Oblon, Spivak, McClelland, Maier & Neustadt, L.L.P.
Developer bearing member, developing device, process cartridge and image forming apparatus
A developer bearing member on which grooves slanting in a thrust direction of the developer bearing member cross other grooves reversely slanting relative to the thrust direction, wherein each of the grooves and the reversely slanting grooves is slanting at an angle of greater than 0° and not greater than 40°. Any two adjacent intersections of the grooves and the reversely slanting grooves in the thrust (or peripheral) direction are preferably on different levels in the peripheral (or thrust) direction. The distance between two adjacent intersections in the thrust direction is preferably from 1.3 mm to 4.8 mm. The distance between two adjacent intersections in the thrust direction is preferably from 0.38 Vd/Vi (mm) to 1.1 Vd/Vi (mm). The deviation in depth of grooves present on a 36° arc surface portion of the member is not greater than 15% of the gap between the image bearing member and the developer bearing member.
Ricoh Company Limited
G
G03G
inventional
Hideki Yoshio Shunji Katsumi Keiichi Kiyotaka Akira Hideo Kenji Yuji
Kimura Hattori Katoh Masuda Yoshida Sakai Azami Yoshizawa Nakajima Suzuki