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US 7,043,172 B2Granted
Image forming apparatus
AssigneeKonica Minolta Business Technologies, Inc.
InventorsYasushi Koshimura, Junichi Koiso, Kanehiro Watanabe
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An image forming apparatus may comprise a suction section, fitted onto the air vent, for sucking toner particles scattered in the image forming apparatus, including an intermediate duct in which the toner particles accumulate and which is detachable from the suction section, and an exhaust fan for sucking air including the toner particles, through the intermediate air duct, and discharging air outside the image forming apparatus.
Claims4
An image forming apparatus, comprising:
- an image carrier;
- a charging device for evenly charging the image carrier;
- an image writing device for forming latent images on the image carrier which is charged by the charging device;
- a developing device for forming toner images on the image carrier by developing the latent images formed on the image carrier, including:
- a developing roller on which toner is formed by magnetic power,
- a housing to house toner agitating screws and the developing roller, and
- an air vent, mounted onto the housing near a gap between the developing roller and the image carrier,
- a transfer section for transferring the toner images onto a transfer material;
- a fixing device for fixing the toner images on the transfer material;
- and
- a suction section, having one end fitted onto the air vent, wherein air including toner particles flows through the suction section, and toner particles scattered in the image forming apparatus accumulate in the suction section, including:
- an upstream side duct having one end fitted onto the air vent;
- an intermediate duct having one end fitted onto a second end of the upstream side duct comprising:
- an upper intermediate duct for guiding air including the toner particles,
- and a lower intermediate duct in which the toner particles accumulate;
- a downstream side duct having one end fitted onto a second end of the intermediate duct;
- and
- an exhaust fan which is connected to a second end of the downstream side duct for sucking air including the toner particles from the air vent through the suction section, and discharging air outside the image forming apparatus.
15 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.