JPH087449B2 - Manufacturing method of electrophotographic photoreceptor - Google Patents

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a method for producing an electrophotographic photoconductor for a semiconductor laser beam printer, for example, and more specifically, controlling the substrate temperature to improve the adhesion of the photoconductor layer to the substrate. The present invention relates to a method for producing an electrophotographic photosensitive member which is improved in electrophotographic characteristics.

[Prior art and its problems]

In recent years, the progress of electrophotographic photoconductors has been remarkable, and development of ultra-high-speed copying machines and laser beam printers has been actively promoted. Since the photoconductors installed in these devices are used at high speed for a long time, they operate Stability and durability are required. In response to this requirement, hydrogenated amorphous silicon is attracting attention because it is excellent in heat resistance, wear resistance, pollution-free property, photosensitivity, etc.
An electrophotographic photoreceptor having a photoconductive layer of amorphous silicon (hereinafter abbreviated as a-Si) has been commercialized.

As an example, there is a photoconductor for a semiconductor laser beam printer, and the photoconductive layer is formed of a-Si.
Since this printer uses coherent light as a light source, the light that has entered the photoconductor layer is reflected by the substrate, and the reflected light interferes with the incident light, which causes an interference fringe pattern in the image. was there.

In order to solve such a problem, for example, as shown in FIG. 1, an electrophotographic photoreceptor having an amorphous silicon germanium layer formed on a substrate by a glow discharge decomposition method has been proposed.

That is, according to FIG. 1, an amorphous silicon germanium layer (2) (hereinafter, amorphous silicon germanium is abbreviated as a-SiGe) is formed on a conductive substrate (1),
Further, it is a laminated type photoreceptor in which an a-Si carrier injection blocking layer (3), an a-Si photoconductive layer (4) and a surface protective layer (5) are sequentially formed on the layer (2). The layer (3) is formed in order to prevent injection of carriers from the substrate (1) to increase the surface potential, and the surface protection layer (5) is made of a material of high hardness to make the photoreceptor durable. It is increasing the nature. And according to the a-SiGe layer (2), 600 to 8
The absorptivity in the wavelength region of 50 nm is significantly higher than that of the a-Si layer, which allows the incident light to be absorbed by the a-SiGe layer (2) even though passing through the carrier injection blocking layer (3). Or
Even though the light is transmitted through the a-SiGe layer (2), the transmitted light is reflected by the substrate (1), and the reflected light is again absorbed by the a-SiGe layer (2).

Thus, according to such a laminated type photoreceptor, it is possible to prevent the occurrence of the interference fringe pattern as described above.

However, according to this photoreceptor, since the a-SiGe layer (2) is formed directly on the substrate (1), the adhesion to the substrate (1) is poor depending on the manufacturing conditions, and, for example, aluminum is used. When the substrate (1) was used, the thin film on the substrate was easy to peel off.

[Object of the Invention]

The inventors of the present invention have made extensive studies in view of the above circumstances, and when manufacturing the photoreceptor as described above by the glow discharge decomposition method, the substrate temperature during the formation of the a-SiGe layer is remarkably excellent in the adhesion to the substrate. It was found that electrophotographic characteristics can be improved by further affecting the substrate temperature when forming the a-SiGe layer and the photoconductive layer.

Therefore, the present invention has been completed based on the above findings, and the purpose thereof is to improve the adhesion of the photoreceptor layer to the substrate and improve the electrophotographic characteristics, thereby achieving high performance and high reliability. It is to provide a method for producing a photographic photoreceptor.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a method for producing an electrophotographic photosensitive member suitable for a semiconductor laser beam printer.

[Means for solving problems]

According to the present invention, the substrate temperature T1 (= 200 ° C to 250 ° C) is applied to the conductive substrate made of aluminum by the glow discharge decomposition method.
℃) to form an a-SiGe layer, a step of forming a carrier injection blocking layer containing a-Si at the same substrate temperature as T1 on the layer, the above substrate temperature on the carrier injection blocking layer And a step of forming a photoconductive amorphous semiconductor layer containing silicon at a substrate temperature set to a temperature higher than T1 and lower than 400 ° C., a method for manufacturing an electrophotographic photosensitive member is provided.

 Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail.

According to the present invention, when the laminated type photoreceptor as shown in FIG. 1 is manufactured by the glow discharge decomposition method, the a-SiGe layer (2) and other amorphous semiconductor layers such as a-Si light are used. The substrate temperature at the time of forming each of the conductive layers (4) is set within a required range, whereby the adhesion of the photosensitive layer to the substrate is enhanced and excellent photoconductivity is obtained.

That is, the substrate temperature T3 with respect to the a-Si photoconductive layer (4) is related to the type of the laminated type of the photoconductor, but it is preferable to set it within the range of about 250 to 300 ° C., so that the charge retention ability can be improved. Also, the photoconductivity can be enhanced, and when the substrate temperature T1 for forming the a-SiGe layer (2) is lowered below the substrate temperature T3, the adhesion between the substrate (1) and the a-SiGe layer (2) We have found that the power becomes significantly greater.

The substrate temperature T1 for forming the a-SiGe layer (2) is related to the kind of the material of the substrate (1). For example, when an aluminum substrate is used, the substrate temperature T1 is about 200 to 250 ° C.
Set within the range of.

Further, this substrate material includes, for example, stainless steel, ITO,
There are metal conductors such as aluminum, copper, brass, etc. or insulators such as glass, ceramics, etc. coated with a conductive film. Among them, aluminum is excellent in reduction of manufacturing cost and photosensitive layer. It is desirable in terms of adhesion.

According to the present invention, if a silicon element is used as a constituent element for such an amorphous semiconductor layer, there are various semiconductors other than a-Si, such as amorphous silicon carbide (hereinafter abbreviated as a-SiC), and amorphous silicon. There are silicon germanium carbide, amorphous silicon nitride, etc., and the substrate temperature T3 for these is about
It is recommended to set the temperature within the range of 250 to 400 ° C.

〔Example〕

 Next, examples of the present invention will be described.

(Explanation of Glow Discharge Decomposing Device) FIG. 2 shows a glow discharge decomposing device, in which 6 is a cylindrical reaction chamber, 7 is a cylindrical conductive substrate support for mounting a photosensitive drum, and 8 is a substrate. A heating heater, 9 is a cylindrical glow discharge electrode plate, a gas jet port 10 is formed in the electrode plate 9, and 11 is a gas introduction port for introducing gas into the reaction chamber. Is a gas exhaust port for exhausting the residual gas of the gas exposed to the glow discharge, and 13 is a high frequency power source for generating glow discharge between the substrate support 7 and the glow discharge electrode 9.

When manufacturing an a-Si photoconductor using this glow discharge decomposition apparatus, a drum-shaped substrate 14 for a-Si film formation is mounted on the substrate support 7, and a thin film forming gas is introduced from the gas introduction port 11. This gas is introduced into the reaction chamber, the gas is ejected to the substrate surface through the gas ejection port 10, the substrate is set to a required temperature by the heater 8, and glow discharge is generated between the substrate support 7 and the electrode plate 9. It is generated, whereby a thin film is formed on the peripheral surface of the substrate 14.

(Production Example of Laminated Photoreceptor) Using the glow discharge decomposition device shown in FIG. 2, a laminated photoreceptor as shown in FIG. 1 was produced. The manufacturing conditions are as shown in Table 1. The surface protective layer in the table is insulating a-SiC.
Consists of.

The electrophotographic photoreceptor thus produced has a dark conductivity of 8 × 10 ⁻¹³ (Ω · cm) ⁻¹ , and this bright conductivity is 2 × 10 3.
^{It was -6} (Ω · cm) ^-1 . Further, the adhesion of the photoconductor layer to the substrate was extremely large, and even when the photoconductor was mounted on a semiconductor laser beam printer and actually used, no peeling of the film occurred.

Further, in forming the carrier injection blocking layer in this example, the substrate temperature T2 was set to 220 ° C., and the other manufacturing conditions were exactly the same as in this example, whereby an electrophotographic photosensitive member was manufactured, and the darkness of the photosensitive member was set. When the electric conductivity, the light electric conductivity, and the adhesion to the substrate were examined, there was no difference in characteristics from the photoconductor of this example.

[Comparative Example 1] Among the manufacturing conditions shown in Table 1, the substrate temperature at the time of forming all layers was set to 260 ° C, and the other manufacturing conditions were exactly the same as those of this example. Was produced, the peeling of the photoconductor layer was observed at the same time when the photoconductor drum was taken out from the glow discharge decomposition device.

[Comparative Example 2] Among the manufacturing conditions shown in Table 1, the substrate temperature was set to 220 ° C when all layers were formed, and the other manufacturing conditions were exactly the same as those of this example. According to the photoreceptor, peeling of the photoreceptor layer did not occur at all. The dark conductivity and the light conductivity of this photoconductor were measured and found to be 3 × 10 ⁻¹² (Ω · cm) ⁻¹ and 3 × 10 ⁻⁶ (Ω, respectively).
-Cm) ^-1 , which indicates that the dark conductivity is significantly higher than that of the electrophotographic photosensitive member of the present invention.

〔The invention's effect〕

As is apparent from the above-described examples, according to the method for producing an electrophotographic photosensitive member of the present invention, the charge holding ability is increased without deteriorating the photoconductivity by changing the substrate temperature within the required range during film formation. As a result, an electrophotographic photoreceptor having significantly improved charging ability, photosensitivity and strong exposure potential is provided.

Further, according to the manufacturing method of the present invention, the adhesion of the photoconductor layer to the substrate is increased, whereby a photoconductor for a semiconductor laser beam printer having high performance and long-term reliability is provided.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a sectional view of a laminated electrophotographic photosensitive member described in an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is an explanatory view of a glow discharge decomposition device. 1 ... Conductive substrate 2 ... Amorphous silicon germanium layer 3 ... Amorphous silicon carrier injection blocking layer 4 ... Amorphous silicon photoconductive layer 5 ... Surface protective layer

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A step of forming an amorphous silicon germanium layer on a conductive substrate made of aluminum at a substrate temperature T1 (= 200 ° C. to 250 ° C.) by a glow discharge decomposition method, and the same substrate temperature as T1 on the layer. And a step of forming a carrier injection blocking layer containing amorphous silicon, and a photoconductive amorphous semiconductor layer containing silicon at a substrate temperature set above the substrate temperature T1 and lower than 400 ° C. on the carrier injection blocking layer. And a step of forming the electrophotographic photosensitive member.