JPS61198183A - Cleaning method of image carrier - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To clean edge parts of a line image and a solid image completely by placing a rubbing member in an abutting state and shifting toner on an image carrier, discharging the image carrier electrostatically with light, and then rubbing a magnetic brush against the surface of the image carrier and cleaning it completely. CONSTITUTION:A recording device exposes the electrostatically charged surfaces of the image carrier to an image by an exposing device 14 in the 1st rotation of the image carrier and a formed image is developed by a magnetic brush device 15 with the magnetic brush; and the rubbing member 2 is brought into contact with the surface of the image carrier 1 and rubbed in the 2nd rotation, so that the sticking toner T shifts from where the surface potential is high on the image carrier 1. Light for electrostatic discharging is made incident on the surface of the image carrier 1 on which the toner T is shifted in sticking position and then the charge at the part of the image carrier 1 where the surface potential is high is erased and the surface potential decreases greatly as shown in a potential graph. The surface of the image carrier 1 is cleaned with the magnetic brush applied with an oscillatory voltage like an AC bias voltage at the magnetic brush carrier.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a method of cleaning an image bearing member of an electrophotographic copying machine or the like using a magnetic brush cleaning device.

[Prior art]

A cleaning method in which toner on an image carrier is removed using a magnetic brush developer is known (%
However, it is difficult to perform a complete leaning using only this method. Therefore, in order to solve this 181 problem, a method of applying a decorative bias voltage to a magnetic brush conveyance carrier (Patent Publication No. 56-97370) and a method of using a brush to rub the surface of the image carrier (% Showa 54-1
16237), a method of using a blade or an elastic member for rubbing the image bearing surface with Ff4 (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 53-13
No. 1050 and No. 53-148440) have been proposed.

According to these methods, the cleaning effect is improved compared to the method of simply rubbing the surface of the image carrier with a magnetic plan.

However, although the method of applying an AC bias voltage to the magnetic brush carrier is very effective for the inside of a P9rn solid image, the edge part of a line drawing or solid image suffers from the edge effect. There is a problem that defects are likely to occur. This is because the toner on the image carrier is thought to adhere to the image carrier due to static force and intermolecular attraction.
When one AC bias voltage is applied to the magnetic brush carrier,
Toner has a strong force that temporarily cancels electrostatic force and intermolecular attraction, making it possible to efficiently capture toner with a magnetic brush, but at the edges of line drawings and solid images, the static electricity The natural force acts very strongly (edge effect),
This appears to be because it is difficult to eliminate this force even by applying an AC bias voltage. In addition, the method of using a brush plan, blade, etc. to rub the surface of the image carrier is as follows.
Although this method uses a mechanical force to shift the toner on the image carrier to make it easier to remove with a magnetic brush, the cleaning effect is insufficient compared to the method of applying an alternating current bias voltage.

Although the cleaning effect is further improved by applying a bias voltage at an alternating current of ω and using a brush or blade that rubs the surface of the image carrier, it is believed that cleaning defects are still likely to occur due to the edge effect. ! One problem cannot be completely resolved.

[Purpose of the invention]

The present invention has been made in order to solve the above-mentioned problems in the cleaning method of removing toner on an image carrier with a magnetic brush, and provides a magnetic brush cleaning device that can completely clean the edges of lfMm+ and solid images. The present invention provides a cleaning method using.

[Structure of the invention]

The present invention provides a cleaning method in which toner on an image carrier is removed by a magnetic brush by applying a vibrating bias pressure to a magnetic brush conveyance carrier, in which a rubbing member is brought into contact with the image carrier in advance. A method for cleaning an image carrier, the method comprising applying a shifting action to the toner, then removing static electricity from the image carrier using light, and then cleaning/cleaning the image carrier by rubbing the surface of the image carrier with the magnetic brush; This configuration achieves the above objective.

That is, in a cleaning method using a magnetic brush cleaning device, the present invention considers that it is best to erase the charge on the image carrier in advance in order to eliminate the occurrence of cleaning failures due to edge effects, and for this purpose, a blade cleaning device is used. The method used when using the toner, which simply exposes the surface of the image carrier to which the toner is attached, by exposing the surface to AC corona discharge or eliminating static electricity, is insufficient because the electric charge is accumulated in the toner layer. This was done by finding a way to erase the telegram No. 1 as well. This point will be explained with reference to FIGS.

FIG. 1 shows an image carrier with residual toner attached after a toner image has been transferred to copy paper, etc., and a large amount of toner T is attached to areas of the image carrier 1 where the surface temperature is high. . Note that 1a is a photoconductive layer, and 1b is a conductor 110, J.

Even if mW light or AC corona discharge is applied to the surface of such an image carrier 1, the @ electricity of the image carrier 1 in the portion to which the toner T is attached is not erased. Therefore,#! When the rubbing member 2 (a brush in the illustrated example) is brought into contact with the surface of the image carrier 10 shown in FIG. 1 and rubbed on the surface of the image carrier 1, the attached toner T is removed. begins to shift from a portion of the image carrier 1 where the surface potential is high. Although the potential graph is omitted in FIG. 2, there is almost no difference from FIG. 1. As shown in FIG. 3, light 3 for charge removal is incident on the surface of the second and first image bearing member l on which the adhesion position of the toner T is shifted, so that the surface potential of the image bearing member 1 is high. The charges on the surface are erased, and the surface potential becomes significantly lower as seen in the potential graph.

By applying an oscillating bias voltage such as AC bias π1: pressure to the surface of the image carrier 10 shown in FIG. This makes it possible to eliminate cleaning defects due to edge effects.

As is clear from the above description, the purpose of the rubbing member 2 used in the method of the present invention is not to directly remove the toner T on the image carrier 1, but to shift the adhesion position. That is. If the rubbing member 2 also directly removes the toner T, a means for removing the toner T from the rubbing member 2 may also be required. Therefore, it is preferable that the rubbing member 2 is a member that only shifts the adhesion position, and furthermore, a member that allows the toner T to be easily removed by a magnetic brush. As the sliding member 2,
In addition to brushes, flexible blades made of rubber, plastic, etc. are also suitably used. The flexible blade is used in such a way that the tip of the blade is placed against the surface of the image carrier 1 to smooth the adhesion position without directly removing the toner T.
4) is preferable. However, it is not limited to this. The brush plan is not limited to one in which appropriately stiff brushes are flocked, but may also be one in which cloth is used for the pile. In addition, if the adhesion position of the toner T can be adjusted, it is possible to use the toner T once a month.

In addition, the light for static elimination: the photoconductive layer 1 of the image carrier 1
Any light may be used as long as it includes a wavelength that makes a conductive and erases the true charge. As the light source for the light 3, a lamp, a fluorescent tube, an LED, or the like is preferably used. If the light guide Wt layer 1a is for a semiconductor laser, it goes without saying that a semiconductor laser can be used for the light 3.

The photoconductive layer 1a may be made of either an inorganic or an organic photoconductor. In general, a device using a Nanjo light camera body is easily deteriorated by ultraviolet light, so in that case, it is preferable to provide a filter between the light source and the image carrier 1 to remove ultraviolet light.

〔Example〕

The present invention will be further explained below with reference to the embodiments shown in FIGS. 4 to 7.

FIGS. 4 and 6 are a schematic diagram of a recording apparatus that implements the cleaning method of the present invention, and FIGS. 5 and 7 respectively.
FIG. 2 is an enlarged view of a portion where the cleaning method of the present invention is carried out. Note that although the illustrated example shows a case where the image carrier is drum-shaped, the same applies to a belt-shaped image carrier.

In the recording apparatus shown in FIG. 4, a drum-shaped image bearing member 1 rotates in the direction of the arrow, its surface is uniformly charged by an electric device 4, and an image exposure device 5 performs image exposure on the charged surface to create a static image. An electrostatic image is formed, the electrostatic image is converted into a toner image by a developing device 6, and the toner image is transferred by a transfer device 8 onto a recording material fed by a carrying means 7, and the toner image is transferred. The recording material is separated from the image carrier 1 by the separator 9 and transferred to the fixing device wL1.
0, and the recording material on which one station of toner has been fixed by the electrolytic layer device i10 is discharged to the outside of the machine. After the toner image has been transferred, the surface of the flexible image carrier shown in FIG. Then, as shown in FIG.
The magnetic brush cleaning device 12 cleans the image bearing member 1 which has been neutralized by the electric charge.

The magnetic brush cleaning device 1i12 has a structure similar to that of the parent image device 6, and the structure is shown in more detail in FIG.

In FIG. 5, 12a is a sleeve-shaped magnetic brush carrier made of a conductive non-magnetic material such as aluminum or stainless steel, and 12b is a magnetic brush carrier with a plurality of N holes provided on its surface provided inside the magnetic brush carrier 12a.

A magnet body in which S magnetic poles are arranged in the circumferential direction, and the magnet body 12
The magnetic particles similar to the carrier of the two-component image agent are conveyed to the surface of the magnetic brush conveying carrier 12a by the magnetic force of b to form a magnetic brush. The thickness is regulated by the magnetic brush transport carrier 12c, and the magnetic brush transport carrier 12a comes into contact with the surface of the image carrier 1 at a position close to the image carrier 1 to capture residual toner on the image carrier 1.

In order to increase the efficiency of toner capture by the magnetic plan, an alternating voltage vibrating bias voltage is applied to the magnetic plan conveying carrier 12a by the cleaning bias power supply 13, as has been done in the past. This imparts vibration to the magnetic brush and cancels the adhesion of toner to the image carrier 1, thereby improving the toner capturing efficiency of the magnetic plan. Although it is preferable to use an alternating current voltage for this oscillating bias voltage, the magnetic brush that has captured the alternating current voltage and the direct current voltage releases the captured toner together with the magnetic particles into the hopper 12d. 〃[Tana magnetic particles are replenished.

In the recording apparatus shown in Figures 6 and 7, a light beam device [14 is used for exposure for image light and static elimination, a magnetic brush device 15 is used for both development and cleaning, and a magnetic brush device 15 is used for developing and cleaning the image carrier. This differs from the recording apparatus shown in FIGS. 4 and 5 in that the recording process for one image is completed in two rotations in the direction of the arrow. In other words, in Figures 6 and 7, Figures 4 and 5 also apply.
In this recording device, during the first rotation of the image carrier l, the exposure device 1i14 performs image exposure on the charged surface, and the magnetic brush device 15 exposes the charged surface to a magnetic brush. performs a PA image, and when it enters the second rotation, the exposure device 14
The rubbing member 2 exposes the surface of the image carrier 10 to remove the residual toner from the adhesion position, and the magnetic plan device 15 performs cleaning with a magnetic brush.

15 in the magnetic brush device 15 shown in detail in FIG.
a, 15b, 15c and 15d are respectively a magnetic brush conveying carrier, a magnet body, a panicle leg regulation plate and a hopper, and the magnetic brush is formed in the same manner as the magnetic brush in FIG. Then, the magnetic brush device iM5:Q
When removing I&, the switch 17 is pressed to the dotted line position, and the developing bias [i
16 applies a developing bias voltage such as a direct current or voltage, and when performing cleaning, the switch 17 is switched to the position shown by the solid line λ, and the cleaning bias t is applied.
613 applies an oscillating bias voltage as described above.

〔Effect of the invention〕

In the present invention, the surface of the image carrier is rubbed with a rubbing member in advance, and then the static electricity removal light is applied, and then cleaning is carried out with a magnetic brush to which an oscillating bias voltage is applied to the magnetic brush conveying carrier. The cleaning method using a magnetic brush also has an excellent cleaning effect, and has excellent effects in that cleaning failures due to line-1 and edge portions of peta images do not occur.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figure 1 is a state diagram showing the image bearing member to which residual toner is attached after the toner image has been transferred and its surface potential. Figure 2 is a state diagram showing the image bearing member with residual toner adhered to it by a rubbing member. FIG. 3 is a state diagram showing the image bearing member exposed to 1 kLm light and its surface potential, FIGS. 4 and 6.
Each figure is a schematic configuration diagram of a recording apparatus that implements the cleaning method of the present invention, and FIGS. 5 and 7 are enlarged views of the portion that implements the cleaning method of the present invention. l...Image carrier, 1a...Light turtle layer, lb
...Conductive substrate, 1゛...Toner, 2...
Rubbing/material, :U...light, 4...charger,
5... Image exposure device, 6... Developing device,
7... Carrying means, 8... Transfer device,
9... Separator, IO... Fixing device, 11
... Static elimination lamp, 12... Magnetic brush cleaning device, I3... Cleaning bias source, 14.
・Chest device, 15...Magnetic brush device, 16
...Development bias power supply, 17...Switch, 12a
, 15a... magnetic brush conveyance carrier, 12b,
15b... Magnet body, 12G, 15C... Panicle leg regulation blade, 12d
, 15d...Hopper. Patent AI applicant Konishiroku Photo Industry Co., Ltd. Agent Patent attorney Haru Takashi Yasushi - Part 1 a Part 2 Figure 3 Figure 4 Figure 5

Claims (5)

[Claims] (1) In a cleaning method in which an oscillating bias voltage is applied to a magnetic brush conveyance carrier to remove toner on an image carrier with a magnetic brush, a rubbing member is brought into contact with the image carrier in advance to remove toner on the image carrier. A method for cleaning an image bearing member, comprising applying a shifting action to the toner, then removing static electricity from the image bearing member using light, and then cleaning the surface of the image bearing member by rubbing it with the magnetic brush. (2) The method for cleaning an image carrier according to claim 1, wherein the rubbing member is a brush. (3) The method for cleaning an image carrier according to claim 1, wherein the sliding member is a flexible blade. (4) The method for cleaning an image bearing member according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the magnetic brush is also used for developing. (5) The image carrier according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the means for irradiating the image carrier with the light utilizes image exposure means for forming an electrostatic image on the image carrier. Cleaning method.