US Patent Issued to RICOH on July 8 for "Fixing device and image forming apparatus" (Japanese Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 9 -- United States Patent no. 12,353,159, issued on July 8, was assigned to RICOH COMPANY LTD. (Tokyo).

"Fixing device and image forming apparatus" was invented by Jun Okamoto (Tokyo), Yuusuke Furuichi (Kanagawa, Japan), Seiji Saitoh (Kanagawa, Japan), Tamotsu Ikeda (Tokyo) and Shigeo Nanno (Kyoto, Japan).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A fixing device detachably attachable to an image forming apparatus includes a housing frame having an open front side in an insertion direction in which the fixing device is inserted into the image forming apparatus. The housing frame includes a support plate, as a back side of the housing frame in the insertion direction, and a pair of si...