Oblon, McClelland, Maier & Neustadt, L.L.P.
Image forming apparatus, image forming method, and process cartridge
An image forming apparatus including an image bearer and a cleaning blade is provided. The cleaning blade comprises an elastic member configured to contact a surface of the image bearer to remove toner particles remaining thereon. The elastic member comprises a substrate and a surface layer comprising a cured product of a curable composition and a siloxane compound. The surface layer is disposed on at least a part of a lower surface of the substrate. The surface layer has a hardness gradient in which a Martens hardness HM measured using a nanoindenter decreases from a surface of the surface layer toward the lower surface of the substrate in a thickness direction, and the Martens hardness HM measured in a region extending from a vicinity of the surface (with a load of 1 μN) to a deepest part in the thickness direction (with a load of 1,000 μN) ranges from 2.5 to 32.5 N/mm2. The toner has a tensile breaking force F of from 200 to 450 gf (from 1.96 to 4.41 N), measured using a powder layer compression/tensile strength measurement device under a load of 32 kgf (313.81 N).
Ricoh Company, Ltd.
G
G03G
inventional
Keiichiro Hiroshi Yuka Shinya
Juri Yamada Aoyama Nakayama