A transport device includes a transport unit that transports a sheet-like transport material without holding a one-end-side portion of the transport material in a transport direction; and a blowing unit that blows air against a lower surface of the transport material that is transported by the transport unit via multiple blowing holes that open with respect to the lower surface, an arrangement interval of the multiple blowing holes in the transport direction being inconstant in the transport direction.

An image forming apparatus includes: a pair of transport rollers that nip and transport a recording medium; an image forming device that is disposed on the downstream side of the pair of transport rollers in a recording-medium transport direction and forms an image on the recording medium; a pair of fixing members that are disposed on the downstream side of the image forming device in the recording-medium transport direction and fix the image formed on the recording medium while nipping and transporting the recording medium; a single driving source that rotationally drives both the pair of transport rollers and the pair of fixing members; and a releasing device that stops rotational driving of the pair of transport rollers by the driving source at a timing when the recording medium is transported while being nipped both between the pair of transport rollers and between the pair of fixing members.

A transport device includes a transport unit that transports a sheet-like transport material without holding a one-end-side portion of the transport material in a transport direction and a blowing unit that blows air against a lower surface of the transport material that is transported by the transport unit via multiple blowing holes that open with respect to the lower surface, a wind speed of the blowing unit being higher on two end sides than on a central side in an intersection direction that intersects the transport direction.

An image forming apparatus, having a photosensitive drum, an intermediate transfer belt located at a lower position with respect to the photosensitive drum to contact the photosensitive drum, a secondary transfer roller contacting the intermediate transfer belt, a first sheet tray located at a lower position with respect to the intermediate transfer belt to store a sheet, and a sheet guide to guide the sheet stored in the first sheet tray to a position between the intermediate transfer belt and the secondary transfer roller, is provided. The sheet guide is located between the intermediate transfer belt and the first sheet tray with regard to a vertical direction and has a curved section. A contact area between the secondary transfer roller and the intermediate transfer belt is located at a lower position with respect to an upper end portion of the curved section.

A removable media handling module includes a body that is horizontally slidable into and removable from an imaging apparatus. The media handling module includes a lower media guide extending between a front and a rear of the body in a direction of insertion of the body into the imaging apparatus. With the media handling module inserted into the imaging apparatus, the lower media guide is positioned parallel to and spaced from a corresponding upper media guide mounted in the imaging apparatus to form at least a portion of a duplex media path therebetween. The media handling module includes a media feed through channel extending from a bottom of the body to an entrance of a simplex media path to allow media to be fed from a media tray below the media handling module and into the simplex media path when the media handling module is installed in the imaging apparatus.

An image forming apparatus includes: a transfer unit configured to transfer a toner image to a recording medium at a transfer nip; a fuser unit configured to heat and pressurize at a fuser nip the recording medium to which the toner image has been transferred by the transfer unit, to fuse the toner image to the recording medium; and a pressing unit configured to press both edge portions of the recording medium in a width direction between the transfer nip and the fuser nip so that a central portion of the recording medium in the width direction becomes lower than the both edge portions of the recording medium in the width direction.

A heating device includes a conveying unit, a heating unit, a temperature detecting unit and a controller. The conveying unit conveys a recording material. The heating unit includes a plurality of heat sources which are disposed so that locations thereof are different from each other in a conveying direction of the recording material, and heats the convey ed recording material. The temperature detecting unit is positioned on an upstream side in the conveying direction of the recording material with respect to the plurality of heat sources, and detects a temperature of the heating unit. The controller controls one of the plurality of heat sources based on a detecting result obtained by the temperature detecting unit. The one of the plurality of heat sources is positioned on the upstream side in the conveying direction of the recording material.

An object of the present disclosure is to provide a conveyance apparatus whose detection unit of a printing medium is unlikely to be damaged. One embodiment of the present invention is a conveyance apparatus including: a first guide that is fixed to a main body; a second guide capable of moving to a position at which the second guide forms, together with the first guide, a conveyance path through which a printing medium is conveyed and a position at which the second guide opens the conveyance path; a first lever that is provided to the main body and which detects whether or not the printing medium exists in the conveyance path; and a second lever that shields light, wherein the first lever and the second lever can swing integrally or independently in accordance with the position of the second guide.

An image forming apparatus includes an image bearing member, a transfer portion, a fixing portion, a first sheet feeding portion including a first belt portion for forming a first feeding surface, a second sheet feeding portion including a second belt portion for forming a second feeding surface, a height detecting portion for outputting a signal depending on a height of a sheet from the first feeding surface at a detecting position, and a controller for receiving the signal outputted from the height detecting portion and for controlling the fixing portion.

A sheet feeding device includes a sheet feeding roller, a following roller, a rotational speed detection part, and a control part. The rotational speed detection part is configured to detect a rotational speed of the following roller. The control part is configured to accelerate a rotation of the sheet feeding roller and to adjust a sheet interval. The control part obtains a rotational rate of the following roller to the sheet feeding roller based on the rotational speed of the following roller, obtains an actual linear velocity of the sheet based on the rotational rate of the following roller and a theoretical linear velocity of the sheet after accelerating the rotation of the sheet feeding roller, and then adjusts the sheet interval based on the actual linear velocity of the sheet.