Developer Housing Multi-Layer Peeling Mechanism
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional developer accommodating units in electrophotographic image forming apparatuses face difficulties in efficiently unsealing the opening of flexible containers, leading to challenges in developer supply and increased costs due to scattering during the manufacturing process.
Innovation Solution
A developer accommodating unit with a flexible container featuring a superposed multi-layer sheet structure, an interlayer bonding portion, and a fixing portion, which improves the unsealing characteristic by allowing easy exposure of the developer accommodating portion through a controlled peeling mechanism.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If a deformable developer accommodating member is used to prevent developer scattering during manufacturing, then developer scattering is reduced, but the opening becomes difficult to unseal during use
Solution Approach 1:
The flexible container is divided into multiple layers (first flexible sheet and second flexible sheet) that are bonded together at specific portions. The bonding portion is segmented into a sealed region and a non-sealed region, allowing the opening to be unsealed by peeling apart the layers at the non-sealed region while maintaining structural integrity during manufacturing.
Solution Approach 2:
A bonding portion acts as an intermediary element between the first and second flexible sheets. This bonding portion is designed with different peeling characteristics - strongly bonded in the sealed region to prevent scattering during manufacturing, and weakly bonded or non-bonded in the opening region to enable easy unsealing during use.
2Ease of operation
If a sealing member is pulled and peeled during use to unseal the opening, then the opening can be unsealed, but it becomes difficult to effect the unsealing when the opening is pulled together with the sealing member
Solution Approach 1:
The function of unsealing is extracted from the sealing member itself and transferred to the bonding portion between the flexible sheets. The sealing member remains in place to maintain sealing, while the bonding portion at the opening allows easy separation by peeling the flexible sheets apart, eliminating the need to pull the sealing member.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of pulling the sealing member to unseal the opening (conventional approach), the invention inverts the approach by making the bonding portion between the flexible sheets the element to be separated. The opening is unsealed by peeling the flexible sheets apart at the non-sealed bonding region, while the sealing member remains stationary.
Data Source
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AI summary
A developer bag 16 of which opening is seal by a sealing member 19 includes a superposed multi-layer sheet structure portion 16g, of a sheet 16u or sheet 16s, for forming a developer accommodating portion, and a first fixing portion 16d fixed to a fixing portion 18c of a frame 18 is provided at the multi-layer sheet structure portion 16g, and a interlayer bonding portion 16h between the superposed layers is provided between the first fixing portion 16d of the multi-layer sheet structure portion 16g of the developer accommodating portion. By this, an unsealing characteristic of the sealing member for sealing the opening of a flexible container for accommodating a developer is improved.