Patent ID: 8346141

Claim:
An image forming apparatus comprising: an image carrier that carries an image; a transfer roller that has a gripping member for gripping or releasing a transfer medium, and that transfers the image carried by the image carrier to the transfer medium at a transfer nip portion that is formed by contacting with the image carrier; and a transfer medium transport section includes; a transfer medium transport surface that sucks the transfer medium, on which the image is transferred at the transfer nip portion, upward in a vertical direction, and a contact member that is disposed on the transfer medium transport surface and contact with the transfer medium, thereby separating the transfer medium from the transfer medium transport surface, wherein a position where the transfer medium transport section starts to suck the transfer medium, a position where the gripping member releases the transfer medium, and a position where the transfer medium is separated from the image carrier are disposed at positions having the relationship of L<L 1 +L 2 , wherein L is the distance between the position where the transfer medium is separated from the image carrier and the position where the transfer medium transport section starts to suck the transfer medium, L 1 is the distance between the position where the transfer medium is separated from the image carrier and the position where the gripping member releases the transfer medium, and L 2 is the distance between the position where the gripping member releases the transfer medium and the position where the transfer medium transport section starts to suck the transfer medium.