JP2003295592A - Integrated toner container - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an integrated toner container of which the container space is saved by integrating each of containers for replenishing and collecting toner and with which the toner can smoothly be replenished and collected without getting its surrounding the replenishing and re-replenishing unused toner and collecting waste toner. <P>SOLUTION: In the integrated toner container comprising: an unused toner chamber which has an unused toner replenishing port provided at the lower side face in the longitudinal direction of the container; a waste toner collecting chamber having a waste toner collecting port provided at the upper side face in the longitudinal direction of the container; a flexible partition member for partitioning both of the chambers; and an unused toner replenishing port on one side face nearly vertical to the longitudinal direction of the container, a flat weight member is fixed to the flexible partition member. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a toner container which can be attached to and detached from an image forming apparatus such as a copying machine, a facsimile machine, a laser printer, etc., in which an unused toner supply container and a waste toner collection container are compactly integrated. Body toner container.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In an electrophotographic image forming apparatus, an electrophotographic process member disposed in the vicinity of the surface of a photoconductor executes an electrophotographic process, so that the surface of the photoconductor is charged and exposed. The formed electrostatic latent image is visualized as a toner image by a developing unit, transferred to a transfer paper, fixed, and then output. After the transfer, the photoconductor goes through a cleaning process and a charge removal process, and then returns to the charging process which is the first electrophotographic process.

On the other hand, since the toner in the developing unit is consumed by being transferred onto the transfer paper, the developing unit is replenished with unused toner from an unused toner container. Further, in the case of the two-component toner, after the transfer, the residual toner on the surface of the photoconductor is wiped by the cleaning member, and then transported to the waste toner collecting container and temporarily stored, and when the unused toner container is refilled (or not). (When replacing the toner container used)
Then, the whole container was collected and replaced with an empty container.

In such a situation, the space occupied by both containers can be saved, and the unused toner can be refilled by a simple operation, and the toner can be supplied to the developing unit and the waste toner can be collected at the same time. An invention relating to a toner container in which the supply and recovery containers are integrated is described in JP-A-61-153683.

This toner container is shown in the sectional view of FIG. The toner container 21 has a toner supply port 2 for the developing device.
6 and a cylindrical box provided with a collected toner inlet 25 from the cleaning device. Inside the unused toner chamber 23 is formed by a soft partition sheet 19 so that unused toner and used collected toner 24 are not mixed. It is divided into a recovery toner chamber 22. A shutter 27 that opens and closes the supply port 26 and the intake port 25 is provided on the outer periphery of the container 21.

[0006]

However, the toner container is still desired to be improved in the following points. That is, although the detailed description of the invention described in the above publication does not describe a method of filling unused toner according to the invention, in consideration of recycling of the container, as can be inferred from the drawings in the publication, When unused toner is refilled from the toner supply port on the lower surface, the shape of the supply port is usually a rectangle that corresponds to the long axis or the longitudinal direction of the cylindrical container, considering good replenishment to the developing unit first. In many cases, the toner is often ejected from the replenishing port during the filling of the toner, which tends to stain the surrounding area.

Further, as described above, when the waste toner or the unused toner is collected or replenished from the collecting port or the replenishing port, respectively, in the container, both are deposited in order from the concave bottom of the flexible partition sheet directly below the port. In order to do so, the tip of the deposited powder reached the replenishment port before it spreads laterally inside the container, and both tended to overflow from the container before fully filling each chamber.

In view of the above points, the object of the present invention is to
The toner supply and recovery containers are integrated to save space in the container, and when filling or refilling unused toner and recovering waste toner, it is possible to smoothly fill and recover without polluting the surrounding area. To provide a toner container.

[0009]

According to the present invention as set forth in claim 1, the object is an unused toner chamber having an unused toner supply port provided on a lower side surface in a longitudinal direction of the container, and the container. A waste toner recovery chamber having a waste toner recovery port provided on the upper side in the longitudinal direction of the container, a flexible partition member separating the chambers from each other, and an unused toner filling port on one side surface substantially vertical to the longitudinal direction of the container. In an integrated toner container having, by providing a flat weight member attached to the flexible partition member,
To be achieved.

According to the second aspect of the present invention, it is preferable to provide the integral toner container according to the first aspect in which the flat weight member is attached to a substantially central portion of the flexible partition member.

According to the present invention of claim 3, the unused toner filling port is provided in the lower part of one side surface substantially vertical to the longitudinal direction of the integrated toner container. Is more preferable.

According to the fourth aspect of the present invention, it is more preferable that the flexible partition member is a polyester sheet, and the integrated toner container according to any one of the first to third aspects is used.

According to the fifth aspect of the present invention, it is preferable that the flat weight member is a polystyrene resin or an acrylonitrile butadiene styrene resin to provide the integrated toner container according to any one of the first to fourth aspects. .

[0014]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION The integrated toner container of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. The present invention is not limited to the examples described below as long as the gist thereof is not exceeded.

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an integrated type toner container according to the present invention, FIG. 3 is a sectional view of the integrated type toner container according to the present invention taken along the vertical direction at the central portion in the longitudinal direction, and FIG. 4 is a conventional integrated type container. FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view of the toner container at the same position as FIG. 3, and FIG. 5 is an integrated toner container according to the present invention, in which the central portion in the longitudinal direction of the container is cut vertically and the direction of the unused toner filling port is seen. FIG. 6 is a sectional view showing the schematic arrangement of an image forming apparatus using the integrated toner container according to the present invention.

In the image forming apparatus 30 shown in FIG. 6, a charging member 2 such as a corotron is provided near the outer peripheral surface of the photosensitive drum 1.
An exposure device 3, a developing unit 6, a transfer device 5, a transferred body 4 such as paper, a fixing device 7, a cleaning device 8, a charge removing member 9, a waste toner conveying member 10, an integrated toner container 11 and the like are provided, and the photosensitive member is exposed. When the electrophotographic process by the above-mentioned members and devices is executed in response to the rotation of the drum 1 in the direction of the arrow, the target image is printed and output via the fixing device 7. Since the functions and the like of the above-mentioned processes are well-known various well-known techniques, detailed description thereof will be omitted here unless it is necessary.

[0017]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT An integrated toner container according to the present invention is designated by reference numeral 11 in FIG. By the corona discharge from the corotron 2, the surface of the photosensitive drum 1 on which the photosensitive layer is applied and formed is
It is uniformly charged to the required potential. Charged photosensitive drum 1
An electrostatic latent image corresponding to a desired print or image pattern is formed by the exposure device 3. Toner is conveyed from the developing unit 6 to the electrostatic latent image, so that the toner is developed on the surface of the photosensitive drum 1, transferred by the transfer device 5 to the transfer target body 4 such as paper, and fixed by the fixing device 7. Is output. On the other hand, the residual toner on the photosensitive drum is wiped by the cleaning device 8. The thus-cleaned photosensitive drum 1 is returned to the position of the first charging process after being discharged by the discharging device.

Since the toner in the developing unit 6 is consumed for each cycle by the electrophotographic process as described above, the integrated toner container 1 according to a predetermined schedule.
Replenished from 1. The integrated toner container 11 has the shape of the perspective view shown in FIG. 1, and the unused toner supply port 13 is placed in conformity with the corresponding receiving port on the developing unit 6. As shown in FIG. 6, the integrated toner container 11 has a shutter 1 fitted to the cylindrical arc shape of the container 11.
11 and 112 are provided, and the recovery port 12 and the replenishment port 13 can be opened and closed at the same time by rotating the outer circumference of the integrated toner container 11.

As shown in the perspective view of FIG. 1, the outer shape of the integrated toner container 11 is roughly defined by an arc-shaped upper side surface and an arc-shaped lower side surface which form a part of the outer circumference of the same cylinder and a surface connecting them. The outer shape of the waste toner collecting port 12 on the upper side surface, the unused toner replenishing port 13 on the lower side surface shown by a dotted line, and the surface perpendicular to the axial or longitudinal direction of the cylinder.
An unused toner filling port 14 is provided on either one of the two side surfaces that are parallel to each other. After the unused toner is filled in the filling port, the cap 18 is fitted and used. The casing of this container is made of polystyrene (PS) resin as a material in consideration of price, strength, etc., and the cylindrical portion is separately molded into an arc-shaped upper side surface and other surfaces, which are separately molded. The container 11 was manufactured by combining the parallel two side surfaces. As the resin material, acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) resin or the like can be used in addition to PS resin, and another resin may be used if the price and the strength are compromised.

As shown in the sectional view of FIG. 3, the inside of the integrated toner container 11 is divided into a waste toner collecting chamber 16 and an unused toner chamber 17 by a flexible partition member 19 made of a polyester sheet. A polyester sheet having a thickness of 0.01 mm was used, and both ends were sandwiched between PS resin plates and fixed in the container. The size of the polyester sheet is sufficiently longer than the delivery length of the container in consideration of the required amounts of the unused toner and the waste toner and the relative changes. In FIG. 3, the fact that each chamber has toner 15 is shown by a point set. In FIG. 3, the toner 15 in each chamber is displayed in the same manner, but in reality, the toner in the waste toner collecting chamber 16 is waste toner, and the toner in the unused toner chamber 17 is different, such as unused toner.

According to the present invention, the partition member 19 made of a polyester sheet has a function of a plate-like weight at the central portion thereof.
It is characterized in that an S resin plate 20 is provided. The PS resin plate 20 is placed in the developing unit 6 in the vertical relationship shown in FIG.
When placed on the PS resin plate 20 as shown in FIG.
Since the flat bottom portion is formed on the flexible partition member 19 by the weight function of, the unused toner is replenished to the developing unit 6 through the replenishment port 13 to be reduced, the PS resin plate 20 is lowered, and the waste toner is then recovered. When the waste toner is collected from the port 12, the collected waste toner easily spreads laterally on the flat PS resin plate at the bottom of the partition member 19, and the collection of the waste toner becomes smooth. The flat weight member 20 has the same function,
Other materials can be selected as long as they have a price.

For comparison, the flexible partition member 19
When the state of waste toner recovery was examined by the conventional toner container shown in FIG. 4 except that the flat weight member 20 is not provided in the sheet, even when the same polyester sheet is used as the flexible partition member 19, the bottom of the sheet is Since the waste toner has a concave shape and is difficult to spread laterally, the waste toner tends to overflow from the recovery port quickly. The PS resin plate 20 has an area of 330 mm and a diameter of 70 mmφ.
In the case of 1, the length 100 mm, the width 20 mm, and the thickness 1 mm were optimal. The size of the PS resin plate can be changed to an optimum size depending on the size of the container and the type of toner.

Further, the integral type toner container 11 according to the present invention, when the unused toner 17 is newly filled or refilled, in the state where the toner container 11 is erected, the upper surface of the surface perpendicular to the axial or longitudinal direction of the cylinder. The toner is filled from an unused toner filling port 14 provided in the. The diameter of the unused toner filling port 14 varies depending on the size of the toner container 11, but in the case of a container having a diameter of about 70 mmφ, a circular hole having a diameter of 25 mmφ is preferable. In FIG.
FIG. 3 is a view of the cross-sectional portion of the central portion as viewed from the bottom side toward the upper filling port direction with the longitudinal direction of the toner container 11 standing upright. The point set in this figure represents toner. The filling port 14 should not be visible when the toner is filled, but it is written to make the position of the filling port easy to understand. In this state, inside the container 11, the polyester sheet 19 is in a pulled state due to the weight of the PS resin plate 20 attached to the central portion thereof, and when the toner is filled due to slack in the vicinity of the filling port 14 as in the conventional case. The obstacle has disappeared.

The toner filling port 14 is located at the toner container 11
The outer side surface perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the unused toner chamber 17 is preferably located below the central portion. Preferably, the polyester sheet 19 to which the weight of the PS resin plate 20 is attached
It is preferable that the PS resin plate 20 is not positioned directly below the filling port 14. Thus, the unused toner filling port 14
By arranging the position of (1) on the outer side surface perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the unused toner chamber 17, there is almost no problem of peripheral contamination by the toner when the toner is filled, and the filling efficiency is improved. In particular, in a compact image forming apparatus, it is necessary to increase the unused toner filling rate as much as possible in order to increase the allowable number of prints. Therefore, it is important to set the position of the toner filling port 14 as described above. large.

The position of the waste toner recovery port 12 is formed substantially at the center in the longitudinal direction of the arc-shaped upper side surface constituting the integrated toner container 11, and the size of the hole is 30 mm in the longitudinal direction.
It was a rectangle with a width of 15 mm. In the widthwise position, the area slightly closer to the edge than the center was able to collect smoothly and was less dirty around the area. The residual toner on the surface of the photoconductor collected by the cleaning device 8 is conveyed as the waste toner from the cleaning device 8 to the integrated toner container 11 by the spiral rotation shaft that constitutes the waste toner conveying member 10, and the toner in the container 11 is removed. It is sent from the recovery port 12 into the container 11. The waste toner that has entered the waste toner collecting chamber in the container 11 slides down the inclined portion of the polyester sheet 19 directly below the collecting port 12 and reaches the flat weight member 20 made of PS resin. Since the weight member 20 is flat, the toner is relatively easy to spread in the lateral direction as compared with the case where this plate is not provided, and the recovery can be smoothly performed by that amount.

[0026]

According to the present invention, the unused toner chamber having the unused toner supply port provided on the lower side surface in the longitudinal direction of the container, and the waste toner recovery provided on the upper side surface in the longitudinal direction of the container. In the integrated toner container having a waste toner collecting chamber having an opening, a flexible partitioning member separating the two chambers, and an unused toner filling opening on one side surface substantially vertical to the longitudinal direction of the container, the flexible partitioning member is provided. Since it is an integrated toner container with a flat weight member attached to it, the toner supply and recovery containers are integrated to save the container space, and at the time of filling or refilling unused toner and waste toner. It is possible to provide an integrated toner container that can be smoothly filled and collected without contaminating the surrounding area at the time of collection.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an integrated toner container according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view of a conventional integrated toner container.

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view in which the central portion in the longitudinal direction of the integrated toner container according to the present invention is cut vertically.

FIG. 4 is a sectional view of a conventional integrated toner container at the same position as in FIG.

FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view of the integrated toner container according to the present invention in which the central portion in the longitudinal direction is cut vertically and the direction of an unused toner filling port is viewed.

FIG. 6 is a schematic configuration diagram of an image forming apparatus using an integrated toner container according to the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

11 Integrated toner container 12 Waste toner collection port 13 Unused toner supply port 14 Unused toner filling port 15 toner 16 Waste toner collection room 17 unused toner chamber 19 Flexible partition member (polyester sheet) 20 Flat weight member

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. An unused toner chamber having an unused toner supply port provided on a lower side surface in a longitudinal direction of a container, and a waste toner recovery having a waste toner recovery port provided on an upper side surface in a longitudinal direction of the container. In the integrated toner container having a chamber, a flexible partition member separating the both chambers, and an unused toner filling port on one side surface substantially vertical to the longitudinal direction of the container, a flat weight member is provided on the flexible partition member. An integrated toner container characterized by being attached. 2. The integrated toner container according to claim 1, wherein the flat weight member is attached to a substantially central portion of the flexible partition member. 3. The integrated toner according to claim 1, wherein the unused toner filling port is provided below the center of one side surface substantially perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the integrated toner container. container. 4. The integrated toner container according to claim 1, wherein the flexible partition member is a polyester sheet. 5. The integrated toner container according to claim 1, wherein the flat weight member is polystyrene resin or acrylonitrile butadiene styrene resin.