JPH06127501A - Toner filling method - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve efficiency of filling with the speed of falling from a funneled part to a container increased by a method wherein an agitator is provided inside the funneled part that is provided for filling the container for filling with toner. CONSTITUTION:Toner is supplied with a constant feeder 9 to a funneled part 10 that is arranged below the feeder, and a container 13 for filling is filled with the toner. An auger type filling machine serving as the constant feeder 9 is composed of a hopper 2 and a funnel 3 that is connected to the lower end of the hopper. An agitator 11 provided to the funneled part 10 is desirable to be formed so that it can turn along the inner surface of the funneled part 10, and is also desirable to be constructed so that a rod-like part thereof can turn itself. Powdered body supplied to the funneled part 10 is quickly moved to the container 13 by virtue of turning of the agitator 11. Thereby, the filling of the powdered body can be made at the speed, six times faster than conventional method of filling, without the need for applying vibrations while reducing the cost for filling pulverized body.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a filling method for filling a container with fine powder, and more particularly to a filling method suitable for filling a container with toner used in an image forming apparatus.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Many methods have been proposed as means for filling fine powder into a container. However, since the average particle size is fine and the adhesion and crosslinkability are large, bridging is easy and air is used. It has been considered that it is difficult to fill fine powder such as toner of an electrostatic copying machine having high fluidity and easily flushing at a high speed.

At present, an auger feeder is most commonly used as a means for filling fine powder having the above-mentioned properties. FIG. 1 schematically shows the structure of an auger feeder. The powder in the hopper 2 is discharged from below the funnel 3 by rotating the screw-shaped auger 1. At the bottom of the funnel, there is a shutter with a resistance plate called Kikuza 4, which is designed to prevent flushing and to provide quantitativeness when the screw rotation is stopped. Such devices are most widely used for filling toner used in electrostatic copiers. However, in the filling device using the auger feeder as shown in Fig. 1,
When the container has a small mouth, there is a drawback that high speed filling is difficult. That is, the improvement of the filling speed using the auger feeder can be realized by either increasing the auger diameter or increasing the auger rotation speed.
If the mouth of the container is small, the auger diameter cannot be increased,
Further, increasing the auger rotation speed has the problems that the fine particles are crushed to reduce the average particle size, or heat is generated to adversely affect the fine powder. In order to solve this, the auger diameter can be increased by adopting a structure in which the funnel 6 is provided under the auger feeder 5 and the container 7 is placed under the funnel 6 as shown in FIG. However, for example, a toner used in an electrostatic copying machine, especially a non-magnetic two-component toner, has a large bridging property, and it takes a considerable amount of time to drop toner discharged from an auger feeder into a container, or a large amount of toner. It was the current situation that it wouldn't fall unless it was vibrated. Therefore, for example, a rotary filling method is adopted in which an empty container introduced from the left side as shown in FIG. 3 which is used for filling powder at high speed is filled in the rotary unit and conveyed rightward after the filling is completed. The situation was that it was very difficult.

The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned circumstances, and is used for charging the fine powder discharged from the filling machine to the funnel portion at a high speed into a container at a high speed, particularly for an electrostatic copying machine. It is an object of the present invention to provide a toner filling method suitable for applying to the filling of the toner.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the present invention provides a toner for supplying toner from a constant quantity feeder to a funnel portion arranged below the toner and filling the container to be filled from the funnel portion. In the filling method, the toner filling method is characterized in that an agitator is provided inside the funnel portion to increase the dropping speed from the funnel portion to the container. Compared with the known methods, such a filling method increases the filling speed. It does not require a complicated system. It can be downsized and made compact, and it has remarkable advantages in reducing the cost of the filling device. There is.

The present invention will be described in detail below. FIG. 4 shows a schematic diagram of an embodiment of the present invention. Although an arbitrary filling machine can be adopted as the fixed quantity feeder 9, for example, an auger feeder type filling machine is preferably used. The auger feeder type filling machine is composed of a hopper 2 and a funnel 3 connected to the lower end of the hopper 2, and by enlarging the diameters of the auger screw 1 and the funnel 3, high-speed cutting is possible. The volume of the funnel portion 10 is 5 times that of the container 13.
0% or more is desirable. Also, it is desirable that the funnel angle θ be small so that the powder easily flows into the container 13,
For example, it is preferably 20 ° or more and 90 ° or less. The agitator 11 prevents the powder filled in the funnel portion from bridging at a higher speed than the filling device, and at least a part of the agitator 11 has a shape that rotates along the inner surface of the funnel portion 10. A good example is a mode in which a rod-shaped portion rotates like 11 in FIG. 4, but an arbitrary mode such as a protrusion may be devised. The clearance between the agitator and the funnel part can be arbitrarily set depending on the particle size, bulk density, fluidity, etc. of the powder, but is preferably 10 mm or less. The optimum point of the rotation speed of the agitator also changes depending on the physical properties of the powder. With normal powder, the falling speed from the funnel tends to increase as the rotation speed increases.
When used for toner, it is preferably 10 rpm or more and 300 rpm or less. The powder filled in the funnel portion by the filling device moves quickly to the container 13 without being bridged by the rotation of the agitator. The seal portion 12 seals the funnel portion 10 and the container 13, prevents dust,
Although there is a meaning to prevent the loss of the raw material, the filling speed tends to decrease due to the sealing, and therefore the dust may be collected by suction without sealing.

The filling method of the present invention is preferable for filling fine powder having a particle size of 20 μm or less, particularly toner used in an image forming apparatus. The toner is a fine powder containing a resin such as a styrene-based resin, a polyester-based resin, or an epoxy-based resin, and containing or added a colorant or an additive, and usually has a particle size of 3 to 20 μm. Also, the filling method of the present invention can be used as a method of filling a developer in which a carrier such as a ferrite-based or iron-based carrier is added to the toner, by arbitrarily adjusting the condition setting. The following is an example in which the filling method according to the present invention and a known filling method are compared.

[0008]

【Example】

Example A non-magnetic two-component toner having a volume average particle size of 10 μm and a true specific gravity of 1.0 was filled with 250 g by a TK-101 type powder quantitative automatic filling machine manufactured by Toyo Kikai Seisakusho Co., Ltd., a filling time of 1.5 S
The funnel was filled with EC. A rod-shaped agitator as shown in FIG. 411 was attached to the funnel along the side wall thereof and rotated at 100 rpm. The time required for the toner to move from the funnel to the container was 10 SEC.

Comparative Example A similar experiment was conducted by removing the agitator of the example. Then, the toner was bridging in the funnel, and the toner could not be filled in the container in the stationary state. When vibration was applied to the funnel and the container, the funnel moved from the funnel to the container at about 60 SEC.

[0010]

As described above, by using the filling method according to the present invention, it becomes possible to fill the fine powder at a filling speed about 6 times faster than the conventional one, and it is not necessary to apply vibration. There is no concern about noise or dust, and the system is simple, which has a remarkable effect on cost reduction of fine powder filling. Further, by combining the present invention with a rotary filling method, it is possible to realize a filling speed which has not been conceived until now.

[Brief description of drawings]

[Fig. 1] Configuration diagram of auger feeder

FIG. 2 shows an example of a powder filling device using an auger feeder.

FIG. 3 is a schematic view of a rotary filling machine.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of the configuration of a toner filling device of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Auger Screw 2 Hopper 3 Auger Funnel 4 Kikuza 5 Auger Feeder Type Filling Machine 6 Funnel 7 Filled Container 8 Filling Machine 9 Filling Part 10 Funnel 11 Agitator 12 Sealing Part 13 Filling Container

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. In a toner filling method of supplying toner from a constant quantity feeder to a funnel portion disposed below the toner feeder and filling the container to be filled from the funnel portion, an agitator is provided inside the funnel portion. Characteristic toner filling method. 2. The powder supplied from the constant quantity feeder is supplied to a funnel section provided below the constant quantity feeder, and the powder is powdered while rotating an agitator provided inside the funnel section. A powder filling method comprising filling a container to be filled from a funnel portion.