JPH0120474B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a printed matter counting device, particularly a device that counts the number of copies of printed matter folded into a plurality of pages and sequentially conveyed on a belt conveyor, in which a laser beam is irradiated onto the printed matter. The present invention relates to a printed matter counting device that counts the number of copies of the printed matter by detecting how the reflected light is reflected by light shielding at the step portion of the printed matter.

For example, newspapers or the like printed by a rotary press are folded and conveyed on a belt conveyor in a stacked state with portions shifted at predetermined pitch intervals. In order to count the number of copies of printed matter conveyed in such a state, it is currently necessary to count a wide range of pages, from 2 pages to 32 pages. In addition, other printed materials have different paper qualities, such as general newspaper, lyuic acid paper, coated paper, etc. The smoothness, whiteness, transparency, etc. of printed materials,
The amount of reflected light from the laser beam varies greatly depending on the thickness of the paper, and the amount of reflected light also varies depending on the printing surface of solid black printing.

In addition, in printed matter such as 2-page, 4-page, sheet-sheet paper, etc., the laser light irradiated onto the stepped portion leaks through the stepped portion, resulting in a situation in which the light cannot be blocked. It is desirable to be able to count even in this state.

The present invention aims to provide a counting device that solves the above problems, and will be described below with reference to the drawings.

Figure 1 is a side view showing one embodiment of the present invention, Figure 2 is a side view showing one embodiment of the present invention;
The figures are diagrams for explaining the main parts of the embodiment shown in Figure 1, Figures 3A, B, and C are diagrams showing the state of leakage of the laser beam irradiated to the stepped portion, and Figure 4 is a diagram showing the detection mode. FIG. 5 is a diagram showing the relationship between the laser beam and the light receiver shown in FIG.

FIG. 1 shows the configuration of a printed matter counting device according to the present invention. In the figure, 1 is a laser tube, 2 is a light receiver, 3 is a hood that serves as a presser plate on the top of the slide to keep the counter constant and prevents disturbance light (details shown in Figure 2), and 4 is a laser beam. , 5 is a conveyor roller, 6
7 is a conveyor, 7 is a pressure roller for keeping the counting point constant, 8 is a mounting base for the pressure roller 7, and 9 is a conveyor, and 9 is a press roller 7 that keeps the printed matter so that the stepped part of the printed matter always passes along the hood 3. A spring for pushing up from below, 10 indicates a printed matter.

In the present invention, as shown in FIG. 1, the number of copies of printed matter 10 conveyed by a belt conveyor 6 is counted. Generally, printed materials such as newspapers printed by a rotary press are folded one by one and then conveyed on a belt conveyor with staggered stacking at predetermined pitch intervals, as shown in Figure 1. has been done. That is, the printed matter 10 is moved on the conveyor 6 moving in the direction of the arrow shown in the figure.
is transported.

In the figure, there are provided a hood 3 whose upper surface presses down the printed matter 10 on the conveyor 6 so that it is always at a predetermined height, and a pressing roller 7 which pushes up the printed matter 10 from below. As shown in the figure, the printed matter 10 is sandwiched and conveyed by the belt 6.

As described above, as a means for counting the number of copies of the printed matter 10 conveyed on the conveyor belt, in the present invention, as described later, the printed matter 10 is irradiated with a laser beam, and the reflected light is reflected from the folds of the printed matter. The state of reflection when the light is blocked by the stepped portion is utilized.

That is, in the embodiment shown in FIG. 1, the laser beam 4 emitted from the laser tube 1 directly strikes the printed matter 1.
irradiated to 0. The reflected light 4' is then received by the light receiver 2. Then, in the light receiver 2, the light is converted into an electric signal depending on the light reception mode, and the number of copies of the printed matter 10 is calculated based on the electric signal (details will be described later). The irradiation direction of the laser beam 4 is a direction opposite to the conveyance direction of the printed matter 10 as shown in the figure, and is predetermined in the direction in which the portion of the printed matter regulated by the upper hood 3 is irradiated. As described above, when the printed matter 10 is regulated by the hood 3, the conveyor 6 is bent downward, so that the irradiation point of the laser beam 4 on the printed matter 10 remains almost constant regardless of the number of pages of the printed matter 10. Therefore, since the direction of the reflected light 4' is also approximately constant, the error in the amount of light received by the light receiver 2 that receives the reflected light 4' can be reduced.
The laser beam 4 is adapted to irradiate the print regulation portion of the hood 3. That is, as shown in FIG. 2, a laser beam 4 is irradiated onto the printed material through a slit portion 11 having a slit cutout in the center, and the reflected light is reflected in a conical shape as shown as reflected light 4' in FIG. do.

The configuration of the printed matter counting device and the outline of its counting principle have been described above with reference to the embodiments shown in FIGS. 1 and 2. Next, the counting principle will be explained in more detail.

FIG. 3A is a cross-sectional view of a two-page printed matter (an example of a newspaper). When the folded portion of the printed material is irradiated with a laser beam as shown in the figure, the reflected light from the irradiation point _P1 is transmitted to the point _P2 because the sheets of paper are thin and weigh only two sheets. Also, even with a 4-page printed matter (example of a newspaper), some reflected light will pass through. FIG. 3B shows the case of 6 pages; in this case, the 6 sheets of paper are so heavy that the reflected light of the laser beam irradiated to point _P1 does not pass through.

These depend on the thickness, whiteness, smoothness, and transparency of the paper. Therefore, in order to count printed matter whose reflected light cannot be blocked, it is desirable to adopt the configuration of the light receiver shown in FIG. 4. Reference numeral 12 indicates an interference filter 13 and 1 for preventing disturbance light.
Reference numeral 4 denotes a light receiving element, which is composed of two elements having the same area so as to detect reflected light by area. The elements 13 and 14 are connected such that their ends are positive, and their centers are grounded. 15 is a lead wire of the element, 16 is a connector, and 17 is a light receiver box. When the laser beam is irradiated to the belly (not the fold) of the printed material 10, the laser beam is reflected in a conical shape as shown by ds in the figure. A multi-page printed matter has a large fold difference, and while the printed matter 10 moves, the irradiation position changes from a to b in the illustration.
→ Move to c. In order to eliminate the influence of this movement, a configuration similar to that in which the light receiving element is placed in the area surrounded by ds in the figure is adopted. The virtual positions of the light receiving elements are shown in A' and B'.

FIG. 5 shows the configuration of an embodiment of the copy number detection circuit.
In the figure, amplifier A and amplifier B amplify changes in the amounts of reflected light from elements A and B, respectively. As an example, the amplification degree of amplifier A is set to 4 times, and amplifier B
The configuration is such that the amplification degree is 10 times. In this way, as shown in FIG. 6, for the light reflected from the antinode of the printed matter 10, the electromotive force va (12 mV) in element A is amplified to V A (64 mV), and the electromotive force in element B is amplified to V _A (64 mV). vb (12mV) is similarly amplified to become V _B (120mV). Incidentally, as shown in the figure, an eccentric voltage E (16 mV) is applied to the output of the amplifier A. This voltage E is selected to be higher than the voltage generated by the amount of reflected light, that is, the leakage light, in the case where the printed matter 10 has a small number of pages and cannot be shielded from light as shown in FIG. 3A. The voltage is selected to be lower than the voltage generated by reflected light when the printed matter is a solid ink paper surface.

In Figure 6, the electromotive force due to the reflected light from the edge of the unprinted blank paper is 12 mV, and the electromotive force due to the reflected light when the light is completely blocked by the fold is 12 mV.
It is expressed as 0.3 mV, and the electromotive force due to the reflected light from the crease is 2 mV when the reflected light leaks from a few pages. This change in the amount of reflected light is amplified by amplifiers A and B, resulting in the indicated output.
V _A and V _B.

The comparator Comp shown in FIG. 5 is V _B <
It is configured so that an output signal can be obtained under the condition of V _A. In Figure 6, X ₁ corresponds to the case where there is no reflected light, that is, the case of a printed matter with many pages, and X ₂ corresponds to the case where there is no reflected light, that is, the case of a printed matter with many pages, and X 2 corresponds to the case where there is no reflected light at the crease (step) of a small number of pages such as page 2 or page 4. This corresponds to the case where there is a leak. Further, the case of reflection from solid black printing paper is shown by dotted lines in FIG. In this case, the comparator Comp
The voltages input to are V _A ′ and V _B ′, and it is easy to understand that the fold portion (step portion) can be detected correctly.

As explained above, according to the present invention, two detection elements are used in the light receiver, two amplifiers A and B are used in the detection circuit, and the amplification degrees of each amplifier A and B are set to be different. By comparing the voltages after amplification, it is possible to easily count printed matter from a small number of pages to a large number of pages, regardless of paper quality.

In the above description, the elements A and B are arranged vertically, but it goes without saying that the same effect can be obtained even if they are arranged horizontally. Furthermore, in the above description, the counting principle for printed matter that is placed first with the fold has been explained, but it is clear that the number of copies can be detected using the same principle for counting printed matter that is placed after the fold.

The appropriate size of the laser beam irradiated from the laser tube is 1 mm or more and 2 mm or less at the irradiation point. This solves the problem that occurs when the shape of the reflected light that reflects from the irradiation point changes depending on the smoothness of the paper surface, so that the reflected light is radiated in a large cone shape.
It may also be considered that this problem is solved by making the intensity of the laser beam form a Gaussian diagram as shown in FIG. 3C.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figure 1 is a side view showing one embodiment of the present invention, Figure 2 is a side view showing one embodiment of the present invention;
The figures are diagrams for explaining the main parts of the embodiment shown in Figure 1, Figures 3A, B, and C are diagrams showing the state of leakage of the laser beam irradiated to the stepped portion, and Figure 4 is a diagram showing the detection mode. FIG. 5 is a diagram showing the relationship between the laser beam and the light receiver, FIG. 5 is a block diagram of a copy number detection circuit, and FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram illustrating copy number detection using the configuration shown in FIG. In the figure, 1 is a laser tube, 2 is a light receiver, 3 is a slide top plate/hood, 4 is a laser beam, 6 is a conveyor, 7 is a pressure roller, 10 is a printed material, 11 is a slit part, 13 and 14 are respectively Photodetector, Comp
represents a comparator.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a printed matter counting device that counts the number of printed matter folded into multiple pages and sequentially conveyed by a belt conveyor, a paper holding plate and a paper press plate are used to keep the counting position of printed matter on the belt conveyor at a predetermined position. , a laser projector that irradiates a pressed portion of the printed matter with a laser beam from a direction opposite to the conveyance direction of the printed material; and a light receiver that receives reflected light of the laser beam irradiated onto the printed material and converts it into an electrical signal. A light receiver configured with at least two light receiving elements detects the reflection mode when the reflected light of the laser beam from the laser projector is blocked by the stepped portion of the printed matter, and The output from the light-receiving elements is amplified by amplifiers with different amplification degrees and then compared, and the state where one is larger than the other and the state where the other is larger than the other. 1. A printed matter counting device, characterized in that the printed matter counting device is configured to count the number of printed matter by detecting a situation in which there is a transition to .