conveys toner in the direction of the arrow d toward the main storage unit 55 at the bottom of the sub-storage unit 60 as it rotates in the direction of arrow a. That is, the transport member 62 transports toner in the direction opposite to the toner transport direction (arrow c direction) by the transport member 66.

  As shown in FIGS. 2 and 4A, a wall portion 69 that partitions the conveying member 66 and the stirring member 56 is provided in the vicinity of the inlet portion of the measuring portion 65, and this wall portion 69 is slightly more than the conveying blade 66a. Highly formed. Further, the polyester film 57 attached to the stirring member 56 is formed with a slit 57b (see FIG. 2) that partitions a portion 57a that slides on the wall portion 69 from other portions based on rotation in the direction of arrow a. . The operation of the slit 57b will be described later.

  Further, a hole that is used when filling the replenishing toner is formed at one end of the cartridge main body 51, and this hole is closed by a cap 52 after filling.

(Toner replenishment operation)
Here, a toner replenishing operation by the toner cartridge 50 having the above configuration will be described.

  The main storage unit 55 and the sub storage unit 60 are filled with replenishment toner in about the eighth minute, and when a toner replenishment signal is issued, the agitating member 56 and the conveying member 66 are rotated by a predetermined number of rotations. At this time, the stirring member 56 is driven to rotate in the direction of the arrow a, and the toner is fed from the main storage unit 55 to the transport unit 68 while stirring. The toner is transported in the direction of the arrow c based on the rotation of the transport member 66 in the direction of the arrow a ′ in the transport unit 68, fed into the tubular portion 67 and falls from the replenishing port 67 a.

  The toner dropped from the replenishing port 67a is dropped from the horizontal conveyance path indicated by the dotted line in FIG. 1 to the vertical conveyance path, and is replenished to the developing unit 33. In addition, the horizontal conveyance path and the vertical conveyance path are conventionally used, and description thereof is omitted. In addition, a predetermined amount of toner can be supplied to the developing unit 33 by controlling the number of rotations of the conveying member 66 to a predetermined value in one toner supply.

  As the remaining amount of toner in the main storage unit 55 decreases, the toner in the sub storage unit 60 also decreases. At this time, since the inclined surface 61 is formed above the measuring unit 65 of the sub-storage unit 60, the toner falls from the inclined surface 61 to the bottom of the sub-storage unit 60 and is transferred to the main storage unit 55 by the conveying member 62. Be transported. Therefore, the toner in the auxiliary storage unit 60 is also reliably supplied. If the upper portion of the measuring unit 65 is flat, the toner in this portion becomes dead toner without being conveyed to the main storage unit 55. However, the present toner cartridge 50 is economical without causing dead toner. In other words, extra toner can be stored from the upper side to the side of the measuring unit 65, and the storage amount of the replenishment toner can be increased by effectively utilizing the capacity of the toner cartridge 50.

  Even when the storage toner is solidified due to prolonged storage, the toner present in the main storage portion 55 is agitated by the rotation of the agitating member 56 and fluidized. In this case, even if the bulk density of the toner changes due to the rotation of the film 57, such toner is blocked by the wall portion 69 and is not sent directly to the vicinity of the inlet of the measuring portion 65. That is, the toner whose bulk density has changed is not conveyed to the measuring unit 65, and the toner replenishment amount is stabilized.

  Further, since the film 57 is formed with a slit 57b that divides the portion 57a that slides on the wall portion 69 from other portions, the portion 57a that slides on the wall portion 69 is flexible (good flexibility). The rotational load of the stirring member 56 does not rise more than necessary. Accordingly, the toner agitation function is stabilized, the replenishment accuracy is improved, and the power of the drive source of the agitation member 56 can be reduced, so that the enlargement of the toner replenishing device is avoided.

(Other examples)
The toner cartridge according to the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment, and can be variously modified within the scope of the gist thereof.

  In particular, the details of the structure of the toner cartridge 50 and the shapes of the agitating member 56 and the conveying members 62 and 66 are arbitrary. Moreover, the wall part 69 should just be formed in the substantially same height or high of the conveyance blade | wing 66a. Further, the film 57 may be formed with slits in other portions in addition to the slit 57b that partitions the wall portion 69 and the portion 57a that slides.

1 is a schematic configuration diagram illustrating a copier equipped with a toner cartridge according to an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 3 is a perspective view illustrating a main part of the toner cartridge. The toner cartridge is shown, (A) is a sectional view taken along line XX in FIG. 2, and (B) is a sectional view taken along line YY in FIG. FIGS. 3A and 3B show the toner cartridge, and FIG. 3A is a cross-sectional view taken along the line A-A in FIG. 3A, and FIG.

Explanation of symbols

33 ... Developing unit 50 ... Toner cartridge 51 ... Cartridge body 55 ... Main storage unit 56 ... Stirring member 57 ... Film 57b ... Slit 60 ... Sub storage unit 65 ... Measuring unit 66 ... Conveying member 66a ... Conveying blade 67 ... Tubular part 67a ... Supply port 69 ... wall

Claims (1)

In a toner cartridge containing replenishing toner for replenishing a predetermined amount of toner toward the developing unit,
A storage unit for storing toner;
A metering unit for metering a predetermined amount of toner stored in the storage unit for replenishment;
A transport member having a transport blade for transporting toner to the measuring unit;
An agitation member for agitating the toner in the storage unit and sending the toner to the conveying member side;
With
The measuring part has a tubular part having an inner diameter substantially the same as the outer diameter of the conveying blade, and a replenishing port is formed at one end of the tubular part,
In the vicinity of the inlet of the metering unit, the conveying member and the stirring member are partitioned, and a wall portion formed substantially the same height or higher as the conveying blade is provided,
A film material is attached to the stirring member, and the film material is formed with a slit that divides a portion that slides on the wall portion from other portions,
Toner cartridge characterized by.

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