JP2000227747A - Image copying device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To enhance a using frequency even when the plural copies of one original are obtained and to enhance productivity as a whole even when one copy of the plural originals is obtained. SOLUTION: By a motor control part 11, a stepping motor 2 is driven so that a full-rate carriage is moved for scanning the original at a scanning speed being higher than the image forming speed of an image output device. By an image read control part 10, the image of the original is read by using a CCD sensor 5 in a scanning term. By an image processing part 13, the read image of the original is transmitted to the image output device while being successively stored in a memory. By the image output device, the image of the original is printed on a transfer paper at the prescribed image forming speed and outputted. Since the scanning speed of an image reader side is set to be higher than the image forming speed of the image output device, recycling time is shortened and the productivity is enhanced as a whole. That means, even when the plural copies of one original are obtained and even when one copy of the plural originals is obtained, the productivity can be enhanced.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image copying apparatus for reading a document, forming a read document image on transfer paper, and outputting the image.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, an image copying apparatus has been provided with an image reading device, an image storage device, and an image output device. For example, when a plurality of sheets are output for one document, a document read by the image reading device is used. It is known that an image is stored in an image storage device, and the stored document image is repeatedly transferred to an image output device for the number of copies to print out on a transfer sheet. In the image copying apparatus described above, the print output of the second and subsequent sheets can be obtained by reading the original image stored in the image storage device and transferring the read image to the image output device. it can.

However, in a conventional image copying apparatus,
It is necessary to synchronize the image reading device and the image output device, and until the image output operation is completed, the image reading device cannot read another document, and thus cannot improve the overall productivity. was there.

Therefore, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No.
For example, by controlling the image reading device, the image storage device, and the image output device independently and in parallel, for example,
In the case of outputting a plurality of originals, the read original image is stored in the image storage device, transferred to the image output device, the first page is printed, and the second and subsequent pages are stored in the image storage device. The first document ejection time (FCOT) of each job is transferred by transferring the original document image to the image output device and performing print processing.
8 (a), the number of times the stored document image is repeatedly transferred to the image output apparatus by the number of copies is set to “−1”, thereby improving the copy productivity. )).

Japanese Patent No. 2501195 discloses a technique for improving productivity by combining an image output device having a higher image forming speed than the reading speed of the image reading device. That is, as shown in FIG.
This corresponds to reducing the printing time (Print) on the image output device side (FIG. 9A).

[0006]

However, in the above-mentioned Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 9-261287, when a plurality of originals are copied one by one by using an automatic document feeder or the like, the first sheet is simply copied. However, since the discharge time (FCOT) of the first sheet is short, the discharge time of the second and subsequent sheets is longer than that when a plurality of copies are made from one document, and there is a problem that the overall productivity cannot be improved. (FIG. 8
(B)).

Also, in the above-mentioned Japanese Patent No. 2501195, when a plurality of originals are copied one by one, the cycle time on the image reading device side is long even if the printing time (Print) in the image output device is shortened. However, there is a problem that the overall productivity cannot be improved with the maximum productivity of the image output device (FIG. 9B).

The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned circumstances, and is applicable to a case where a single original is copied a plurality of times, a frequently used case where a plurality of originals are copied as a single copy, It is an object of the present invention to provide an image copying apparatus capable of improving the productivity of the image copying apparatus.

[0009]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a reading device for reading image information of a document, and a method for forming image information of the document read by the reading device. And a speed setting unit for setting the reading speed of the image information by the reading unit to a speed higher than the forming speed of the image information by the forming unit.

According to this invention, when the image information of the original is read by the reading means, and the image information of the read original is formed and output by the forming means, the image information by the reading means is output by the speed setting means. Is set to a speed higher than the speed of forming image information by the forming unit. Therefore, even when a plurality of originals are copied, or when one copy of a plurality of originals is frequently used, the overall productivity can be improved.

[0011]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described with reference to the drawings. A. Configuration of Embodiment FIG. 1 is a side view showing a configuration of an image reading device of an image copying apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. In the figure, a full-rate carriage 1 is provided with a hot cathode lamp 1a for irradiating the original surface, a mirror 1b for guiding the reflected light from the original surface to a half-rate carriage described later, and the like. When turned on, the document surface is illuminated, and the reflected light from the document surface is guided to the half-rate carriage 3 by the mirror 1b. The full-rate carriage 1 is driven by a stepping motor 2 and scans a document surface. After scanning, the full-rate carriage 1 is driven by the stepping motor 2, returns to the scanning start position, and waits for the next scanning.

The half-rate carriage 3 has two mirrors 3a and 3b. The half-rate carriage 3 is reflected by the mirror 1b of the full-rate carriage 1 while moving in the same direction at half the speed with respect to the full-rate carriage 1. The reflected light from the original surface is incident on the imaging lens 4. The imaging lens 4 forms an image of the light reflected from the original surface on the CCD sensor 5. The CCD sensor 5 is composed of a line sensor or the like, converts the formed document image (line) into an electric signal corresponding to the amount of light, and supplies the electric signal to an image processing unit described later.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the image copying apparatus according to the present embodiment. Parts corresponding to those in FIG. 1 are denoted by the same reference numerals and description thereof is omitted. In FIG. 1, an image reading control unit 10 issues a motor drive request to a motor control unit 11 in accordance with a copy start instruction from an operation unit (not shown), and scans a CCD sensor 5 according to a predetermined clock to copy a document image (line unit). And supplies the read document image to the image processing unit 13.
The motor control unit 11 drives the stepping motor 2 according to the motor drive request, and controls the illumination control unit 1
2 issues a lamp lighting request. Thereby, as described above, the full rate carriage 1 and the half rate carriage 3 are driven.

Next, the illumination control section 12 turns on the lamp 1a in accordance with the lamp lighting request, and turns off the lamp 1a when the reading of the original is completed. The image processing unit 13
After the electrical signal corresponding to the original image converted by the CCD sensor 5 is converted into digital data by A / D conversion, predetermined image processing is performed, and the image data is stored in a page memory or the like. The image data stored in the page memory is output at a predetermined timing from an image output device such as a printer.

FIG. 3 shows the image reading control unit 1 described above.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a motor controller and a motor control unit; In the figure, an image reading control unit 2 includes a CPU 10a,
It comprises a ROM 10b, a RAM 10c, a D / A converter 10d and a pulse generator 10e. CPU 10a
Is a pulse generator 1 according to a predetermined program, in accordance with a copy start instruction from an operation unit (not shown).
0e, a pulse generation instruction S1 is transmitted, and a motor-on signal MOT-ON for instructing the start of driving of the motor 5 is provided.
And a motor forward signal MOT-FWD for instructing the rotation direction of the stepping motor 2 to the motor control unit 11.

The pulse generation instruction S1 includes an instruction corresponding to the first mode in which the scanning speed of the full rate carriage 1 is the same as the image forming speed of the image forming apparatus, and a second mode in which the scanning speed is higher than the image forming speed of the image forming apparatus. There are instructions corresponding to two modes. In each case, the same-size copying is used as a reference, and it goes without saying that the scanning speed is changed in accordance with the scaling factor when scaling. The first mode is an operation mode selected when, for example, copying a color original or image quality is prioritized, and the second mode is an operation mode selected when, for example, copying a black and white original or copying with normal image quality. It is. Further, whether to copy in the first mode or the second mode may be instructed by a user from an operation unit (not shown), or may be automatically determined from read document image data.

The motor-on signal MOT-ON
Indicates that the motor is on when it is active, and that it is off when it is inactive. The motor forward signal MOT-FWD instructs motor forward when active, and instructs motor backward when inactive.
Further, the CPU 10a supplies a reference value for limiting the exciting current of the stepping motor 2 to the D / A converter 10d.

The ROM 10b stores programs executed by the CPU 10a. RAM 10
c is used as a working area when the CPU 10a executes a program. The D / A converter 10d converts the reference value into an analog signal Vref and supplies the analog signal Vref to the motor control unit 11. Also, the pulse generator 10e
Generates a predetermined pattern of pulses for driving the stepping motor 2 in accordance with a pulse generation instruction from the CPU 10a, and supplies the generated pulses to the motor control unit 11 as a motor clock MOT-CLK. Specifically, the frequency of the motor clock MOT-CLK when the pulse generation instruction is the first mode in which the scanning speed by the full rate carriage 1 is the same as the image forming speed of the image forming apparatus is f1,
If the frequency of the motor clock MOT-CLK is f2 in the second mode in which the image forming speed is higher than the image forming speed of the image forming apparatus, there is a relationship of f1 <f2.

Next, the motor control unit 11
a, a pulse divider 11b and a drive circuit 11c. The buffer 11a is provided with a D /
The reference value Vref from the A converter 10d is buffered and supplied to the drive circuit 11c. Pulse divider 11b
Is a motor clock MOT-CL according to the motor-on signal MOT-ON and the motor forward signal MOT-FWD.
K is divided into pulses for each excitation phase corresponding to the stepping motor 2 and supplied to the drive circuit 11c. Drive circuit 11c
Drives the stepping motor 2 by controlling on / off the exciting current to the exciting phase of the stepping motor 2 according to the pulse from the pulse divider 11b. As described above, the stepping motor 2 drives the full-rate carriage 1 in the first mode to have the same scanning speed as the image forming speed of the image forming apparatus, and in the second mode, the image forming speed of the image forming apparatus. The full-rate carriage 1 is driven so as to have a higher scanning speed.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an image copying apparatus centered on the image processing unit 13 described above. In the figure, an image processing unit 13 includes a clock generator 1.
3a, counter 13b, synchronization signal generation circuit 13c, read image processing unit 13d, memory 13e, synchronization signal generation circuit 1
3f, an output image processing unit 13g and a CPU 13h. The clock generator 13a generates a reference clock,
It is supplied to the counter 13b. The counter 13b counts the reference clock and supplies the divided clock to the synchronization signal generation circuit 13c. Synchronous signal generation circuit 13c
Generates two types of synchronization signals VIDEO-CLK1 and VIDEO-CLK2 according to the control signal S2 from the CPU 13h, and supplies them to the read image processing unit 13d. That is, when scanning is performed in the above-described first mode, the synchronization signal VIDEO-CL
K1 is supplied to the read image processing unit 13d, and when scanning is performed in the second mode, the synchronization signal VIDEO-CLK2 is supplied to the read image processing unit 13d.

The read image processing unit 13d receives the synchronization signal V
IDEO-CLK1 or synchronization signal VIDEO-CLK
According to 2, the original image signal from the CCD sensor 5 is read, A / D converted and shading corrected, and then supplied to the memory 13e. The memory 13e is a CPU
In accordance with the address control from 13h, while sequentially storing the original image data from the read image processing 13d, the stored original image data is supplied to the output image processing unit 13g. Next, the synchronizing signal generation circuit 13f generates a normal synchronizing signal and supplies it to the output image processing unit 13g. The output image processing unit 13g performs various filtering processes and γ correction on the document image data read from the memory 13e according to the control signal S3 from the CPU 13h,
It is sent to an image output device 20 such as a printer. The image output device 20 prints the document image data on a transfer sheet at a predetermined image forming speed and outputs it.

B. Next, an operation of the above-described embodiment will be described. Here, FIG. 5 is a conceptual diagram for explaining operations in the first mode and the second mode of the image copying apparatus according to the present embodiment. First, when the first mode is set, FIG.
As shown in (a), the full-rate carriage 1 accelerates from the scanning start position and moves at a constant scanning speed Vs1. During this time, the original image is read by the CCD sensor 5 in accordance with the synchronization signal VIDEO-CLK1 from the synchronization signal generation circuit 13c (Scan).

The read document image is sent to the image processing unit 13.
And is sequentially stored in the memory 13e via the read image processing unit 13 and sent to the image output device 20 via the output image processing unit 13g. Image output device 20
Then, the supplied document image is printed on a transfer sheet and output.

The full-rate carriage 1 decelerates near the end, and when reaching the end, accelerates in the opposite direction, that is, toward the scanner start position (G1), moves at a constant speed Vr, and decelerates near the scanner start position. And stop (R
eturn). During this time, the image output device 20 is in a standby state until the next original image data is supplied (II).
G).

Next, when the second mode is selected,
As shown in FIG. 5B, the full rate carriage 1
It accelerates from the scanning start position and moves at a constant scanning speed Vs2. The relationship between the scanning speed Vs2 and the scanning speed Vs1 in the first mode described above is Vs2> Vs1. During this time, the original image is read by the CCD sensor 5 according to the synchronization signal VIDEO-CLK2 from the synchronization signal generation circuit 13c (Scan).

The read document image is sent to the image processing unit 13.
And is sequentially stored in the memory 13e via the read image processing unit 13 and sent to the image output device 20 via the output image processing unit 13g. Image output device 20
Then, the supplied document image is printed on a transfer sheet and output (Print).

The full-rate carriage 1 decelerates near the end, and when reaching the end, accelerates in the opposite direction, ie, toward the scanner start position (G1), moves at a constant speed Vr, and decelerates near the scanner start position. And stop (R
eturn). The acceleration G1 and the speed Vr when returning to the scanner start position are not changed because there is a physical limit. During this time, the image output device 20 is in a standby state until the next original image data is supplied (II).
G).

FIG. 6 is a conceptual diagram for comparing operations in the first mode and the second mode. In the first mode shown in FIG. 6A, the scanning speed and the image forming speed are the same as in the related art. On the other hand, FIG.
In the second mode shown in FIG. 7, since the scanning speed on the image reading device side is higher than the image forming speed of the image output device, it can be seen that the cycle time is shortened and the overall productivity is improved. That is, the productivity can be improved regardless of whether a plurality of originals are copied or a single copy of a plurality of originals.

The difference from the image forming speed of the image output device caused by increasing the scanning speed of the image reading device is:
By adjusting the capacity of the memory 13e, an adverse effect is prevented. That is, the memory 13e only needs to have a capacity of (maximum read original size × (Vs2−Vp) / Vs2). Note that Vp is the process speed in the image output device. In this case, Vp <Vs2. However, the memory 13e may be for one page, or may be for RGB3.
A color component or four colors of KYMC may be used.

FIG. 7 is a conceptual diagram showing the torque characteristics of the stepping motor 2. As shown,
This is the speed range in the first mode, where Vs1 / 4 is the speed when the copy magnification is 4 times and 4 · Vs1 is the speed when the copy magnification is 1/4 times. On the other hand, the speed range in the second mode is a speed range included in the above speed range. Within this range, the scanning speed can be increased without increasing the load on the stepping motor 2.

[0031]

As described above, according to the present invention, when the image information of a document is read by the reading means, and the image information of the read document is formed and output by the forming means, the speed setting is performed. Means for setting the reading speed of the image information by the reading means to a speed faster than the forming speed of the image information by the forming means. Therefore, even when copying one original plural times, the frequency of use is high. Even when one copy of a plurality of documents is copied, there is an advantage that the overall productivity can be improved.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side view illustrating a configuration of an image reading device of an image copying apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of the image copying apparatus according to the present embodiment.

FIG. 3 shows an image reading control unit 10 and a motor control unit 11
FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the configuration of FIG.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an image copying apparatus centered on an image processing unit 13;

FIG. 5 is a conceptual diagram for explaining operations in a first mode and a second mode of the image copying apparatus according to the present embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a conceptual diagram for comparing operations in a first mode and a second mode.

FIG. 7 is a conceptual diagram showing torque characteristics of the stepping motor 2.

FIG. 8 is a conceptual diagram for explaining an operation example of an image copying apparatus when an image output device having the same image forming speed as the reading speed of an image reading device is combined in the related art.

FIG. 9 is a conceptual diagram for explaining an operation example of an image copying apparatus when an image output apparatus having a higher image forming speed than a reading speed of an image reading apparatus is combined in the related art.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Full-rate carriage (reading means) 2 Stepping motor 3 Half-rate carriage 5 CCD sensor (reading means) 10 Image reading control section (speed setting means, selecting means) 11 Motor control section 12 Illumination control section 13 Image processing section (reading of read image) Control means) 13e memory (storage means) 13h CPU (read image capture control means) 20 image output device (formation means)

Claims (6)

[Claims] A reading unit configured to read image information of the document; a forming unit configured to form image information of the document read by the reading unit; a reading speed of the image information read by the reading unit; And a speed setting means for setting a speed higher than a forming speed of the image forming apparatus. 2. A first mode in which the reading speed of the image information by the reading unit is substantially the same as the forming speed of the image information by the forming unit, and the reading speed of the image information by the reading unit is an image by the forming unit. Selecting means for selecting one of a second mode faster than the information forming speed; and the speed setting means for reading the image information by the reading means in accordance with the mode selected by the selecting means. 2. The image copying apparatus according to claim 1, wherein: 3. The image copying apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a storage unit for sequentially storing the image information read by the reading unit and sequentially sending the stored image information to the forming unit. apparatus. 4. The storage device according to claim 1, wherein the storage device has a storage capacity sufficient to absorb a speed difference between a reading speed of the image information by the reading device and a forming speed of the image information by the forming device. 3. The image copying apparatus according to 3. 5. A reading image capturing control means for changing a capturing timing of image information read by said reading means according to a reading speed of image information by said reading means. Image copying equipment. 6. A maximum speed of reading image information by the reading unit in the second mode is equal to or less than a maximum speed of reading image information by the reading unit in the first mode. Claim 2
An image copying apparatus as described in the above.