JPS59224368A - Image forming element and image forming method - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To enable recording on a sheet of usual paper without using corona charge, by, in a facsimile, etc., installing an isolated dielectric body covered with an insulated layer on every three-dimensional intersection of stripe-type electrodes. CONSTITUTION:Each stripe-type electrode 3a and 4a of the first and the second electrode group 3 and 4 is connected to each power source 10 and 11 through scanning member 8 and 9 for scanned selection of each one. Further. On a three- dimensional intersection of the electrode 3a and 4a, an isolated dielectric body 6 of larger area than each electrode is installed to cover an insulating layer 7. Then, when a voltage is applied by scanned selection of the electrode 3a and 4a through scanning member 8 and 9, an electrical potential is generated in the dielectric body 6 of the intersecting point, and by rubbing operation on the surface of the layer 7 with developing agent 13 composed of an insulating toner adhered to a developing roller 12, the toner 14 sticks to a part where an electric potential image is formed. Thus, by means of an electrophotographic system recording on a sheet of usual paper becomes available.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Field of Industrial Application The present invention relates to a novel image forming element and image forming method for forming an image using electrical signals, which is used in a printing device H of a facsimile machine, a printer, etc. Recording methods conventionally used in print recording devices such as facsimiles and printers include thermal recording methods and electrophotographic methods. The thermal recording method applies a pulse voltage input signal to the thermal head with the thermal recording paper and thermal head in close contact with each other, heats the resistor in the 7th conductor, and uses the heat to color the thermal recording paper. This is a method of recording a single image. This method is characterized in that there is almost no wear on the thermal head, the apparatus is easy to maintain, and since it utilizes the primary color development of 1.S thermal recording paper, there is no need for development or fixing. However, on the other hand, it requires special specially processed recording paper, and is inferior to plain paper recording in terms of paper cost, writability, operability, etc.

On the other hand, in the electrophotographic method, an electrical signal containing image information is converted into an image signal of optical energy such as laser output, and the image signal is exposed onto a uniformly charged electrophotographic photoreceptor to form an electrostatic latent image. The image is then developed, transferred, and fixed using colored toner to obtain an image on plain paper. This method has an advantage over thermal recording methods in that plain paper can be used as the recording paper. However, the image signal system using optical energy used in this system is generally more expensive than the image signal system using a thermal head, and has the disadvantage of being larger.

Purpose of the Invention The present invention eliminates the drawbacks of conventional image forming and recording methods, does not require corona charging, enables recording on plain paper, and provides a novel image forming method that enables compact and inexpensive electrical signal recording. The object of the present invention is to provide an element and an image forming method.

That is, according to the present invention, an insulating support, a first electrode group having a plurality of strip drive-like electrodes on the insulating support, and the first electrode group of the insulating support. a second electrode group having a resistance layer on a side surface and a plurality of striped electrodes in the resistance layer so as to three-dimensionally intersect with the electrodes of the first electrode 11); , on the surface of the resistor Iti opposite to the insulating support, on each three-dimensional intersection of the striped electrodes of the first and second electrodes IF, and having an area larger than the three-dimensional intersection. An image forming element is provided that includes an isolated conductor having a conductor and an insulating layer covering the isolated conductor.

Furthermore, according to the present invention, a voltage is applied to the first electrode group and the second electrode group of the image forming element configured as described above in accordance with image information, and the voltage is applied to the first electrode group and the second electrode group. While a voltage is being applied to the first electrode group and the second electrode group, the insulating l. An image forming method is proposed which is characterized by developing a potential image with a toner.

As mentioned above, due to the failure of voltage application between the three-dimensionally intersecting electrodes 1a, the potential due to the difference in potential of the isolated conductor occurs in response to the difference in the voltage distributed by the resistance layer between the three-dimensionally intersecting electrodes. An image can be formed on the surface of the imaging element. Then, this potential image is visualized by a developing process that is performed simultaneously with applying a voltage between the crossed electrodes.

Example The present invention will be described in detail below based on the drawings.

A typical configuration of an image forming element according to the present invention is shown in FIG. The image forming element (2) includes an insulating support 2, a first electrode group 3 having a plurality of striped electrodes 3a on the insulating support, and three examples of the first electrode group of the insulating support 2. A second electrode group has a resistive layer 5 on the surface of the resistive layer 5, and a plurality of striped electrodes 4a in the resistive layer 5 so as to three-dimensionally intersect with the electrodes 3a of the first electrode group 3 without contacting them. 4
and above each three-dimensional intersection of the striped electrodes 3a, 4a of the first and second electrode groups 3.4 on the surface of the resistance layer 5 opposite to the insulating support. It consists of an isolated conductor 6 having a larger area and an insulating layer 7 covering the isolated conductor.

The insulating support 2 has a higher resistance than the resistance layer 5. Specifically, it is formed of glass, resin film, or the like. Then, on such an insulating support 2, an electrode 3a is formed. Electrode 3a can be formed by various methods.

Typical manufacturing methods include vapor deposition or sputtering and etching using photoresist. According to this method, after depositing an electrode material on the surface of the support, a masking pattern of a strip-like electrode is formed using a photoresist, and then a predetermined etching solution is used to remove the deposited electrode material layer. After selective etching, the photoresist masking pattern is removed to form striped electrodes.The electrode materials include M18B, I'
b, Zn, Ni, 8u, Lr, no-, In.

Various metals such as Nb, TaXU, Ti, Pt, In
Metal oxides such as 2O3 and 5n02 can be used. Another method for forming the electrode 3 is to form a striped electrode 1.
It is also possible to use a method in which the electrode material is deposited on an insulating support through a mask having a . The thickness of the electrode 3 is about 100 to 1 μm. After the electrode 3a is formed, the electrode 4a
and a resistance layer 5 are formed.

Since the electrode 4a is surrounded by the resistance layer 5, in order to form the electrode 4a and the resistance layer 5, first the resistance N
A method can be used in which the electrode 4 is formed after a portion of the resistive layer 5 is formed, and then the resistive layer 5 is formed again. The same material and forming method as the electrode 3a can be used for the electrode 4a. The electrode 4a crosses the electrode 3a three-dimensionally without contacting it. The state of the intersection is shown in Figure 2.

The resistance layer 5 is made of polyester resin, acrylic resin, silicone resin, alkyd resin, epoxy resin, urethane resin, butadiene-styrene resin, imide resin, silicone resin, etc.
It is formed by mixing a binder such as butadiene resin and conductive fine powder such as carbon black or tin oxide together with a solvent, and applying and drying the dispersed coating liquid using a dispersing means such as a ball mill disperser. The amount of conductive fine powder added is a few percent in terms of solid content.
~ several tens of weight%.

Then, an isolated conductor 6 is formed on the resistance layer 5. The isolated conductor 6 is formed in the same manner as the electrode 3a or the electrode 4a. The isolated conductor 6 is a discontinuous island-shaped conductor, and becomes a pixel of an image to be formed. Examples of the shape of the isolated electrode are shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, but the shape is not limited to these shapes, and other shapes may be used.

Thereafter, an insulating layer 7 is formed on the isolated conductor 6. The material for this layer may be electrically insulating and known resins such as polyester, polycarbonate, polyurethane, and polystyrene.

A method of forming a potential image using the image forming element described above will be explained with reference to FIGS. 5 to 7. As shown in FIGS. 5 and 6, each electrode 3a of the first electrode group 3 is connected to a first power source 10 via a first scanning section 8. As shown in FIGS. Each electrode 4a of the electrode group 4 is connected to a second power source 11 via a second scanning section 9. The first scanning unit 8 scans and selects one of the first electrode groups 3 and selects the first power source 1.
0, voltage v3 is applied. Further, one of the second electrode groups 4 is scanned and selected by the second scanning section 9, and a voltage v4 is applied from the second power source 11. FIG. 7 shows an equivalent circuit at the intersection of electrode 3a and electrode 4a. Here, the resistance between the isolated conductor 6 and the electrode 4a is Rz, and the isolated conductor 6
If the resistance between the electrode 3a and the electrode 3a is R2, and the resistance between the electrode 3a and the electrode 4a is R3, the potential Vo of the isolated conductor 6 is expressed by the following equation.

Therefore, the voltages v3 and v4 applied to electrodes 3a and 4a
By appropriately selecting , the potential Vo of the isolated conductor 6 corresponding to the intersection of that portion is determined. v3 and V4 each as shown below
If a point is selected, the potential vo of each isolated conductor will be as shown in Table 1.

Table-1 V3=Va (
Rt +R2)/Rz, V4 =V a (Rt +R2)/R2 to one electrode selected by the scanning unit 11
is applied to each electrode, and all other electrodes are set to Ov, the potential of the isolated conductor 6 of the image forming element is 2Va at the intersection of the selected electrodes, and a voltage of 2Va is applied to only one electrode other than the intersection of the selected electrodes. Va is applied to the portion where Va is applied, and 0 is applied to the other portions, and a potential image is formed. To develop such a potential image, as shown in FIG.
By rubbing the surface of the insulating layer 7 of the image forming element with a developer 13 such as an insulating toner held by the toner 2, the toner 14 adheres to the portion where the potential image is formed.

Development must be performed while the potential image is being formed. In practice, a voltage is selectively applied to the electrodes located in the developing nip. Therefore, it is necessary to scan the electrodes in synchronization with the movement of the image forming element.

li! input corresponding to the scanning of electrode groups 3 and 4. ii
Based on the time-series signal of image information, the electrode group 3 is
By controlling the voltages applied to and 4, input image information can be reproduced on the image forming element. The potential image formed in this manner can be developed with toner on the developing roll 12 to which a bias voltage is applied by the bias power supply 15 while maintaining the voltage application to the first electrode group and the second electrode group.

By using an insulating toner as the toner, the toner can be attached only to selected electrode intersections.

Toners may be used with carriers. In addition, the bias voltage is a voltage between the voltage of the potential image and the higher voltage of the voltage applied to the first electrode group or the second electrode group, for example, 2V.
If the voltage is between a and Va, a good image without fogging can be obtained. The developed toner image is transferred and fixed onto a transfer paper, and the image forming element can be cleaned and reused.

Next, a specific example will be explained.

Example: M is deposited on a glass substrate through a mask, with a pitch of 25
A striped electrode 3a with a thickness of 0μ and an rt of 190μ was formed. Next, a paint prepared by dispersing a mixed solution of 90 parts by weight of polyester resin, 10 parts by weight of carbon black, and tetrahydrofuran in a ball mill was applied to the electrode face plate of the glass substrate, and dried to form a painted image of about lθμ. It was used as a resistance layer. On the first day of this resistor, M was vapor-deposited through a mask and a striped electrode 4a having a medium diameter of 30 μm was formed using a pinch of 250 μm.

This striped electrode was arranged to be approximately orthogonal to the electrode 33 already formed on the glass substrate. The second stripe electrode 4a was coated with the same paint as that for the resistance layer, dried, and further provided with a resistance layer of about 5μ, making the total thickness of the resistance layer 15μ.

On top of this, M was vapor-deposited through a mask.
Isolated conductors with a thickness of 5μ and an interval of 25μ were formed. In FIGS. 2 and 4, the size of each electrode of the image forming element manufactured by the above method had approximately the following values. a
=30μ, b=220μ, c=90/j, d=160μ
, e=f=225μ, g=h=25μ.

The resistance R□ between the isolated conductor and the electrode 4 at the intersection of the electrode 3a and the electrode 4a of the image forming element was approximately the same as the resistance R2 between the isolated conductive electrode 3. p) Scan each electrode group of the image forming element above, and scan the 20 electrodes corresponding to the image information.
Development was performed at the same time as a voltage of 0 V was applied. A developer consisting of a conductive magnetic powder carrier and an insulating toner was used, and a bias voltage of 100 V was applied to the developing roller to perform development. Through the above steps, a toner image corresponding to the image information was formed on the image forming element. This toner image was transferred to a transfer paper by corotron transfer according to a conventionally known method, and the image forming element could be used repeatedly after cleaning.

Effects of the Invention As is clear from the above, if images are formed according to the present invention using the image forming element according to the present invention, it is possible to record on plain paper by an electrophotographic method without using corona charging. In addition, it is possible to record electric signals in a small and inexpensive manner.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a schematic cross-sectional view showing the basic configuration of an image forming element according to the present invention. FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing the electrodes of the image forming element of the present invention. FIGS. 3 and 4 are examples of shapes of isolated conductors of the image forming element of the present invention. FIGS. 5 and 6 are explanatory diagrams of an image forming method using the image forming element of the present invention. FIG. 7 is an equivalent circuit diagram of FIG. 5.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 11) an insulating support, a first electrode group having a plurality of striped electrodes on the insulating support, and a first electrode group on the first electrode group side of the insulating support; a second electrode group having a plurality of striped electrodes in the resistance layer so as to three-dimensionally intersect with the electrodes of the first electrode group without contacting the electrodes; an isolated conductor on the surface of the layer opposite to the insulating support, located above each three-dimensional intersection of the striped electrodes of the first and second electrode groups and having a larger area than the three-dimensional intersection; and an insulating layer covering the isolated conductor. (2) an insulating support, a first electrode group having a plurality of striped electrodes on the insulating support, and a resistor on a surface of the insulating support on the first electrode group side; a second electrode group having a plurality of striped electrodes disposed in the resistance layer so as to intersect three-dimensionally without contacting the electrodes of the first electrode group; an isolated conductor on the surface opposite to the insulating support, which is located above each three-dimensional intersection of the stripes and body electrodes of the first and second electrode groups and has a larger area than the three-dimensional intersection; preparing an image forming element consisting of an insulator covering the isolated conductor; applying a voltage to a first electrode group and a second electrode group of the image forming element in accordance with image information; a developing roll to which a bias voltage is applied while a potential image is formed on the isolated conductor on the intersection of the first electrode group and the second electrode group, and a voltage is applied to the first electrode group and the second electrode group; An image forming method characterized by developing a potential image using the above insulating toner. (3) Paragraph (2), characterized in that the bias voltage is a voltage between the voltage of the potential image and a voltage that is higher in absolute value among the voltages applied to the first electrode group or the second electrode group. image forming method.