At FUJIFILM Business Innovation, we are working to develop technologies that reduce the power consumption of multifunction devices and printers to achieve lower environmental impact.
The fuser in multifunction devices and printers that is designed to melt the toner to set it on paper is responsible for 60% to 80% of the power consumption of the whole device. With conventional fusers, preheating was necessary to ensure that the device would be able to immediately wake up from standby mode to serve users. This preheating consumed a large amount of electricity.
At FUJIFILM Business Innovation, we developed an IH fusing technology. It is a heating unit with a low thermal capacity that is able to quickly heat up. In the past, it was considered difficult to heat nonmagnetic metals using electromagnetic induction. We have discovered that a thin film of copper, a nonmagnetic metal, with a thickness of several micrometers can be heated in a way that is comparable with magnetic metals.
Then, a copper film that is among the world's thinnest at a thickness of several micrometers is employed as the heating layer of the IH belt. In addition, a heat sensing magnetic alloy and other technology that controls excessive temperature increases of the IH belt while improving IH heating efficiency are also incorporated to achieve a fuser with the world's shortest rise time, three seconds, without the need to preheat to provide customers with convenience and conserve energy.
This technology won a science and technology prize in the development category from the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in fiscal 2014.