| CPC G03G 15/2057 (2013.01) | 13 Claims |
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1. A fixing member comprising:
a substrate having an endless shape; and
an elastic layer on an outer peripheral surface of the substrate,
the elastic layer containing a silicone rubber and fillers dispersed in the silicone rubber,
a content of the fillers with respect to the elastic layer being 35 vol % to 50 vol %,
the fillers including at least a first filler and a second filler,
the first filler being at least one selected from the group consisting of magnesium oxide and zinc oxide,
the second filler being at least one selected from the group consisting of metal silicon and silicon carbide, and
a proportion of a sum of the first filler and the second filler to a total amount of the fillers in the elastic layer being 90 vol % or more,
wherein when obtaining SEM images each having 115.2 μm long by 153.6 μm wide at 6 arbitrary sites of a cross-section of the elastic layer in a longitudinal direction perpendicular to a peripheral direction of the fixing member at a magnification of 2,000 times, provided that a vertical direction of each of the SEM images coincides with a thickness direction of the elastic layer, and a horizontal direction of each of the SEM images coincides with a longitudinal direction perpendicular to the thickness direction of the elastic layer,
binarizing each of the SEM images so that portions of the fillers are black and a portion of the silicone rubber is white to obtain binarized images, and
partitioning each of the binarized images into 1,024 columns in a horizontal direction thereof and 768 rows in a vertical direction thereof with a square pixel 0.15 μm on a side,
as to each of the binarized images that have been partitioned, determining a coefficient of variation of inter-surface distances between the fillers in each pixel column, which has 768 rows, from a standard deviation and an average of the inter-surface distances between the fillers in the pixel column to obtain 1,024 coefficients of variation, and
obtaining 6 sets of a representative coefficient A of variation for each of the binarized images, where the representative coefficient A of variation is an average of 50 largest numerical values out of the resultant 1,024 coefficients of variation,
an arithmetic average of 6 sets of the representative coefficient A of variation, is 1.4 or more.
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