Image forming apparatus
AssigneeKyocera Mita Corporation
InventorTomohiro Takahashi
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
In an image forming apparatus, in each of a cyan image forming unit, a magenta image forming unit, a yellow image forming unit, and a black image forming unit, during a non-development period during which no toner is discharged out of a development unit, when toner in the development unit is agitated with an agitation roller, every time the drive time of a development motor for driving the agitation roller is counted, the drive time is stored on an accumulative basis in an EEPROM; with respect to the developer unit of which the drive time has become equal to or longer than a predetermined period, a predetermined amount of toner is supplied thereto and the predetermined amount of toner is discharged therefrom, and thereafter the stored drive time is reset.
Claims2
An image forming apparatus, comprising:
- a development unit in which toner is accommodated,
- the development unit including
- an agitator for agitating the toner and,
- a development roller to which a predetermined development bias voltage is applied,
- the development unit performing development by making the toner adhered to the development roller, to which the predetermined development bias voltage is applied, attach to a latent image formed on a surface of an image carrier;
- a driver for driving the agitator;
- a toner supply portion for supplying toner to the development unit;
- a time counter for counting a drive time of the driver while the development unit is not performing development;
- a drive-time-storage controller that, each time the time counter counts the drive time, stores the drive time on an accumulative basis in an electrically rewritable nonvolatile memory;
- a toner discharge portion for discharging out of the development unit the toner accommodated therein;
- and
- a toner supply/discharge controller that performs toner supply/discharge control such that, when the drive time stored in the nonvolatile memory reaches or exceeds a predetermined period, the toner supply portion supplies a predetermined amount of toner to the development unit and that the toner discharge portion discharges the predetermined amount of toner out of the development unit,
- wherein
- the drive-time-storage controller resets the drive time stored in the nonvolatile memory after the toner supply/discharge controller performs the toner supply/discharge control.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.