FR2567666A1 - BANK NOTES DISTRIBUTOR DEVICE - Google Patents

Abstract

AT THE OUTPUT OF A CASSETTE 100 OF TICKETS TO BE DISTRIBUTED, AND OF ITS TICKET EXTRACTION EQUIPMENT, IMMEDIATELY PROVIDED WITH BODIES 120 FOR GRIPPING, CHECKING AND SORTING, IN THE FORM OF VANE WHEELS, WHICH WILL TEST IF A TICKET IS COMPLIANT OR NON-CONFORMED (THAT IS A DOUBLE OR A FOLDED TICKET). COMPLIANT TICKETS ARE RELEASED IN A STACKING STATION 190 WHEN A REJECTION CONVEYOR RETURNS NON-CONFORMING TICKETS INTO A RETURN BOX 180. WHEN THE DESIRED NUMBER OF TICKETS IS REACHED, THE STACK OF TICKETS IS TAKEN BY ITS SMALL SIDE , AND CROSSES SLOT 10 OF A SAFE 1 BEFORE BEING DELIVERED TO THE USER.

Description

! The invention relates to

  banknote dispensers, and more particularly their internal devices which are responsible for constituting a stack of banknotes,

  representing the amount requested by the user.

  It is known that a device for distributing banknotes comprises at least one cassette, which houses a stack of distributable banknotes, of a determined face value, and comprises equipment intended to extract the banknotes one by one, on command, from the cassette. There are also means of handling these banknotes, which fulfill several tasks: checking the banknotes one by one, to ensure that they are neither double nor folded, because it is currently difficult to distinguish two "stuck" notes from a folded note. - discard non-conforming tickets; constitute, in a stacking station, a counted stack

of tickets checked.

  This stack is then transferred to the user, who

  will be able to seize it through a system of the sort lock.

  For security reasons, an enclosure or safe is used, which surrounds the entire distributor of

  tickets, and whose tickets come out through a slot.

  A problem then arose for the Applicant: the known cash dispensers do not allow an exact follow-up, in value, of the tickets which leave the cassette, since these can be either a conform ticket, or a conform ticket but simply folded, double. The object of the present invention is in particular to provide a

solution to this problem.

  The invention also aims to provide a banknote handling device which is both simple, flexible in its applications, and with the aid of which the value of the banknotes remaining inside the bank can be checked at any time. safe enclosure, as well as those of

tickets that came out.

  Yet another object of the invention is to allow the production of a banknote dispenser in which the exit slot of the safe enclosure is

as small as possible. -

  The proposed banknote dispenser device is of the general type comprising: - a cassette, which houses a stack of distributable notes, and includes equipment designed to extract the notes one by one, on command, - means for handling these banknotes, suitable for constituting, in a stacking station, a counted stack of verified banknotes, while excluding non-conforming banknotes; - Means for transferring this battery to the user, and - an enclosure forming a safe, which contains the cassette, the tickets leaving this enclosure through a slot. According to a general definition of the invention, the handling means, which check the banknotes as soon as they leave the cassette; are mounted to immediately constitute said enumerated stack, and discard the non-conforming banknotes in a return box close to the cassette; - The enclosure surrounds the cassette, these handling means and their return box; its outlet slot being parallel to the short side of the des.billillet stacking station, and - the transfer means comprise means for gripping the stack of banknotes by its short side,

through said exit slot.

  According to another aspect of the invention, the transfer means comprise a toothed belt, which supports at least one controlled clamp, and engages through said slot inside the enclosure. These transfer means can in particular release the stack of banknotes in a

  housing which can be made accessible to the user.

  Very advantageously, said clamp cooperates with a cam fixed at the stacking station, to achieve the

gripping the stack of banknotes.

  According to another aspect of the invention, the handling means comprise wheels each comprising a blade for transporting a ticket from the outlet of the cassette to the stacking station, means for checking the ticket during its journey on these paddle wheels, said paddle wheels normally bringing their load to the stacking station; while they are susceptible,

  on order, send it to the return box.

  In a preferred embodiment, the impellers have a common hollow shaft, which houses a translation rod, which is moved to ensure the grip of the ticket and allows the release thereof on command to

  stacking station or to the return box.

  In a particular embodiment, the path to the return box includes a conveyor accessible behind

  a tilting side wall of the stacking station.

  Advantageously, this conveyor comprises two conveyor belts in a closed circuit capable of closing one on

the other.

  The driving of the handling means and of the transfer means is preferably carried out by stepper motors.

  not under the control of at least one control unit.

  Finally, the invention also provides that the bill dispensing device comprises several bill manipulators as defined above, the cassettes of which contain bills of different face value, the different stacks of bills being finally assembled for

be presented to the user.

  Other characteristics and advantages of the invention

  will appear on review of the detailed description

  below, as well as the accompanying drawings, in which: - Figure 1 is a general block diagram of a cash dispenser according to the invention; - Figure 2 schematically illustrates the conventional structure of a cassette of tickets to be distributed; - Figures 3 and 3C are two general schematic perspective views of part of the cash dispenser according to the invention; - Figure 3A is a first detail of the device shown schematically in Figure 3; - Figure 3B is a second detail of the device shown schematically in Figure 3; - Figure 4A is a top view better showing certain elements of the device according to the invention, as illustrated in Figure 3; - Figure 4B is another top view showing a different part of the device of Figure 3; and - Figures 5A and 5B are two views which correspond

  and illustrate the rest of the device of the invention.

  In FIG. 1, the thick dashed line referenced 1 designates an enclosure which forms a safe and encloses a part

  cash dispenser elements.

  This enclosure 1 here contains a cassette 100 of banknotes to be distributed, gripping, ordering and sorting members denoted 120 as a whole, a return box for rejected banknotes denoted 180, and a station for stacking compliant banknotes denoted 190 The assembly can be placed under the control of a local control unit 110, which is also housed inside the enclosure 1. By an interface, the unit 110 communicates with a general control unit 200 which , for its part, is placed outside the enclosure 1. A variant consists in providing a single control unit, internal or external, to the enclosure 1, while retaining an interface for crossing this enclosure. With the aid of detection means which may be of known type, the control inside the enclosure 1 targets the number of tickets leaving the cassette, the result of the verification of the ticket at the level of the organs 120, the number of tickets stacked at extension 190, and the number of tickets

  returned to box 180, in particular.

  Outside, a device 210 transfers the stack of tickets available at post 190 to the user, via the front face 250 of the device. The passage of the notes takes place at a slot 10 of

enclosure 1.

  The external control unit 200 controls the transfer of the stack of banknotes to the user by the member 210, as well as the operations conventionally inherent in the distribution of banknotes, using means incorporated in the front face of the banknote. device (magnetic card reader, keyboard

control, display, etc.).

  FIG. 2 schematically illustrates a cassette, which consists of a parallelepipedic box 100, in which a presser 101 urges a stack of banknotes 102 towards an outlet orifice. An extraction mechanism by swivel suction arm 104 allows the extraction, in principle one by one, of banknotes such as 103. The banknotes are immediately taken up by two cooperating rollers 105 and 106. The cassette used according to the invention can be of known type or, preferably, of the type described in the application

  French patent N 83 18 420, in the name of the Applicant.

  Reference is now made to FIG. 3. Between side walls 107 and 108, which house the cassette 100 (not shown here), there are provided a set of shafts which support cooperating members for carrying out the handling of the ticket (we use hereinafter the word "ticket"

  although it may be a duplicate).

  We recognize in Figure 3 the shaft 104 and its suction arms. We also see the rollers 105 and 106 which realize the immediate taking of the ticket to advance it. Kinematic control of this advance is known up to now. According to an important aspect of the invention, the ticket is then supported by a row of paddle wheels, 121, 121A and 121B; mounted on a common shaft 130. This shaft is driven by a roller 131, driven by a stepping motor (not shown) and provided with an exhaust mechanism 132. The

  pebbles 133 to 135 drive the other trees already mentioned.

  Below the paddle wheels 121, and towards the front, there is a banknote stacking station 140. On the side of the paddle wheels 121, the station 140 is delimited by a side wall

  formed of a comb of teeth 145, which are retractable.

  The retraction of these teeth opens the passage to a banknote ejection conveyor, one of which is seen

elements in 170.

  Finally, at the bottom right of the figure, there is a toothed belt 211, which will be described below. It is noted for the moment that the belt 211 comes to pass near the

  short side of stacking station 140.

  FIG. 3A, which is partial, better shows certain elements of FIG. 3. We find the rollers 105 and 106 there. We can see one of the wheels 121 on the shaft 139, and the

  two parts 122 and 123 of the blade which this wheel comprises.

  An incoming ticket will be introduced between the two blades 122 and 123 of the dawn, where it is pinched, either by the intrinsic relative elasticity of these two blades or, preferably, by the intervention of auxiliary gripping means that

will be described below.

  After pivoting of the paddle wheel 121, the ticket will either be placed, to start or continue a stack, at station 140, if it has been checked and recognized as compliant, or on the contrary introduced into the reject conveyor, s 'it was recognized as non-compliant. It is known in fact that a ticket leaving a cassette such as that described above has in principle the good face value, with which the cassette is associated. On the other hand, this note can be folded either from the origin, or more often, following its extraction from the cassette. The other annoying possibility is that two tickets were checked out at the same time. The banknote recognition detectors used so far make it possible to ensure that a banknote is in single thickness; on the other hand, they do not make it possible to distinguish duplicates from banknotes

  folded over a greater or lesser part of their surface.

  It is then conventional to discard a ticket thus recognized - non-compliant. But so far it is not possible to

  keep accurate accounts of non-conforming tickets.

  According to the invention, on the contrary, the tickets are checked immediately, at the paddle wheels 121, using means which may be of known type. If the ticket is recognized as true, it is therefore placed as previously indicated at stacking station 140. In the case

  instead, it goes to the reject conveyor.

  This conveyor consists of a lower belt 175, supported by two end rollers 175A and 175B, the axes of which are fixed. Above, the second part of the conveyor consists of a belt 170, supported by end rollers 170A and 170B mounted on an arm 172, secured to a perpendicular rod 171. The rod 172 pivots

around the axis of the roller 170A.

  Furthermore, the left wall of the stacking station 140 is therefore defined by the tooth comb 145, which is integral with a lower plate 141 which can pivot about an axis located under the bottom of the stacking station 140 Thus, the wall 145 can be retracted to pass through the intermediate position 145A and lead to the final position B, where it opens the passage of the bill between the two belts 170 and 175 of the conveyor. The roller 170B then approaches the roller 175B to drive the rejected banknote (s) to the return box 180 (FIG.

  1), the shape of which can be chosen as required.

  In FIG. 3B, we see at 176 a wheel carrying a

  cam 177, which can come to stress down an arm 178.

  The cam is biased in the presence of a non-conforming ticket, to push down the arm 178, which then lowers the rod 171 and therefore the end roller B, after having pulled down, by its end 179 , the tooth comb 145. To better fix the relative positions of the elements, the shaft 130 is also shown.

paddle wheels 121.

  Also seen in Figure 3B the belt 211, which carries a clamp 220, for gripping the stack of tickets (Figure 3C), after a desired number of tickets

  were brought to stacking station 140.

  In FIG. 4A, the roller 131 can be recognized for driving the paddle wheels 121, 121A and 121B. The 121A paddle wheel is shown in partial section. We also recognize the trees 104 and 106 already mentioned, as well as the

  stacking station shown diagrammatically in 140. -

  The shaft 130 of the paddle wheels 121 is hollow, as illustrated in 150. It internally houses a control rod, denoted 151, and capable of being actuated by an end pusher 159. At each of the paddle wheels 121, the rod has a notch 152 in which is housed the foot of a rod 153 provided with a stud 154 which is flush with the periphery of the wheel 121A, and is biased radially inwards by an elastic return defined in 155. The control unit 110 (FIG. 1) jointly actuates the stepping motor for rotating the wheels 121 and the pusher 159 to produce, after the insertion of the ticket between the two blades 122 and 123 (FIG. 3A ) of the wheel, the firm grip of the latter, because the rod 151 is then moved axially inside the shaft 130 so that the stud 154 protrudes slightly, and thus comes to close in the manner of pliers the blade 123 on its counterpart 122. This pinching action remains either until the arrival ée at the stacking station 140, if the ticket is recognized as compliant, or until the entry of the reject conveyor if the ticket is recognized as non-compliant, with in the latter case prior actuation of the cam 177 which comes from '' be described with reference to Figure 3B, to first retract the side wall which forms tooth comb 145, and then close the two parts of the conveyor

  of rejection one on the other (the two belts 170 and 175).

  FIG. 4B better illustrates certain details which will help understanding of the above: there we see the upper belt 170, the control rod 171, which passes through sleeves such as 171A formed between two pairs of arms 172 which support the rollers ends such as 170A and

B of the belt 170.

  We also see the arm 178, whose pivoting under the effect of the cam 176 will allow, by the end 179, to retract by descent the tooth comb 145, using a lug 146 of one teeth of it. Then, the lower face 174 (FIG. 3B) of the arm 178 comes to urge the rod 171 to close the two belts 170 and 175 towards each other.

of the reject conveyor.

  FIG. 4B also shows the belt 211, with the clamp 220 which it carries, in the open position, and

  waiting to grasp the stack of banknotes.

  FIG. 5A again shows the clamp 220 in the standby position. This position is obtained by cooperation of a lateral lug 240 (FIG. 3C) of this clamp with the cam surface 215. The clamp is therefore here open. FIG. 3C also shows that the clamp 220 is mounted on the belt 211 by its pivoting articulation, against

  springs 241 on a jumper 242 which overlaps transversely

  5. LEMENT belts Lateral extensions such as 243 of this rider engage in guide rails such as 245 and 246; when the clamp 220 passes opposite the stacking station 140 (FIG. 3C and 5A); it is during this passage that the clamp opens under the effect of the

cam 215.

  When she is released, she will take the stack of tickets,

  who has the desired number of tickets (this number is ob-

  held by counting the number of actuations of the paddle wheels, for which the ticket has been recognized as compliant) - The stack of tickets can be taken naturally by the clamp 220, or pushed into it. When it escapes the cam surface, the clamp grips the stack of banknotes, and then takes position 220A, to continue its journey with the movement of the belt 211, which is now moved. In 220B is illustrated the position of the clamp when passing through the two walls of the slot 10 of the safe enclosure. It is noted that the belt 211 is wound on a lower roller 221, and passes over a deflection roller 222 to provide a minimum of volume at the level of the passage of the slot 10. The axis line TA allows the overlapping of the Figures SA and 5B. After this superimposition, it will appear that the stack of banknotes is now out of enclosure 1, to pass over another roller 224, then over roller 225, while the belt closes its circuit by going over a other-return roller 223, located at the same vertical level as the roller 222 For its part, at the roller 225, the clamp which supports the stack of banknotes, illustrated in 220C, will open under the effect of a cam surface 218, which results in the

  deposit of the stack of banknotes in a receptacle 255. -

  The movement of the T 211 belt is obtained using a stepping motor, which is mounted on one of the rollers of this belt. Note that the slot 10 can be made very narrow, since the stack of notes passes through this slot passing through its short side (transverse to the plane of FIGS. 5A and 5B), the long side of the slot is therefore slightly greater than the small side of tickets. The short side of the slot 10 is only defined by the requirements for the passage of the belt 211, in double thickness, and the maximum thickness of the stack of banknotes which it may be necessary to deliver to the user. . The transfer mechanism of FIGS. A and 5B is particularly simple, and flexible to apply, since it is easy to subject any toothed belt to any desired path, and to adjust the control of the stepper motor accordingly. training at unit level

command 200.

  For its part, the banknote handling unit described with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4 is also extremely simple, since it adds to the conventional structure only the paddle wheels, the stacking station, its side comb. outlet, and the reject conveyor. This assembly can be housed in a minimum volume at the end of the banknote cassette, which is accompanied by a reasonable size of the safe deposit box 1. Again the device is also flexible to use, since the internal control unit 110 can easily be adjusted to take account of the particular characteristics of the tickets,

  as well as other factors involved in the distribution

tion of tickets.

  Finally, and above all, the present invention makes it possible to provide, inside the local control unit 110, precise control of the number of tickets remaining in the cassette 100, of the number of tickets delivered (certainly per unit) to the outside, to be given to the user, and finally the number of questionable tickets, which return in the return box 180. It is then possible to design a

13 -

  strict accounting of the number of tickets remaining inside the safe, which presents

  many advantages for transaction control.

Claims (10)

Claims.   1. A device for distributing banknotes, of the type comprising: - a cassette (100), which houses a stack of distributable banknotes, and comprises an equipment (104) provided for extracting the banknotes one by one; on command; - Means (120) for handling these tickets, suitable for constituting; in a stacking station, a numbered pile of verified tickets while spreading the non-conforming tickets, - means (210) for transferring this stack to the user, and - an enclosure (1) forming a safe, which contains the cassette, the banknotes leaving this enclosure through a slot (10), characterized in that: - the handling means (120), which check the banknotes as soon as they leave the cassette, are mounted to immediately form said stack enumerated (190) and discard the non-conforming banknotes in a return box (180) close to the cassette, - the enclosure (1) surrounds the cassette, these handling means (120) and their return box (180), its outlet slot (10) being parallel to the short side of the banknote stacking station, and - the transfer means (20) comprise means for gripping the stack of banknotes by its short side, which   pass through said outlet slot (10).   2. Device according to claim 1, characterized in that the transfer means (210) comprise a toothed belt (211), which supports at least one clamp (220) controlled, and engages through said slot (10) to inside the enclosure (1). 3. Device according to claim 2, characterized in that the transfer means (210) release the stack of notes in a housing (255) which can be returned accessible to the user.   4. Device according to one of claims 2 and 3,   characterized in that said clamp (220) cooperates with a cam (215) fixed at the stacking station, for   gripping the stack of banknotes.   5. Device according to one of the preceding claims,   characterized in that the handling means (120) comprise wheels (121) comprising a blade (12, 123) for transporting a ticket from the outlet of the cassette (100) to the stacking station (140), means for verifying the ticket during its journey on these paddle wheels, said paddle wheels normally bringing their load to the stacking station (140), while they are susceptible, on   order, send it to the return box (180).   6. Device according to claim 5, characterized in that the paddle wheels have a common hollow shaft (130) which houses a translation rod (151), which is moved to ensure the grip of the ticket and allows the release of it- these on order at the stacking station or to the return box.   7. Device according to one of claims 5 and 6,   characterized in that the path to the return box includes a conveyor (170, 175) accessible behind a   tilting side wall (145) of the stacking station (140).   8. Device according to claim 7, characterized in that the conveyor comprises two belts (170, 175) rolling in closed circuit, capable of closing towards one another.   9. Device according to one of the preceding claims,   characterized in that the handling means and the transfer means are driven by stepper motors   under the control of at least one control unit.   10. Cash dispenser device, characterized in that it comprises several devices according to one of   previous claims, operating for different values facial tickets.