JPH0876663A - Cleaning device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide a cleaning device capable of drastically improving cleaning performance with comparatively low pressing force. CONSTITUTION: The δ2/δ1 of the distance δ2 between the side 24c of a plate-like spring member 24 in a 1st state where a rubber member 22 and the plate-like spring member 24 are deformed by pressing the rubber member 22 to a photoreceptor 30 and the rear surface 24a of the spring member 24 in a 2nd state where the rubber member 22 and the spring member 24 are undeformed by removing the photoreceptor 30 to the distance δ1 between the side 22a of the rubber member 22 in the 1st state and the surface 22b of the rubber member 22 in the 2nd state is defined as 0.15 to 0.3.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method for developing a developer containing a toner such as a toner, which remains on a photoreceptor after transfer in an image forming apparatus such as an electrophotographic copying machine or an electrophotographic printer. The present invention relates to a cleaning device that mechanically removes a blade (a plate-shaped rubber member).

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, an image forming apparatus using an electrophotographic system has been widely spread. In this electrophotographic image forming apparatus, a photosensitive member (photosensitive drum) normally formed in a drum shape is uniformly charged, and light carrying information of an image recorded on a document is applied to the photosensitive drum. By irradiating, an electrostatic latent image is formed on the photoconductor drum, the electrostatic latent image is developed with a developer (toner), and the developed image is transferred to a sheet directly or through a transfer drum or the like. By
This is a device for obtaining a printed image. The electrophotographic image forming apparatus includes a cleaning device that removes the developer remaining on the photoconductor after transfer. As this cleaning device, a cleaning device that mechanically peels off the developer remaining on the photoconductor after transfer using a rubber blade is widely used.

As a conventional cleaning device using a rubber blade, as shown in FIG.
Is pressed by a photoconductor (not shown) to peel off the developer remaining on the surface of the photoconductor at the side 12a, and the rubber blade 12 is adhered to the rear end 12b of the rubber blade 12. There is known a cleaning device 10 including a support member (blade attachment fitting) 14 that supports the cleaning device. In this cleaning device 10, the pressing force is expected to decrease due to "fatigue of rubber (a phenomenon in which permanent strain of rubber increases over time due to deformation of rubber, etc.)" and decrease in impact resilience at low temperatures. The pressing force is set higher. However, a high pressing force causes wear and damage on the surface of the photoconductor and abnormal noise due to the "stick-and-slip phenomenon" between the rubber blade and the photoconductor surface. There is a problem in terms of improving the sex.

Therefore, as shown in FIG. 14, the edge 22a at the tip is pressed by a photoconductor (not shown) and the edge 22a is pressed.
The plate-shaped rubber member 22 for stripping off the developer remaining on the surface of the photosensitive member by a, and the front surface 24a that spreads substantially parallel to the plate-shaped rubber member 22 and the rear surface 22 of the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member 22.
a plate-shaped spring member 24 that is adhered to b and extends rearward beyond the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member 22;
4, the plate-shaped rubber member 22 is adhered to the rear surface 24b of the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member 22 which is spaced a predetermined distance rearward from the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member 24.
Cleaning device 2 having a supporting member 26 for supporting
No. 0 has been proposed (see Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 4-172486). In this cleaning device 20, the plate-shaped spring member 2
4 and the plate-shaped rubber member 22 are bonded and integrated, and the plate-shaped spring member 24 is elastically deformed to press the plate-shaped rubber member 22 to minimize the deformation of the plate-shaped rubber member 22. There is. Therefore, it is possible to suppress the "fatigue" of the plate-shaped rubber member 22 and reduce the decrease in the pressing force.
A lower pressing force can be set as compared with the conventional cleaning device shown in FIG. As a result, abrasion of the photoconductor can be reduced. Further, since the plate-shaped spring member 24 is elastically deformed, it is possible to reduce a pressing force decrease due to a decrease in impact resilience at a low temperature, which is peculiar to a rubber material. Therefore, a rubber material having a low impact resilience can be used. , It is possible to suppress the generation of abnormal noise due to the "stick and slip phenomenon".

[0005]

By the way, in recent years, organic photoconductors have been widely used in place of the conventionally used inorganic photoconductors. Although this organic photoreceptor has advantages such as being stable against temperature and humidity and being lightweight, it has a disadvantage that mechanical strength such as abrasion resistance and hardness is weak. Therefore, when cleaning the organic photoconductor using the above cleaning device, it is necessary to prevent the occurrence of filming (toner component that sticks or adheres to the photoconductor surface), comet (toner component that digs into the photoconductor surface), and recording paper. In addition to being able to remove talc in the components, it is necessary to extend the life of the organophotoreceptor by minimizing wear and damage on the surface of the organophotoreceptor.

In the electrophotographic copying machine having the cleaning device and the organic photoconductor shown in FIG. 14, the pressing force of the cleaning device is usually set to about 1 g / mm. The charging method and latent image phenomenon method may be changed. It is known that the performance of the cleaning device is strongly influenced by the charging method of the photoconductor and the phenomenon method of the latent image. Therefore, by using an electrophotographic copying machine equipped with the cleaning device and the organic photoconductor shown in FIG. 14, the charging method and the phenomenon method are changed to about 1 g / mm.
When the cleaning performance was examined by the pressing force of, the image quality defect, which is considered to be caused by filming, comet, talc, paper dust, etc., occurred. It is considered that this is because the pressing force is too low, and the cleaning performance was investigated by appropriately changing the main parameters of the cleaning device shown in FIG. 15 so as to increase the pressing force as shown in Table 1. In this experiment, the length L1 of the plate-shaped rubber member was set to 12 mm, and the free length L2 of the plate spring member was set to 2.6 mm. Incidentally, in Table 1, the mark ◯ indicates that filming or the like has not occurred, and the mark x indicates that filming or the like has occurred.

[0007]

[Table 1]

As shown in Table 1, even if the pressing force is increased by appropriately changing the thickness A of the plate-shaped rubber member or the thickness B of the plate-shaped spring member, the talc deregion (image loss due to talc is omitted). ), Poor cleaning (cleaning failure) occurred, and the cleaning effect was not improved. From this experiment, it was found that the improvement of the performance of the cleaning device cannot be achieved simply by increasing the pressing force by appropriately changing the thickness and free length of the plate-shaped rubber material and the thickness of the leaf spring member.

In view of the above circumstances, it is an object of the present invention to provide a cleaning device capable of significantly improving cleaning performance with a relatively low pressing force.

[0010]

A cleaning device of the present invention for achieving the above object forms a latent image on a photoconductor, develops the latent image with a developer, and transfers the developed image to a transfer material. In the image forming apparatus, a plate-shaped rubber member for stripping off the developer remaining on the surface of the photoconductor by pressing the side of the front end of the photoconductor-side surface against the photoconductor after transfer, and the plate-shaped rubber A plate-shaped spring member that extends substantially parallel to the member and has a front end surface bonded to the rear end of the back surface of the plate-shaped rubber member and extending rearward beyond the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member; A cleaning device provided with a supporting member fixed to a predetermined position for supporting a rear end portion of the plate-shaped spring member rearwardly spaced from the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member by a predetermined distance. The edge is pressed against the photoconductor The plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member in the first state in which the plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member are deformed are not deformed. The side of the tip of the surface of the plate-shaped spring member in the first state with respect to the distance δ1 from the surface of the plate-shaped rubber member in the second state, and the plate-shaped spring member in the second state. The ratio δ2 / δ1 of the distance δ2 from the above surface is 0.15 or more and 0.3
It is characterized in that the value is within the following range.

Here, in a first state in which the side of the plate-shaped rubber member is pressed and deformed by the photosensitive member, the side of the plate-shaped rubber member is in contact with the surface of the photosensitive member. The angle between the tangent to the surface of the photoconductor and the portion of the surface of the plate-shaped rubber member that is in contact with the photoconductor is
The angle is preferably in the range of 8 degrees or more and 12 degrees or less.

Further, the plate-shaped rubber member is not less than 65 degrees.
It preferably has a hardness within the range of 0 degrees or less.

[0013]

According to the cleaning device of the present invention, the distance δ1
The ratio of distance δ2 to δ2 / δ1 is 0.15 or more 0.3
Since the value is within the following range, the plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member can be bent in an appropriate range, and the viscoelasticity of the plate-shaped rubber member and the elasticity of the plate-shaped spring member can be used in a well-balanced manner. As a result, the plate-shaped rubber member is less likely to settle, an appropriate frictional force can be obtained between the plate-shaped rubber member and the surface of the photoconductor with a low pressing force, and the cleaning performance can be improved.

Here, in a state where the plate-shaped rubber member is pressed and deformed by the photoconductor, the tangent line of the photoconductor surface at the position where the side of the plate-shaped rubber member contacts the photoconductor surface. When the angle formed by the surface of the plate-shaped rubber member and the portion in contact with the photoconductor (hereinafter referred to as the working angle) is within the range of 8 degrees or more and 12 degrees or less, the cleaning performance is further improved. Can be improved.

Further, the plate-shaped rubber member is not less than 65 degrees and 70
When the hardness is within the range of not more than 40 degrees, the cleaning performance can be further improved. Next, the reason for limiting the numerical values as described above will be described. Figure 1
4 is a graph showing the relationship between the pressing force and the wear amount of the photoconductor obtained by an experiment using an electrophotographic copying machine equipped with the cleaning device (leaf spring composite type) shown in FIG. The wear amount of the photoconductor was examined. The vertical axis represents the amount of wear of the photoconductor when the photoconductor was rotated 300,000 times, and the horizontal axis represents the pressing force (g / mm) of the plate-shaped rubber member against the photoconductor.
As can be seen from FIG. 1, the pressing force applied to the photoconductor and the wear amount of the photoconductor are in a proportional relationship, and the wear amount increases as the pressing force increases. Further, FIG. 1 shows a conventional cleaning device (type without a leaf spring) shown in FIG.
Also shown is the amount of photoreceptor wear when used at a pressing force in the range of 4.5 g / mm, which is a pressing force that is usually appropriate for this cleaning device. In both of the two types of cleaning devices shown in FIGS. 13 and 14, the relationship between the pressing force and the wear amount of the photoconductor was the same. From FIG. 1, there is a region in which the wear amount of the photoconductor does not significantly increase even if the pressing force of the conventional leaf spring combined type cleaning device is increased by about 1.5 to 2 times the normal pressure of about 1 g / mm. I understand.

However, as shown in Table 1 above, the cleaning of the cleaning device is simply performed by appropriately changing the thickness and free length of the plate-shaped rubber member, the length of the plate-shaped spring member, etc. Performance does not improve. Therefore, here, a balanced shape design is performed so that both the plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member are appropriately deformed, and the relationship between the pressing force and the cleaning performance is investigated.

The relationship between the amount of displacement of the tips of both the plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member and the cleaning performance will be described with reference to FIGS. As shown in FIG. 2, the plate-shaped rubber member 2
The displacement amount of the tip end of the plate-shaped rubber member 22 in the first state is that the plate-shaped rubber member 22 and the plate-shaped spring member 24 are deformed by the plate-shaped rubber member 22 being pressed by the photoconductor 30.
Is represented by a distance δ1 between the side 22a and the surface 22b of the plate-shaped rubber member 22 in the second state where the photoconductor 30 does not exist and the plate-shaped rubber member 22 and the plate-shaped spring member 24 are undeformed. The amount of displacement of the tip of the plate-shaped spring member 24 is determined by the side 24c of the tip of the surface 24a of the plate-shaped spring member 24 in the first state and the plate-shaped spring member 2 in the second state.
4 is represented by a distance δ2 from the surface 24a.

FIG. 3 shows the ratio δ of the distance δ2 to the distance δ1.
6 is a graph showing the relationship between 2 / δ1 and the lower limit of pressing force that allows sufficient cleaning. From FIG. 3, by determining the shape dimensions of the plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member so that δ2 / δ1 is a value within the range of 0.15 or more and 0.3 or less, a relatively low pressing force is sufficient. It was found that cleaning performance can be obtained.

Next, the relationship between the working angle and the pressing force will be described with reference to FIGS. 4, 5 and 6. Here, first, the working angle will be described with reference to FIG. Side 22a of the plate-shaped rubber member 22 in a state where the plate-shaped rubber member 22 is pressed by the photoconductor 30 and deformed.
A tangent line 32 on the surface of the photoconductor 30 at a position where is in contact with the surface of the photoconductor 30, and a line 34 extending from a portion 22C of the surface 22b of the plate-shaped rubber member 22 that is in contact with the photoconductor 30.
The angle θ formed by is called the working angle.

FIG. 4 shows the relationship between this working angle and the pressing force. As shown in Fig. 4, the pressing force is about 1g.
It was found that a sufficient cleaning performance can be obtained when the working angle is in the range of 8 degrees or more and 12 degrees or less in the range of / mm to 2 g / mm. FIG. 5 shows an example in which the working angle θ is less than 8 degrees. The strength of the plate-shaped spring member 24 is higher than that of the plate-shaped rubber member 2.
When the strength is higher than 2, the working angle θ is small as shown in FIG. 5, and in this case, the ratio of the displacement of the plate spring member 24 to the displacement of the plate rubber member 22 is small. That is, the distance δ with respect to the above distance δ1
The ratio δ2 / δ1 of 2 is less than 0.15. When the working angle θ becomes smaller than the proper range, the plate-shaped rubber member 2
Since the frictional force between the photosensitive member 30 and the photosensitive member 30 is reduced, and the spring property of the plate-shaped spring member 24 can hardly be utilized, the plate-shaped rubber member 22 is increased in its settling. The advantage of the cleaning device (leaf spring combined type) is lost.

FIG. 6 shows an example in which the working angle θ exceeds 12 degrees. When the strength of the plate spring member 24 is lower than the strength of the plate rubber member 22, as shown in FIG.
A large working angle θ is shown, and in this case, the ratio of the displacement of the plate spring member 24 to the displacement of the plate rubber member 22 is large. That is, the ratio δ2 / δ1 is 0.3
Exceeds. If the working angle θ is larger than the appropriate range, it is easy to induce the cleaning failure due to the partial turning of the plate-shaped rubber member. Further, since the deformation of the plate-shaped rubber member is too small, the viscoelastic property of the plate-shaped rubber member 22 cannot sufficiently obtain the adhesion effect and the like, the frictional force also decreases, and the cleaning performance deteriorates.

FIG. 7 shows the results of an examination of the relationship between the hardness of the plate-shaped rubber member and the cleaning performance from the viewpoint of the frictional force between the plate-shaped rubber member and the photosensitive member. FIG. 7 shows the case where the cleaning device shown in FIG.
It is a graph which shows the relationship between a filming occurrence frequency and a pressing force when a plate-shaped rubber member having a hardness of 0 degrees and 77 degrees is used. As shown in FIG. 7, the hardness of the plate-shaped rubber member also affects the cleaning performance, and the hardness of the plate-shaped rubber member having a hardness within the range of 65 degrees or more and 70 degrees or less is about 1.
A pressing force in the range of 8 g / mm to 2.4 g / mm is obtained,
The cleaning performance can be improved. If the hardness of the plate-shaped rubber member is 60 degrees or less, the plate-shaped rubber member is too soft and the cleaning performance is deteriorated, while the hardness of the plate-shaped rubber member is 70 or less.
If it exceeds the range, the plate-shaped rubber member becomes too hard and the adhesion between the plate-shaped rubber member and the photoconductor deteriorates. When the conventional cleaning device shown in FIG. 13 is used, the cleaning performance cannot be improved unless the pressing force is increased, as indicated by the black circles in FIG. In the cleaning device shown in FIG. 2, by setting the hardness of the plate-shaped rubber member to 65 degrees or more and 70 degrees or less, sufficient cleaning performance can be obtained with a relatively low pressing force.

[0023]

Embodiments of the cleaning apparatus of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram showing a laser printer equipped with the cleaning device of the present invention. When printing with the laser printer 40, first,
The surface of the photoconductor 44 is uniformly charged by the charger 48 that rotates in the direction indicated by the arrow 46 following the photoconductor 44 rotating in the direction indicated by the arrow 42. A laser beam 50 carrying image information is irradiated from an exposure device (not shown) onto the surface of the charged photoconductor 44.
The electrostatic charge of the portion irradiated with is removed and an electrostatic latent image is formed on the surface of the photoconductor 44. Here, an organic photoconductor is used as the photoconductor 44, a negative charge is applied to the surface of the photoconductor 44 by a charger 48, and a latent image composed of a large number of dots is formed by a laser beam 50. Toner is applied from the developing device 52 to the portion where the electrostatic latent image is formed by the laser light 50, and a developed image in which the electrostatic latent image is visualized is obtained. Here, a negative bias is applied to the developing roll 52a of the developing device 52. Next, the elastic roll 56 rotating in the direction shown by the arrow 54 and the photosensitive member 44.
The recording paper 58 is sandwiched between the recording paper 5 and the recording paper 5 by the elastic roll 56 from the back side of the recording paper 58 so that an electric charge having a polarity opposite to the toner is applied.
8, the developed image and the recording paper 58 are superposed, and the developed image is transferred to the recording paper 58 by electrostatic force. The recording paper 58 to which the developed image is transferred is conveyed to a fixing device (not shown) via a paper guide (not shown). In the fixing device, heat and pressure are applied to the transferred developed image, whereby the developed image is fused to the recording paper 58 to form a permanent image. On the other hand, the toner remaining on the photoconductor 44 without being transferred is removed by the cleaning device 60, and the removed toner is collected inside the cleaning housing 62. One cycle is completed by a series of processes from the charging of the photoconductor 44 to the removal of the toner remaining on the photoconductor 44, and this cycle is repeated for each print.

Using the above laser printer 40, an acceleration test for observing the occurrence of filming, comet, and talc deregion was performed. The organic photosensitive drum used in the laser printer 40 is an aluminum pipe in which a blocking layer, a charge generation layer, and a charge transport layer are sequentially laminated, and the drum peripheral speed is 56 mm / sec.
And

As the cleaning device of Examples (1), (2) and Comparative Example (3), the cleaning device shown in FIG. 14 was used, and a stainless plate was used as the plate spring member. The shape of each cleaning device is shown in Table 2 using parameters A, B, and C shown in FIG. Table 2
Shows the characteristic values of the plate-shaped rubber member. Example (1),
As the plate-shaped rubber members of Example (2) and Comparative Example (3), Bandoo # 1865, Bando # 2870, and Tokai Rubber # 4060 were used, respectively. As the cleaning device of Comparative Example (4), the cleaning device shown in FIG. 13 was used, and the plate-shaped rubber member had a free length of 7.5 mm and a length of 2 mm.
Was used.

[0026]

[Table 2]

In Table 2, the blade nip amount is the difference between the thickness of the plate-shaped rubber member when the cleaning device is pressed against the surface of the photoconductor and the thickness of the plate-shaped rubber member when the photoconductor is removed. Say. FIG. 9 is a graph showing the relationship between the thickness of the plate-shaped rubber member and the thickness of the plate-shaped spring member, and the ratio δ between the distance δ1 and the distance δ2 shown in FIG.
It is a graph of the values obtained based on the cantilever calculation formula so that 2 / δ1 is a value within the range of 0.15 or more and 0.3 or less. Based on this graph, the thickness of the plate-shaped rubber member and the thickness of the plate-shaped spring member were set. For example, in the case of the embodiment (1), if the thickness (rubber thickness) of the plate-shaped rubber member is 3 mm and the rubber hardness is 65 degrees, the plate-shaped rubber member proceeds in the direction of the arrow in FIG. SUS thickness) is 0.12m
It is calculated as m. In obtaining this figure, the free length of the plate-shaped rubber member (the length indicated by C in FIG. 15) is set to 8
mm, the overlapping length of the plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member (Fig. 1
5 is 4 mm, and the free length of the plate spring member (the length shown by L2 in FIG. 15) is 2.6.
It was fixed to mm.

The operating conditions of the laser printer in the experiment here are as follows. (Latent image formation) Charge potential: -350V Laser exposure part potential: -60V (Development condition) Development bias voltage: AC 1.6KVp-
p, 2.4 kHz, DC 270 V toner; styrene-butyl acrylate copolymer magnetic powder amount; 40 wt% toner particle size; average 7 μm (image density) filming, comet test; solid black 10
0% talc deregion test; 1% (experimental environment) filming, comet test; normal laboratory, about 22 ℃ Talc deregion test; 28 ℃, humidity 85% Filming and comet acceleration test under the above conditions After solid black images (images in which the entire surface of the original document was made completely black) were continuously printed 2,000 times, the number of filmings and comets remaining on the surface of the photoconductor was counted. Accelerated test of talc deregion is 28 ℃, humidity 85%
Printed 2,000 blank sheets in the laboratory at 28 ℃, humidity 85
% The laser printer was left in the laboratory overnight to observe the talc deregion that had appeared on the first printed paper the next morning.

FIG. 10 shows the acceleration test results for filming and comet, and FIG. 11 shows the acceleration test results for talc deregion. FIG. 10 shows the numbers of filming and comets generated in Examples (1) and (2) and Comparative Example (4), where the number of filming and comets generated in Comparative Example (3) is 22 / cm ^2. It is a graph showing. FIG. 11 shows the total length of the image dropouts on the paper with 100% of the full width dropout (a state in which no print is made on the paper in the axial direction of the photoconductor, that is, in the direction orthogonal to the paper transport direction). It is a graph.

As shown in FIG. 10, in Examples (1) and (2) of the present invention, the number of filmings and comets generated was significantly reduced as compared with Comparative Examples (3) and (4). However, as shown in FIG. 11, the talc deregion was generated by using the plate-shaped rubber member having a rubber hardness of 65 degrees, but in Example (1), the plate-shaped rubber member having a rubber hardness of 70 degrees was used. It is inferior to the example (2) which was carried out. However, it was found that the occurrence of the talc deregion was significantly improved as compared with Comparative Example (3), and it was necessary to properly use the cleaning device according to the image forming process.
In Example (2), it was found that the cleaning device has excellent performances in terms of the generation levels of filming, comet, and talc deregion, and can contribute to reduction of photoreceptor wear as a cleaning device having sufficient cleaning ability with low pressing force. did. Table 3 shows the results of examining the durability of the plate-shaped rubber members of Examples (1) and (2) and Comparative Examples (3) and (4). No abnormality is observed in the image in the initial use of any of the plate-shaped rubber members, but after printing 20,000 sheets, as shown in Table 3, in Examples (1), (2) and Comparative Example (4). The image was good, but the image was defective in Comparative Example (3).

[0031]

[Table 3]

Next, using the cleaning devices of Examples (1), (2) and Comparative Example (4), the amount of abrasion of the photoconductor when the photoconductor was cleaned with a pressing force sufficient to clean the photoconductor was measured. The results of the examination will be described. 12
Is about 2.2 g / mm, about 1.9 g / mm, and 3.7 g / mm to 4.5 g for the pressing forces of the cleaning devices of Examples (1), (2), and Comparative Example (4), respectively. / Mm
7 is a graph showing the amount of wear of the photoconductor when the photoconductor is rotated 300,000 times by setting to 1. Table 4 shows the wear amount of the photoconductor when the photoconductor was rotated 300,000 times and the life of the photoconductor when the allowable wear amount of the photoconductor was 16 μm.

As shown in FIG. 12, the embodiment (1),
In (2), the pressing force could be reduced to 1.9 g / mm even if the cleaning ability was the same as in Comparative Example (4). As a result, in Comparative Example (4), the amount of wear per 300,000 rotations of the photoconductor was about 25 μm, but in Example (2), the amount of wear under the same conditions was 16 μm, which was 39% lower, It has become possible to extend the life significantly. Further, as shown in Table 4, the number of printed sheets up to the life of the photoconductor could be significantly improved.

[0034]

[Table 4]

[0035]

As described above, according to the cleaning device of the present invention, the cleaning ability is maximized,
Cleaning performance can be significantly improved with a relatively low pressing force.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a graph showing a relationship between a pressing force and a wear amount of a photoconductor, obtained by an experiment.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing displacement amounts of tip ends of a plate-shaped rubber member and a plate-shaped spring member.

FIG. 3 is a graph showing the relationship between the ratio δ2 / δ1 of the distance δ2 to the distance δ1 and the lower limit of the pressing force that allows sufficient cleaning.

FIG. 4 is a graph showing the relationship between working angle and pressing force.

FIG. 5 is a schematic view showing the cleaning device when the working angle is less than 8 degrees.

FIG. 6 is a schematic view showing the cleaning device when the working angle exceeds 12 degrees.

FIG. 7 is a graph showing the relationship between the occurrence frequency of filming and the pressing force when the hardness of the plate-shaped rubber member is set to 65 degrees, 70 degrees, and 77 degrees when the cleaning device including the plate-shaped spring member is used. Is.

FIG. 8 is a schematic view showing a laser printer using the cleaning device of the present invention.

FIG. 9 is a graph showing the relationship between the thickness of a plate-shaped rubber member and the thickness of a plate-shaped spring member.

FIG. 10 is a graph showing the number of occurrences of filming and comets in the comparative example (3) of 22 / cm ² as 100%, and the example (1),
6 is a graph showing the number of filmings and comets generated in (2) and Comparative Example (4).

FIG. 11 is a graph showing an acceleration test result of a talc deregion showing the total length of image dropouts with the full width dropout set to 100%.

FIG. 12 shows pressing forces of the cleaning devices of Examples (1), (2) and Comparative Example (4) of about 2.2 g / m, respectively.
m, about 1.9 g / mm, and 3.7 g / mm to 4.5 g
6 is a graph showing the amount of abrasion of the photoconductor when the photoconductor is rotated 300,000 times by setting / mm.

FIG. 13 is a schematic view showing a conventional cleaning device.

FIG. 14 is a schematic view showing another conventional cleaning device.

FIG. 15 is a schematic diagram showing main parameters of the cleaning device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 20 cleaning device 22 plate-shaped rubber member 22a side 24 plate-shaped spring member 24a front surface 24b back surface 26 support member δ1, δ2 distance θ working angle

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. An image forming apparatus for forming a latent image on a photoconductor, developing the latent image with a developer, and transferring the developed image to a transfer material, wherein the side of the tip of the surface on the photoconductor side is after transfer. A plate-shaped rubber member that peels off the developer remaining on the surface of the photoconductor by the side of the plate-shaped rubber member when pressed by the photoconductor, and the surface of the tip end portion of the plate-shaped rubber member spreads substantially parallel to the plate-shaped rubber member. A plate-shaped spring member that is adhered to the rear end of the back surface and extends rearward beyond the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member, and the plate-shaped spring member rearward from the rear end of the plate-shaped rubber member. A cleaning device provided with a support member fixed at a predetermined position for supporting a rear end portion separated by a predetermined distance, wherein the side of the plate-shaped rubber member is pressed by the photoconductor to form the plate-shaped rubber member. And the plate-shaped rubber member in the first state in which the plate-shaped spring member is deformed The first state with respect to the distance δ1 between the side and the surface of the plate-shaped rubber member in the second state in which the plate-shaped rubber member and the plate-shaped spring member are not deformed and in which the photoreceptor is not present. The ratio δ2 / δ1 of the distance δ2 between the tip side of the surface of the plate-shaped spring member and the surface of the plate-shaped spring member in the second state is 0.15 or more and 0.3 or less. A cleaning device characterized by a value within. 2. The photosensitive member at a position where the side of the plate-shaped rubber member is in contact with the surface of the photosensitive member in a first state in which the side of the plate-shaped rubber member is pressed and deformed by the photosensitive member. The angle formed by the tangent line of the body surface and the portion of the surface of the plate-shaped rubber member that is in contact with the photoconductor is 8
The cleaning device according to claim 1, wherein the angle is within a range of not less than 12 degrees and not more than 12 degrees. 3. The cleaning device according to claim 1, wherein the plate-shaped rubber member has a hardness within a range of 65 degrees or more and 70 degrees or less.