JPH0511667A - Electrophotographic image forming device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To prevent toner from being splashed to the inside and the outside of a housing and to eliminate an adverse effect on the quality of an image or environment by fixing and holding the splashing toner by the sticking adhesive agent of the surface of a sheet stuck on the inside wall surface of the housing. CONSTITUTION:A sticking adhesive sheet 10 is stuck in a recessed groove 11 provided on the bottom part of the housing 8. In such a case, the groove 11 has inclination toward the bottom surface from both sides at the bottom part of the housing 8 under a transfer device 3 and the sheet 10 is stuck on the bottom surface of the groove 11. That means, the sheet 10 is obtained by coating both surfaces of a paper 101 being a base material with pressure sensitive adhesive agent 102 and 103 being as the sticking adhesive agent. Then, when one part of the toner 21 is spilt in the housing 8, splashed in the housing 8, made to drop and stored in the bottom part thereof, specially in the groove 11, the toner dropping or splashing on the sheet 10 is fixed and held by the sheet 10.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an electrophotographic image forming apparatus for forming an image on a recording sheet using dry toner.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art FIG. 3 is a schematic sectional side view of a conventional electrophotographic printing apparatus disclosed in, for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2-67584. In FIG. 3, reference numeral 1 denotes a photoconductor in which a photosensitive rotating drum provided rotatably in the direction of arrow A has a photosensitive layer which is brought into a conductive / nonconductive state according to an exposed / unexposed state. The developing device includes a magnetic roller 22 that agitates the toner 21 and supplies the toner 21 to the photoconductor 1.

Reference numeral 3 is a transfer device for transferring the toner image formed on the photosensitive member 1 to the recording paper 9, 4 is a cleaner, 5 is a neutralizer, 6 is a charger, and 7 is an exposure device such as an LED array. is there. The exposure device 7 is configured so that a binary signal corresponding to the print data is supplied from a controller (not shown). The components 2 to 7 are arranged around the outer periphery of the photoconductor 1 in this order, and are housed in the housing 8 together with the photoconductor 1.

Next, the operation will be described with reference to FIG. The photoconductor 1 is rotated in the direction of arrow A in the drawing, and the charger 6
Are uniformly charged to a positive voltage, and the presence / absence of binary dot exposure is performed by the exposure device 7 according to print data in a controller (not shown). A latent image corresponding to the print data is formed on the photoconductor 1 by the presence or absence of this dot exposure.

This latent image appears depending on the presence or absence of the electrification voltage, but the toner (black fine powder) 21 in the developing device 2 selectively passes through the magnetic roller 22 depending on the presence or absence of the electrification voltage. Is adhered onto the photoconductor 1 to form a toner image and is visualized. The toner image on the photoconductor 1 is transferred onto the recording paper 9 fed in the direction of arrow B in the figure by the transfer device 3 which is negatively charged. The transferred toner image is heated and pressed by a fixing device (not shown),
It is fixed on the recording paper 9.

On the other hand, the toner on the photoconductor 1 that has not been transferred to the recording paper 9 is removed by the blade of the cleaner 4 from the photoconductor 1.
Scraped off the surface of the. After that, photoconductor 1
After being discharged by the static eliminator 5, it is fed again to the charger 6 side, and the printing process is repeated.

[0007]

Since the conventional electrophotographic image forming apparatus is constructed as described above, during the normal image forming operation, or during the maintenance or adjustment of the photosensitive member 1 or the developing device 2, or the like, At the time of replacement, a part of the toner 21 scatters in the housing 8 and circulates in the apparatus, adversely affecting the performance of the apparatus or the image quality, and a part of the toner 21 is eventually discharged to the outside of the apparatus. There were problems such as adversely affecting the environment.

The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and an object of the present invention is to obtain an electrophotographic image forming apparatus capable of preventing scattering of toner spilled in a housing.

[0009]

In the electrophotographic image forming apparatus of the present invention, a sheet having a surface coated with a tacky adhesive is attached to the inner wall surface of the housing.

The inner wall surface of the housing to which the sheet is attached is in the groove at the bottom of the housing.

[0011]

In the electrophotographic image forming apparatus according to the present invention, the toner scattered or dropped in the housing is fixed and held by the adhesive adhesive of the sheet.

Further, since most of the scattered toner tends to collect in the groove at the bottom of the housing, the sheet is fixed and held at this position.

[0013]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a schematic cross-sectional side view of an electrophotographic printing apparatus as an example of an electrophotographic image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 1, the same reference numerals as those in FIG. Reference numerals 9, 21, and 22 are omitted and the description thereof is omitted. Reference numeral 10 denotes an adhesive sheet having the structure shown in FIG. 2, which is attached in a concave groove 11 provided at the bottom of the housing 8. The groove 11 is inclined from both sides toward the bottom surface of the bottom of the casing 8 under the transfer device 3. The adhesive sheet 10 is attached to the bottom surface of the groove 11.

As shown in FIG. 2, the pressure-sensitive adhesive sheet 10 is formed by applying pressure-sensitive adhesives 102 and 103 as pressure-sensitive adhesives on both sides of a paper 101 as a base material.

The printing process in FIG. 1 is the same as that of the conventional example, and therefore its explanation is omitted. However, during normal use, the photoreceptor 1 and the developing device 2
At the time of maintenance, adjustment, or replacement of the toner,
A part of 1 spills into the housing 8, scatters in the housing 8, and falls and accumulates in the bottom of the housing 8, especially in the groove 11. However, the toner dropped or scattered on the adhesive adhesive sheet 10 is fixed and held by the adhesive adhesive sheet 10 to prevent further scattering of the toner. This pressure-sensitive adhesive sheet 10 has pressure-sensitive adhesives 102 and 103 applied on almost both sides, one of which is for sticking to the inner wall of the housing 8, and the other is for fixing scattered toner to the surface. It is for making it. This sticky adhesive sheet 10 has a structure in which scattered toner adheres to the surface to some extent after being used for a certain period,
It can be removed artificially and replaced easily.

The characteristic feature of the tacky adhesive sheet 10 is that it does not lose its tackiness for long-term use.
It is known that the pressure-sensitive adhesives 102 and 103 are generally made by mixing the following three components. (A) Main agent such as polyisobutylene, polyvinyl ether, etc., (B) ester gum, adhesion aid such as phenol resin, (C) phthalate ester, plasticizer such as chlorinated paraffin, (A), (B), ( Pressure-sensitive adhesive 10 consisting of C)
2, 103 is applied to both surfaces of the paper 101, except for the edges, to form the tacky adhesive sheet 10. If the boundary portion where the pressure-sensitive adhesive is not applied is bent, the above-mentioned removal at the time of exchanging the adhesive adhesive sheet 10 can be easily performed.
Further, generally, the particle size of the toner 21 is 5 μm to 15 μm in diameter.
It is about μm and can be easily fixed and held by the pressure-sensitive adhesive prepared by blending (A), (B) and (C).

In the above embodiments, the pressure-sensitive adhesive need not be a pressure-sensitive adhesive as long as it is a tacky adhesive, and a plastic film can be used as the base material instead of paper. It may be applied on one side on the side to be attached. Further, the sticking position of the adhesive sheet may be any position as long as the scattered toner can be attached on the inner wall surface of the housing.

Although the electrophotographic printing apparatus has been described in the above embodiment, the present invention can be applied to an electrophotographic copying machine and the same effect as that of the above embodiment can be obtained.

[0019]

As described above, according to the present invention, the scattered toner is fixed and held by the sticky adhesive on the surface of the sheet attached to the inner wall surface of the housing, so that the structure is inexpensive. Thus, it is possible to prevent the toner from scattering inside and outside the housing, and prevent the image quality and the environment from being adversely affected. Further, even if the dust-collected sheet is easily replaced and discarded as it is, no environmental problem will occur.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic cross-sectional side view of an electrophotographic image forming apparatus applied to an electrophotographic image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of the tacky adhesive sheet in FIG.

FIG. 3 is a schematic sectional side view of a conventional device.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 photoconductor 2 developer 3 transfer device 4 cleaner 5 Static eliminator 6 charger 7 Exposure device 8 housing 9 Recording paper 21 toner 10 Adhesive adhesive sheet (sheet) 101 paper 102,103 Pressure-sensitive adhesive (tacky adhesive)

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A developing device for developing a latent image formed on a photoconductor by charging / exposure to form a toner image and the photoconductor are housed in a housing, and charged, exposed, developed, transferred, and fixed. An electrophotographic image forming apparatus for forming an image on a recording sheet, characterized in that a sheet having a surface coated with an adhesive is attached to an inner wall surface of the casing. 2. The electrophotographic image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein an inner wall surface of the housing to which the sheet is attached is in a groove provided on the bottom of the housing.