Image forming apparatus and program executed by computer of image forming apparatus

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10509344-B2
Application number	US-201816163018-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 17, 2018
Priority date	Oct 27, 2017
Publication date	Dec 17, 2019
Grant date	Dec 17, 2019

Abstract

An electrophotographic image forming apparatus includes: an image carrier that carries and conveys a toner image; a charging member arranged in contact with or close to the image carrier; a charging power supply that charges the image carrier; an exposurer that forms a latent image on the charged image carrier; a developing member arranged close to the image carrier; a developing power supply that develops the latent image and forms a toner image on the image carrier; a transfer member that transfers the toner image to a medium; and a hardware processor that controls the image forming apparatus, wherein the hardware processor obtains a potential of an exposure part and a non-exposure part, on the image carrier after the toner image has been transferred to the medium, determines a charging bias based on a difference between the obtained potentials, and determines a developing bias based on the determined charging bias.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An electrophotographic image forming apparatus comprising:
an image carrier that is rotatable and carries and conveys a toner image;
a charging member that is arranged in contact with or close to the image carrier;
a charging power supply that charges the image carrier by applying a charging bias to the charging member;
an exposurer that forms a latent image on the charged image carrier;
a developing member that is arranged close to the image carrier;
a developing power supply that develops the latent image and forms a toner image on the image carrier by applying a developing bias to the developing member;
a transfer member that transfers the toner image formed on the image carrier to a medium by receiving an applied transfer bias; and
a hardware processor that controls the image forming apparatus, wherein
the hardware processor
obtains a potential of an exposure part where the latent image is formed and a potential of a non-exposure part where the latent image is not formed, on the image carrier after the toner image has been transferred to the medium,
determines the charging bias based on a difference between the obtained potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part so that a potential on the image carrier becomes uniform after the toner image has been transferred to the medium, and
determines the developing bias based on the determined charging bias.

2. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor obtains the potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part based on a rotation speed of the image carrier and the transfer bias.

3. The image forming apparatus according to claim 2 , wherein
the hardware processor obtains the potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part based on at least one of a usage of the image carrier, a film thickness of the image carrier, and a magnitude of current flowing to the charging member.

4. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor determines an exposure condition of the exposurer based on the determined developing bias.

5. The image forming apparatus according to claim 4 , wherein
the hardware processor determines an exposure area per unit area as the exposure condition.

6. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor determines the developing bias so that a difference with the determined charging bias becomes a predetermined value.

7. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor determines the transfer bias based on a charge amount of toner forming the toner image formed on the image carrier, an adhesion amount of the toner per unit area, a rotation speed of the image carrier, and a length of the toner image in an axial direction of the image carrier.

8. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , further comprising:
a voltage sensor that detects a magnitude of a voltage to be applied to the transfer member when a predetermined current is flowed to the transfer member, wherein
the hardware processor determines the transfer bias based on measurement result of the voltage sensor.

9. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor
determines an amount of change of the charging bias relative to a reference value based on a difference between the obtained potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part, and
adjusts the amount of change based on at least one of image information used to form an image next and information on an image immediately before.

10. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , further comprising:
an environmental sensor that measures at least one of temperature and humidity, wherein
the hardware processor determines the charging bias based on the difference between the obtained potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part and measurement result of the environmental sensor.

11. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , further comprising:
a plurality of image forming units that forms a toner image, wherein
each image forming unit includes the image carrier, the charging member, and the developing member, and
the hardware processor determines the charging bias and the developing bias for each image forming unit.

12. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor
can switch a first mode and a second mode,
performs control to determine the charging bias based on the difference between the potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part in the first mode, and
does not perform control to determine the charging bias based on the difference between the potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part in the second mode.

13. The image forming apparatus according to claim 12 , wherein
the hardware processor
sets an exposure output of the exposurer in the second mode to a region in which a potential of a part of the image carrier where the latent image is formed does not substantially fluctuate relative to an output of the exposurer, and
sets the developing bias in the second mode to a potential necessary for supplying toner with predetermined density to the latent image in a case where the latent image is formed in the entire image carrier in the axial direction.

14. The image forming apparatus according to claim 12 , wherein
the hardware processor
obtains a film thickness of the image carrier and
determines that a usable period of the image carrier has expired in a case where the film thickness of the image carrier is less than a predetermined thickness in the second mode.

15. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor determines that the usable period of the image carrier has expired in a case where the charging power supply cannot output the determined charging bias or a case where the developing power supply cannot output the determined developing bias.

16. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein
the hardware processor controls the charging power supply to apply a charging bias to the charging member without discharging the potential on the image carrier after the toner image has been transferred to the medium.

17. A non-transitory recording medium storing a computer readable program causing a computer of an electrophotographic image forming apparatus to perform:
obtaining a potential of an exposure part where a latent image is formed and a potential of a non-exposure part where the latent image is not formed, on an image carrier after a toner image has been transferred to a medium;
determining a charging bias to charge the image carrier based on a difference between the obtained potentials of the exposure part and the non-exposure part so that a potential on the image carrier becomes uniform after the toner image has been transferred to the medium; and
determining a developing bias to develop the latent image formed on the image carrier based on the determined charging bias.

Assignees

• Konica Minolta Inc

Inventors

• Kimura Masato

Classifications

• G03G21/06

  Eliminating residual charges from a reusable imaging member · CPC title

• G03G15/043 Primary

  with means for controlling illumination or exposure (G03G15/041 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G03G15/02

  for laying down a uniform charge, e.g. for sensitising; Corona discharge devices (G03G15/14 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G03G15/0266

  Arrangements for controlling the amount of charge · CPC title

• G03G15/169 Primary

  with means for preconditioning the toner image before the transfer (G03G15/095 and G03G15/11 take precedence) · CPC title