JPS62191372A - Sheet sorting device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To make it possible to move bin trays at a high speed, by gearing the passive member of a bin tray to spiral grooves in every rotation of spiral cam devices, and controlling the interval of bin trays, in a sheet sorting device for a copying machine or the like. CONSTITUTION:When sheets are stored in the highest bin tray 6, a motor 23 is driven directly, the lift-up members 30 formed at the lower end of the spiral grooves 24' of both side spiral cams 24 lift up a follower 6b, and push up it along the spiral grooves 24', while other bin trays 7-9 are lifted up by support bars 12. When the follower 6b reaches the upper flat surface of the spiral cams 24, a microswitch 27 detects it to stop the follower 6b. Then sheets are stored in the bin tray 7 which is controlled at the adequate interval. In the same manner, sheets are stored to bin trays 8.... Therefore, a high speed movement of bin trays is possible, and a high speed sheet sorting can be carried out.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a sheet sorting device that sequentially distributes and stores sheets of documents and the like discharged from an image forming machine such as a copying machine, a printing machine, and a facsimile machine into receiving trays (hereinafter referred to as bin trays).

For example, the light weight of a sheet sorting device for receiving, sorting, and sorting originals or copy sheets (hereinafter simply referred to as sheets) that are continuously discharged from a copying machine.

Downsizing is desired.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and it is an object of the present invention to provide an excellent sheet sorting device that is lightweight, compact, and capable of moving a group of bin trays with low driving force.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a sheet sorting device that is lightweight, compact, and capable of reliably raising and lowering a bin tray at high speed.

Furthermore, it is another object of the present invention to enable reliable high-speed lifting and lowering operations in a sheet sorting device that is lightweight, compact, and equipped with a large number of bin trays.

An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a side sectional view of a sheet sorting device showing one embodiment of the present invention. The sheets continuously discharged from the pair of paper discharge rollers 2 of the copying machine 1 are passed through the entrance guide 4 of the sheet sorting device disposed opposite to the pair of paper discharge rollers 2, and then conveyed to the bin toilet by the pair of conveyance rollers 5 to 9. It is sent to and stored. The conveyor roller pair 5 is rotated by a drive motor (not shown) when the pin tray is stopped. The rear end R of the stacked plurality of pin trays 9 is supported by a support arm 10 of the main body of the sheet sorting device, and each pin tray 9 is
The rear ends of 9 are slidably overlapped with each other.

On the sheet receiving side of the sheet sorting device, columns 14 and 15 are arranged on the left and right sides of the main body of the apparatus (FIG. 3), and slots 11 extending vertically are formed in the side walls of each column. This slot 11 has cylindrical followers 6a, 6b, 7a, 7b provided on the left and right sides of the tip of the bin tray.
, 8a.

8b, 9a, and 9b are slidably engaged (Fig. 3)
. Furthermore, the followers 6a and 6b.

7a, 7b, 8a, 8b, 9a, and 9b are also engaged with the support frame 12.

FIG. 2 is a side view showing the engagement state of the support frame 12 and each follower. A long hole 13 is formed in the support frame 12 in the same way as the slot 11 described above, and the support frame 12 can be slid up and down along the slot 11. Followers 6a and 6b of the pintreiro in the uppermost stage are engaged with the upper part of the support frame 12, and the right and left sides of the pintreiro are fixed to the support frame 12 by screws 12'. Therefore, in this embodiment, the pintrayro does not rotate relative to the support frame 12 (it moves up and down with the support frame. The other followers 7a, 7b, 8a, 8b and 9a, 9b of the bin tray 7°8.9 Support frame 12
It is engaged with the elongated hole 13 so as to be movable up and down.

In this case, the above-mentioned support arm 10 is fixed to the support frame 12 on the conveyance roller 5 side, so that it can move up and down together with the support frame 12 while supporting the rear end of the bin tray.

Therefore, if the support arm 10 is to be fixed to the support column 14, 15 and configured to be immovable, the followers 6a and 6b of the pintreiro at the top stage need not be fixed to the support frame 12 (
If they are engaged in a fit-fitting manner and configured to be freely rotatable, the rear end position of each bin tray will not move up and down significantly (only the tip of the bin tray can be moved up and down. With this configuration, the rear end position of each bin tray can be moved up and down. Sheets are naturally aligned at the tip of the bin tray while the tip is being raised and lowered.This configuration is suitable for a sheet sorting device with a small number of bin trays.

As already mentioned, in this embodiment, the support arm 10 moves up and down together with the support frame 12. This configuration is more suitable as the number of bin trays increases. This is because, in a configuration in which the support arm 10 is fixed, as the number of bin trays increases, the slope of the topmost bin tray becomes steeper, which may cause the sheets on the bin trays to slide down or become rough. Also, if you configure the bin tray to all rotate, it will rotate clockwise (Figure 1).
By rotating each bin tray, sheets on the bin tray can be easily taken out.

FIG. 3 is a sectional view taken along the line AA in FIG. 1 as seen from the rear end of the bin tray. The left and right pillars 14 and 15 have the same pitch, -
A pair of groove-shaped spiral cams 24 each having one pitch of spiral grooves 24' are provided and are fitted and supported on the upper portions of the vertical rotation shafts 18 and 19.

The above rotating shaft is 18. At the bottom of 19 is a sprocket 20.
21 is provided to transmit the rotational force of a motor 23 provided in the main body 3 to the helical cam 24 via a chain 22. The motor 23 is capable of forward and reverse rotation, and in the following description, the case in which the rotating shaft 19 is rotated in the D direction (the case in which the bin tray is raised) will be referred to as normal rotation.

FIG. 4 is a developed view of the outer periphery of the helical cam 24 according to the present invention. In the figure, the spiral cam 24 extends from the spiral groove 24' to the spiral groove 24'.
This is the locus of one normal rotation ((b) to (e)) of .

Hereinafter, the sheet sorting operation will be explained in detail with reference to FIGS. 1 to 4 described above. When the stopped sheet sorting device starts operating in response to a signal from the copying machine 1 or an external input instruction from the operator, the motor 23 reverses and moves the support frame 1
2 descends along the slot 11 together with the tip of the bin tray group. In FIG. 4, state (d) represents the respective follower positions of the bin tray group in FIG.

Moreover, FIG. 5 shows a plan sectional view of the above-mentioned support column 14.15. A follower 6b is mounted on the upper smooth surface of the spiral groove cam 24. This state corresponds to the state (d) in FIG. 4, and is the normal stop position of the spiral groove cam 24.

The lowering of the support frame 12 begins with the reversal D' of the helical cam 24. The entire weight of the pintreiros 7, 8, and 9 acts on the followers 6a and 6b via the support frame 12. Therefore, in FIG. 4, the spiral cam 24 is reversed and the spiral groove 24 is
When ' moves below the follower 6b, the follower 6b enters the helical groove 24' and the helical groove 24
′ and descends. While maintaining the bin spacing determined by the elongated holes 13 of the support frame 12, the support frame 12 descends together with the bin tray group to the lower end 25 of the slot. The support frame 12 is connected to the microswitch 26 arranged at the lower end of the slot 11.
, and the spiral cam 24 is at the normal stop position (
The position (a) in Figure 4 is shown. When the microswitch 27 detects that the microswitch is touched from position (B), the reverse rotation D' is completed.

When the reverse rotation D' is completed, the pin tray roller at the highest stage is in the position to receive the conveyed sheet. Simultaneously with the completion of the reverse rotation, the pair of conveying rollers 5 starts rotating, and the sheet sent from the pair of discharge rollers 2 is sent to the pin tray roller. The passage of the sheet is controlled by a microswitch 28 provided downstream of the pair of transport rollers 5.
Detect with.

Static electricity on the sheet is removed by bringing it into contact with a static eliminating brush 29.

When the sheet passes through the microswitch 28 and no paper is detected on the pair of transport rollers 5, the rotation of the transport roller 5 is stopped, and at the same time, the motor 23 starts normal rotation. The bin tray starting position in this case is shown in FIG. 4 (A). When the spiral cam 24 rotates in the normal direction, the sharp scooped-up portion 30' forming the lower end of the helical groove 24' of the helical cam 24 comes into contact with the lower circumferential surface of the follower 6b, and only the follower 6b along with the support frame 12 moves into the helical groove 24.
Push up along ′. And other bin trays 7.8
．． 9 is not guided by the spiral groove 24' of the spiral cam 24, but is pulled up in the same manner as the support frame 12, and the follower 6b
Only the upper smooth surface 31 of the spiral cam (regular stopping position) (
When (d) is reached, the microswitch 27 detects this and the normal rotation is stopped. At the same time, the conveyance roller pair 5, which had been stopped, starts rotating and feeds the sheet into the bin tray 7. When the end of feeding is detected by the microswitch 28, the conveying roller pair 5 is stopped again, the spiral cam 24 starts rotating forward, and (
The bin tray 8 is raised to the sheet receiving position through the steps e) (f) (f) (g) (ch) (su).

When the helical cam 24 rotates (°number of bin trays - 1) times, the follower 9b of the bottom bin tray 9 moves to the helical cam 2.
It reaches near the bottom surface of 4. The follower 8b of the second bin tray 8 from the bottom is the follower 6b of the pin tray 7, which is already loaded and supported on the upper smooth surface 31 of the spiral cam.
It reaches the stacking position b. After counting the operation of the microswitch 27 and confirming that the lowermost bin tray 9 has reached the sheet receiving position, the conveying roller pair 5 is rotated to feed the sheet to the bin tray 9.

Note that if the number of sheets continuously discharged from the copying machine is greater than the number of bin trays, all the extra sheets can be stored in the bottom bin tray, and for this purpose the bottom bin tray is formed deeper than the other bin trays. You can increase the amount of storage by doing so. In addition, the struts 14.15 are connected to the base portions 14' and 15.
If the support frame 12 is configured to be movable up and down with ', the vertical position of the support frame 12 can be set, so it can be used with various types of copying machines without being limited to the paper ejection position of the copying machine.

In this embodiment, for example, in the cycle starting from the state (D) and reaching the state (S) in FIG.
The weights 1 of all the bin trays engaged with 2 are connected to the spiral groove 24'.
Until the state (G) in which the follower 7b touches the follower 6b of the topmost pintreiro, instead of touching the
All that is required is to slide up the follower 7b of the bin tray 7 along the spiral groove 24'. That is, since a large number of followers are not slid along the spiral groove 24', the driving force of the spiral cam 24 is also small. Further, the helical groove 24' receives the weight of all the bin trays by the bin tray support frame 12 when the follower in the helical groove 24' contacts and pushes up the follower on the upper smooth surface. Therefore, by making the subsequent slope (pitch) warm (31' in FIG. 4), the rotational load on the helical drive cam can be reduced and load fluctuations can be suppressed. Furthermore, the follower may be a rotating roller in order to reduce the rotational load.

Further, if the follower is a cylindrical one-turn roller or a spherical rotating body, the scooping part of the spiral cam can reliably and easily enter between the followers and scoop up the bin tray.

Now, when the sheets are fed into all the bin trays, the motor 23 rotates in the reverse direction and the spiral cam 24 also rotates in the reverse direction D'. While the followers 8a and 8b of the bin tray 8 are sliding on the upper smooth surface 31, the weight of the Pintreiro 7.9 is acting on them via the support frame 12.

Therefore, the followers 8a and 8b can be reliably slid into the spiral groove. This configuration is particularly suitable for sliding the top pin tray into the spiral groove. That is, the size of the sheet sorting device is small.

As the weight is reduced, each bin tray is made smaller and lighter. However, according to the configuration of this embodiment, the weight of other bin trays acts on the topmost pin tray through the support frame. Therefore, the followers 6a and 6b can be slid in securely.

In particular, when the lifting speed is high, even if the rotational speed of the spiral cam is increased, there is no possibility that the follower will jump over the spiral tM and the bin tray will not fall.

As described in detail above, according to the present invention, the bin tray is moved by engaging the follower of the bin tray with the engaging part of the cam each time the spiral cam rotates, so that low-power sheet classification is possible. I was able to obtain the equipment. Furthermore, when the driven portion of each bin tray engages with the engaging portion (groove) of the spiral cam, the weight of all the bin trays acts on each driven portion. Therefore, even if the bin tray is lightweight, it is possible to move the bin tray at high speed by operating the spiral cam at high speed. According to the invention, it was possible to obtain a sheet sorting device that is lightweight, compact, and equipped with a large number of bin trays and capable of high-speed movement.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side cross-sectional view of a sheet sorting device showing a first embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 shows the engaged state of the support frame 12 and each follower. Arrow sectional view,
3 is a sectional view taken along the line AA in FIG. 1, and FIG. 4 is a developed view of the outer periphery of the helical cam, showing the state of engagement with the follower. FIG. 5 is a sectional view taken along arrow BB in FIG. 1. 6.7, 8.9...Bintreiro a, 6b, 7a, 7b, 8a, 8b, 9a.

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) It has a plurality of bin trays facing each other, a support means for mutually movably supporting rear end sides of the plurality of bin trays, and a spiral cam means for engaging with a driven part provided on the bin trays. . A sheet sorting device characterized in that each time the helical cam means rotates, the driven portion is engaged with an engaging portion of the helical cam means to move the distal end side of the bin tray to control the interval between the bin trays.