Patent ID: 7570896

Claim:
A fixing apparatus which causes a recording material to pass through a space between a rotatable fixing member and a pressure member that press-contacts the fixing member so as to fix a toner image formed on the recording material, the fixing apparatus comprising: a plurality of heat sources, which are disposed inside the fixing member, having mutually different regions as heating regions; a plurality of temperature detecting members, disposed on a surface side of the fixing member so as to correspond to the heat sources, which detect surface temperatures of the fixing member; and a fixing control section which controls power supplies to the heat sources so that surfaces of the fixing member are maintained at a preset fixing temperature, in accordance with temperatures detected by the temperature detecting members, wherein: out of the temperature detecting members, an end section temperature detecting member which is disposed at an end section of the fixing member is disposed outside a region of the fixing member where a maximum-size recording material that can be used by an image forming apparatus in which the fixing apparatus is installed passes; in continuous printing process, the fixing control section changes a control temperature for controlling power supply to the heat source which is disposed corresponding to the end section of the fixing member, in accordance with a temperature detected by the end section temperature detecting member; and the larger the number of paper sheets that have been processed in one continuous printing process or the number of paper sheets that continuously have passed through the fixing member in one continuous printing process, the higher the fixing control section sets the control temperature.