Patent ID: 7844205

Claim:
An image forming apparatus comprising: an image carrier on which a toner image is formed; an endless belt that is supported by a plurality of supporting members; a transfer unit that transfers the toner image from the image carrier to a recording member when the image carrier is in contact with the recording member, the recording member being any one of the endless belt and a recording medium carried by the endless belt; and a moving unit configured to perform a contacting operation including relatively moving the endless belt and the image carrier to cause the endless belt and the image carrier to come in contact with each other, and a separating operation including relatively moving any one of the endless belt and the image carrier to cause the endless belt and the image carrier to be separated from each other; and a control unit that controls the moving unit, wherein the control unit controls the moving unit so as to perform the separating operation when an image is not to be formed on the image carrier, and controls the moving unit so as to perform, when an image is to be formed, the contacting operation a plurality of times before the transfer unit starts transferring the toner image.