An image forming apparatus having a fixing unit, a belt, a conveyance unit, a heat sink, first and second rollers, a belt position detection unit, a steering unit, and a control unit further includes an image forming unit to form a toner image on a recording material, and perform a state transition to a power-off state and to a standby state where image forming by the image forming unit is possible. The belt position detection unit detects a position of the belt. The steering unit swings the first roller relative to the second roller based on a detection result by the belt position detection unit to widthwisely move the belt relative to the first roller. When the image forming apparatus enters the power-off state, the control unit controls the steering unit to make a rotational axis of the first roller approximately parallel to a rotational axis of the second roller.

An additive manufacturing system comprising a transfer medium configured to receive the layers from a imaging engine, a heater configured to heat the layers on the transfer medium, and a layer transfusion assembly that includes a build platform, and is configured to transfuse the heated layers onto the build platform in a layer-by-layer manner to print a three-dimensional part.

A cooling conveyor includes a conveyor, a cooler, and a pipe. The conveyor includes at least a first conveyor and a second conveyor to sandwich and convey a recording material. The first conveyor approaches and separates from the second conveyor. The cooler is disposed in the second conveyor to cool the recording material after an image is fixed on the recording material. The pipe is connected to the cooler to flow a cooling liquid into the cooler.

A fixing device includes a pair of fixing members disposed to face each other in a fixing area, a movable member movably supporting at least one of the fixing members between first and second positions, a driving device including a contact member and a drive source to move the movable member between the first and second positions, and a controller that controls the driving device, and if a temperature of the one of the fixing members is equal to or higher than a preset temperature when the driving device moves the movable member from the second position to the first position, changes the control to make driving force constantly exceed a rotational load of the driving device in accordance with advancement of a time of increase in the rotational load as compared with when the temperature of the one of the fixing members is lower than the preset temperature.

A cooling device, which is included in an image forming apparatus, includes first and second conveying belts facing each other to hold and convey a recording medium therebetween, a first cooling body in contact with the first conveying belt to cool the recording medium, a second cooling body in contact with the second conveying belt to cool the recording medium, a heat dissipating body to dissipate heat of each cooling medium absorbed from the first and second cooling bodies, a cooling medium entering passage to flow each cooling medium from the heat dissipating body toward respective inlets of the first and second cooling bodies, and a cooling medium exiting passage to merge each cooling medium discharged from respective outlets of the first and second cooling bodies and flow the merged cooling medium to the heat dissipating body.

A gas impingement device includes a first surface including a pattern of a plurality of gas outlets, the pattern including a number of substantially parallel rows of gas outlets, the rows arranged in a direction, which direction is at a skew angle α with a front edge of the first surface of the gas impingement device. A recording substrate treatment apparatus and a printing system including such a gas impingement device and a method of drying a recording substrate by using the gas impingement device are also disclosed.

An image forming apparatus includes a heating unit that heats a recording material, a contact member that is positioned upstream or downstream from the heating unit in a transport direction of the recording material and is in contact with the recording material, the contact member being configured in such a manner that a portion of the contact member that is in contact with the recording material moves with the recording material, a temperature detection unit that detects a temperature of the contact member, and a control unit that controls, based on a detection result obtained by the temperature detection unit, an output of the heating unit.

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.

A heater includes an insulator substrate, a heat generating section in which a plurality of divided regions are formed in a longitudinal direction on a first surface of the insulator substrate, electrodes formed at both end portions of the heat generating section to correspond to the plurality of divided regions, and electric conductors connected to at least one of the electrodes and formed over a surface different from the first surface of the insulator substrate.

A recording material cooing device includes a first unit provided with a first endless belt and a cooling member, a second unit provided with a second endless belt and a supporting member but not provided with a cooling member, a holding member and a fixing member. The holding member is fixed to a supporting frame and rotatably hold the supporting member in order to be rotated by a use. The fixing member is fixed the first supporting member to the holding member at any rotating position by the user.