Patent ID: 7561825

Claim:
An image forming apparatus comprising: an image forming unit that forms an image on a recording medium, the image forming unit having a predetermined surface and a first receiving surface, the first receiving surface comprising a semispherical protrusion having a convex surface with a curvature and a locking hole at its apex portion; a discharge tray provided on the predetermined surface for receiving the recording medium discharged from the image forming unit; an image reading unit disposed in confrontation with the discharge tray for reading an image from an original document, the image reading unit having a second receiving surface that confronts the first receiving surface, the second receiving portion having a concave surface that substantially follows the curvature of the convex surface, the second receiving portion provided at a position confronting the semispherical protrusion; a coupling portion disposed at a first position on the image forming unit, the coupling portion coupling the image reading unit with the image forming unit, allowing the image reading unit to pivotally move about a first pivoting axis, the image reading unit being pivotally movable between a closed position at which the image reading unit covers the discharge tray and an open position at which the image reading unit exposes the discharge tray, the image reading unit being pivotally movable both in an opening direction toward the open position and in a closing direction toward the closed position; a pivoting-restricting portion disposed at a second position different from the first position, the pivoting-restricting portion restricting pivotal movement of the image reading unit past the open position in the opening direction; and wherein an elastic holding portion is provided inside the concave surface, the elastic holding portion engaging with the locking hole when the image reading unit is in the closed position.