JPH03221973A - Electrophotographic device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To carry out the service life management of a photosensitive body without hindrance by providing a nonvolatile storage element and a comparing means and maintaining reliability on printing number data. CONSTITUTION:The nonvolatile storage element 23 is provided with printing number storing addresses A, B and C, and printing numbers are stored as counted value data A, B and C. When power is turned on, the data is read out from the processor 21 and compared with each other. When A coincides with B, A is validated and stored in an erasing type element 24, whereas if Anot equal to B, B is compared with C. If B coincides with C, B is stored in the element 24, whereas if Cnot equal to B, C is compared with A. If C coincides with A, C is stored in the element 24, whereas if Cnot equal to A, the max. value of A - C is approximated mostly to the service life counted value of a photosensitive drum 2 and stored in the element 24. On the completion of writing the data to the element 24, printing is waited for. When the printing is started, +1 is applied to the contents of the erasing type element 24 at every printing, and updated printing numbers are stored in the address A - C of the usual storage element. With this constitution, reliability on the printing number is secured and the service life management of the photosensitive body can be carried out without hindrance.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to an electrophotographic apparatus that stores the life of a photoreceptor as a counted value of the number of prints.

[Prior Art] An electrophotographic apparatus includes a photoreceptor, and prints information on paper by exposing, developing, and transferring information to the photoreceptor. The photoreceptor used in such a device has a limited lifespan, and when the photoreceptor reaches the end of its lifespan, problems such as blurred printing occur.

For this reason, conventionally, a non-volatile permanent memory type memory element is used to count the lifespan of the photoreceptor as the number of printed sheets and store it in this memory element, and the number of stored sheets corresponds to the preset lifespan of the photoreceptor. A display informs you that the photoconductor should be replaced when it reaches the number of sheets.

[Problem to be solved by the invention] However, in the past, no consideration was given to the occurrence of any abnormality in the print number data stored in the memory element. There was a problem in that the reliability of the data was completely lost and life management of the photoreceptor was hindered.

Accordingly, the present invention provides an electrophotographic apparatus that manages the life of a photoreceptor by storing the number of prints in a permanent storage type memory element, and is capable of maintaining the reliability of the number of prints as much as possible and managing the life of the photoreceptor without any problems. This is what we are trying to provide.

[Means for Solving the Problems] The present invention includes a non-volatile constant memory storage element that stores the life of a photoreceptor as a count value of the number of printed sheets in a plurality of addresses, and a storage element that stores the lifespan of a photoreceptor at each address when the power is turned on. A comparison means is provided to compare the counted values, and when at least two or more comparison results by the comparison means match, the matched counted value is considered valid and used for the subsequent number of printed sheets, and the comparison result is When all the counted values are different, the largest counted value is considered valid and used for counting the number of printed sheets thereafter.

[Operation] In the present invention having such a configuration, the number of printed sheets counted by printing is stored as a count value in a plurality of addresses of a permanent storage type storage element. Then, when the power is turned on to operate the device, the count values stored at each address of the permanent storage type storage element are respectively read out and compared.

If two or more counted values match, the matched counted value is made valid and used for counting the number of printed sheets thereafter. Further, when all the counted values are different, the one closest to the end of the life of the photoreceptor, that is, the one with the largest counted value is used as valid for counting the number of prints thereafter.

[Embodiments] Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. In this embodiment, the present invention will be described as applied to a non-impact printer.

Figure 1 shows the configuration of a non-impact printer.
A photoreceptor drum 2 is disposed approximately in the center of a housing 1 that is pivotally supported at one end and can be vertically separated from the other end. This photoreceptor drum 2 is rotationally driven in one direction, that is, clockwise in the figure, by a drive motor 3, and the photoreceptor drum 2 is surrounded by a photoreceptor drum 2 according to an electrophotographic process.
A charger 4 that charges the surface of the photoreceptor, that is, the photoreceptor.
, an exposure device 5 that exposes and records information by irradiating light onto the photoconductor charged by the charger 4, and a developer 6 that attaches toner as a developer to the photoconductor exposed by the exposure device 5. , a transfer charger 7 that transfers the toner image on the photoreceptor drum 2 to the paper being conveyed, and the photoreceptor drum 2
A cleaning device 8 that removes toner from the toner and a static eliminator 9 that neutralizes the photosensitive drum 2 are arranged in this order.

The transfer charger 7 is located below the photoconductor drum 2, and the paper is fed into a predetermined position by the operation of the pickup roller 1 from a paper feed cassette 10 provided on one side of the housing 1 toward the transfer charger 7. The sheets are transported one by one at the timing of .

After the toner image on the photoreceptor drum 2 is transferred to the conveyed paper by the transfer charger 7, the toner image is removed by the charger 2, and then fixed by the fixing device 13. The fixed paper is then discharged out of the casing by a paper discharge roller 4.14.

The drive motor 3 serves not only as a drive source for the photosensitive drum 2 but also as a drive source for a paper conveyance mechanism.

Further, inside the housing 1, there are provided a fan 15 for discharging internal heat to the outside, a power supply device 16, a cover open switch 17 for detecting when the housing 1 is vertically separated and turning off the power. ing.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the main circuit configuration, and numeral 21 is a microprocessor constituting the main body of the control section that controls each section. This microprocessor 21 has a pass line 22.
A nonvolatile permanent storage type storage element 23, a volatile erasable storage type storage element 24, and an I10 port 25 are connected through the .

The drive motor 3 is connected to the I10 port 25.

As shown in FIG. 3, the permanent memory type memory element 23 includes:
Three addresses A and BC are provided for storing the number of printed sheets.
Count value data A for the number of printed sheets at each address A, B, and C
, B, and C.

When the power is turned on, the microprocessor 2]
The program is set to perform the preprocessing shown in the figure.

That is, when the power is turned on, data A at address A, data B at address B, and data C at address C are sequentially read out.

Then, data A, data B, data B, data C, data C, and data A are sequentially compared. (Comparing means) In this comparison, data A and data B are first compared, and if they match, data A is determined to be valid data and is stored in the erasable storage element 24. If data A and data B do not match, then data B and data C are compared. If they match, data B is determined to be valid data and is stored in the erasable storage element 24. If data B and data C do not match, then data C and data A are compared. If they match, the data C is determined to be valid data and is stored in the erasable storage element 24.

Also, if data C and data A do not match, it is determined that all data do not match, and in this case, the data with the largest value among data A, B, and C is determined to be valid data and is stored in erasable type. It is stored in the element 24. That is, the largest value is the value closest to the count value of the life of the photoreceptor drum 2, and that value is considered valid.

After the data of the number of prints determined to be valid is stored in the erasable memory element 24, the microprocessor 21
will perform print sequence control.

In this print sequence control, each time one sheet is printed, the content (stored data) of the erasable storage element 24 is incremented by +1, and the content (stored data) is increased by +11. The contents of the erasable memory element 24 are stored in each of the memory elements A, B, and C of the permanent memory element 23.
Write each.

In this embodiment having such a configuration, each address A of the permanent storage type storage element 23 is stored when the power is turned on.

Data A, B, and C, which are the total number of printed sheets up to that point, are read from B and C and compared with each other.

If data A and data B match, data A is determined to be valid data and is stored in the erasable storage element 24. Further, even if data A and data B do not match, if data B and data C match, data B is determined to be valid data and is stored in the erasable storage element 24. Further, even if data A and data B and data B and data C do not match, if data C and data A match, data C is determined to be valid data and is stored in the erasable storage element 24. Furthermore, data A,
When all of the data B and C do not match, the data with the largest value among the data A, B, and C is determined to be valid data and is stored in the erasable storage element 24.

Once data is written into the erasable storage element 24 in this way, it becomes ready for a printing operation.

When a printing operation is started in this state, the contents of the erasable memory element 24 are incremented by 1 every time one sheet is printed, and the contents incremented by 1 are stored in the permanent memory element 2.
3 addresses A, B, and C. In this way, the newly updated number of printed sheets is stored in each address A, B, and C of the permanent storage type storage element 23.

The number of identical printed sheets accumulated in this way is written to each address A, B, and C of the permanent storage type memory element 23, and when the power is turned on, they are read and compared, and when the two data match, the data is used as valid data. Since the data is stored in the erasable memory element 24 and used to count the number of sheets printed after that, for example, even if an error occurs in one data, the remaining two correct data will be used as valid data, and the reliability of the data will be improved. can be held securely. Therefore, the photosensitive drum 2 can be managed reliably and reliability can be improved.

In addition, when all the data do not match, the data with the largest value is stored as valid data in the erasable storage element 24 and used to count the number of sheets printed after that, so even if there are only two or three copies, although the probability is small, If an abnormality occurs in one of the data, the data closest to the end of the life of the photosensitive drum 2 can be used as valid data, and the reliability of the data can be maintained as much as possible. Therefore, life management of the photoreceptor drum 2 is not seriously hindered.

Note that in the above embodiment, the number of printed sheets data to be written in the permanent storage type storage element is three, but it is not necessarily limited to this, and it may be two or more than four.

Further, in the above embodiments, a drum type photoreceptor was used, but it is needless to say that the photoreceptor is not limited to this.

In the above embodiment, the present invention was applied to a non-impact printer, but the present invention is not necessarily limited to this, and can also be applied to a copying machine or the like.

[Effects of the Invention] As detailed above, according to the present invention, the reliability of the number of printed sheets data can be maintained as much as possible in a device that manages the life of a photoreceptor by storing the number of printed sheets in a permanent storage type memory element. It is possible to provide an electrophotographic apparatus that can manage the life of a photoreceptor without any problems.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

The figures show an embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 1 is an overall configuration diagram, FIG. 2 is a block diagram of main parts, FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a memory configuration of a permanent storage type memory element, and FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing preprocessing by a microprocessor. 1...Photosensitive drum, 1...Microprocessor,...Continuous memory type memory element.

Claims (1)

[Claims] A non-volatile constant memory storage element stores the lifespan of the photoreceptor as a count value of the number of printed sheets in a plurality of addresses, and a comparison means is provided for comparing the count value stored in each address of the memory element when the power is turned on. , If at least two or more comparison results by the comparison means match, the matched count value is used as valid and used for counting the number of printed sheets thereafter, and if all the count values are different as a result of the comparison, the largest count value is used. An electrophotographic device characterized in that it is used to count the number of subsequent prints with the number of sheets as valid.