Patent ID: 6253039
Filing Date: 2001-06-26
Classification: G03G

Abstract:
A color image forming apparatus comprising:a photosensitive member;an exposure unit for exposing images of colors to said photosensitive member to form a latent image;a plurality of development units for developing the latent image formed on said photosensitive member by a toner of a corresponding color to form a plurality of toner images;an intermediate transfer member in which said formed toner images are repeatedly subject to primary transfer to form a color image; anda transfer member for causing said formed color image to be secondary-transferred to a surface of a recording medium;wherein, for a recording medium having a size smaller than one half of the longest image length capable of forming a color image which is continuously subject to image formation, two modes are set including a first mode of continuously carrying out a developing process for forming a latent image and a toner image and a second mode of employing a stop process for stopping the developing process in the midst of the developing process.