Patent ID: 8811839
Filing Date: 2014-08-19
Classification: G03G

Abstract:
1. A toner recovery device comprising: a toner recovery path; a vibration exciter that applies vibration to the toner recovery path; a detector that detects vibration of the toner recovery path; a determining unit that determines whether characteristics based on the vibration detected by the detector have reached predetermined reference vibration characteristics; and an output unit that outputs the result of the determination by the determining unit, wherein the reference vibration characteristics are set in advance as indications representing that toner stagnates in the toner recovery path, wherein the determining unit determines indications that toner stagnates in the toner recovery path by determining whether the characteristics based on the vibration detected by the detector have reached the reference vibration characteristics, wherein the output unit outputs information representing indications that toner stagnates in the toner recovery path as the result of the determination by the determining unit, wherein the detector detects at least one of an initial vibration value and a vibration attenuation amount, and wherein the characteristics based on the vibration are an index value obtained by adding a count value representing the operating state of the image forming apparatus to at least one of the initial vibration value and the vibration attenuation amount.