PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15935327
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-03
Publication Date: 2018-10
Patent Classification: ["399", "068000"]

Abstract:
An image forming apparatus includes: a roller; a heating member heating a sheet conveyed by the roller; a temperature sensor outputting a signal depending on a temperature of an end region of the heating member; and a controller. The controller selectively executes a first mode and a second mode. In the first mode, the roller conveys the first sheet, then conveys the second sheet at a first interval. In the second mode, the roller conveys the first sheet, then conveys the second sheet at a second interval which is longer than the first interval. When the controller has determined that a first time has elapsed after starting continuous printing in the first mode, and when the controller has determined that the temperature of the end region of the heating member is higher than a first temperature, the controller changes the mode from the first mode to the second mode.

Claim (Index 7):
An image forming apparatus, comprising:\n a roller configured to convey a sheet; a heating member configured to heat the sheet conveyed by the roller and extending in a width direction orthogonal to a conveyance direction of the sheet; a first temperature sensor configured to output a signal depending on a temperature of an end region of the heating member in the width direction; a second temperature sensor configured to output a signal depending on a temperature of a center region of the heating member in the width direction; and a controller electrically connected to the first temperature sensor and the second temperature sensor, the controller configured to selectively execute a first mode and a second mode in a case that the image forming apparatus executes continuous printing in which an image is formed on a second sheet continuously after an image is formed on a first sheet, the first mode being a mode in which the roller conveys the first sheet first, then conveys the second sheet at a first interval, the second mode being a mode in which the roller conveys the first sheet first, then conveys the second sheet at a second interval which is longer than the first interval, wherein, when the controller has determined that a first time has elapsed after the image forming apparatus starts the continuous printing in the first mode, and when the controller has determined based on the signal from the first temperature sensor and the signal from the second temperature sensor that a difference between the temperature of the end region of the heating member and the temperature of the center region of the heating member is greater than a first threshold value, the controller is configured to change the mode of the roller from the first mode to the second mode in the continuous printing in which the first mode has been executed.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 26.0
- Percentile: 90.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.73333
- Patent Class: 399.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: True
- Related Applications: ['14700800', '15280109', '14221487', '12477351', '11957532']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.8008604529739669
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.4610264510878502
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.7668770527853552
- Mean Citation Score: 180.15407
- Max Citation Score: 190.50249
- Similarity Product: 151.35846238605913

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 0
- Claim Label 103: 1
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 0
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test