US 6,241,401 B1Granted

Image forming apparatus

AssigneeFuji Photo Film Co., Ltd.

InventorsKazuo Sanada, Tsutomu Takatsuka, Seiichi Inoue

Life of this patent

Estimating the term…

Loading patent…

Abstract

Photosensitive material which is a silver halide photosensitive material optimally used for copies of a color film original and the like is coated with developing solution from the nozzle holes of a spray tank. A chamber provided with an internal cavity is disposed on the opposite side of the transporting path to the spray tank with the transporting path sandwiched therebetween. The upper portion of the chamber is covered with a heating plate. The heating plate is pierced with a plurality of suction holes which penetrate from the inside of the chamber to the outside thereof. The unexposed surface of the photosensitive material is suctioned through the suction holes and the heating plate heats the photosensitive material as well as guides the photosensitive material. Downstream of the heating plate on the photosensitive material transporting path D, transporting rollers are disposed for transporting the photosensitive material and for squeezing out developing solution from the photosensitive material.

Claims13

Dependent claims

An image forming apparatus for forming an image on an exposed photosensitive material by carrying out a plurality of types of processes in sequence on said photosensitive material, comprising:

transporting means for transporting said photosensitive material along a transporting path which guides said photosensitive material;
and
processing solution supply means which are provided at each stage of the plurality of types of processes and which supply the processing solutions used at each stage on a single exposed surface of said photosensitive material at a time,
wherein said processing solution supply means comprises processing solution storage tanks, elastically deformable processing solution spray tanks which communicate with said processing solution storage tanks, and piezoelectric elements which are connected to a portion of the side walls of said elastically deformable processing solution spray tanks, and
wherein said piezoelectric elements are deformed by energizing said piezoelectric elements, said deformation of said piezoelectric elements increases the pressure on the processing solution inside said processing solution spray tank, and said processing solution is sprayed simultaneously through a plurality of nozzle holes provided in said processing solution spray tank along a direction orthogonal to the direction in which said photosensitive material is transported thereby coating said photosensitive material with said processing solution.

2 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.