JP3504527B2 - Plate recording medium processing system - Google Patents

Description

Description: BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0001] 1. Field of the Invention [0002] The present invention relates to automatically writing information on a plate-like recording medium such as a CD or DVD and printing the information on the surface of the recording medium. More particularly, the present invention relates to a processing system for a plate recording medium having a small and compact configuration. 2. Description of the Related Art First, the applicant of the present invention transports a plate-like recording medium such as a CD or DVD on a transport tray via a printing position of an ink-jet printer, thereby obtaining the surface of the recording medium. Has proposed a system that can perform desired printing. In addition, a system has been proposed in which a drive such as a CD writer is arranged while printing is performed and a master CD can be copied at the same time (WO).
97/11850). [0003] It is an object of the present invention to make such a system smaller and more compact. According to the present invention, there is provided a plate-shaped recording medium supply unit having a through hole formed in the center thereof, and predetermined information is written on the recording medium supplied from the supply unit. An information recording unit, a printing unit that prints on the surface of a recorded recording medium on which information has been written, a collection unit that collects the printed recording medium, and a recording medium from the supply unit to the information recording unit. in the processing system of the plate-like recording medium having a suction type of media carriers that carry: the printing unit includes a media transport tray that conveys through the printing position of the recording medium 12 received by the media receiving position The information recording section
It is in the discharge position directly above the medium conveying trays in the medium receiving position; includes a medium tray capable of moving in the recording medium passable discharge position and the recording medium to write information available insert position The media tray is positioned; falling from the discharge position
Up and down to guide the recording medium to the medium receiving position
A media guide of the formula is arranged;
A through hole formed in the medium transport tray and the recording medium;
A shaft that can be inserted through the through hole of the body.
The front end of the medium guide is the medium receiving position.
Standby position located immediately below the media transport tray at
In front of the medium transport tray at the medium receiving position
The tip is in the discharge position while penetrating the through hole.
Between the raised position located immediately below the media tray,
It is characterized by being able to move up and down. [0005] In the processing system having this configuration, the recording medium is conveyed as follows. A recording medium such as a CD transported from the supply unit to the information recording unit by the suction-type transport carrier is placed on a medium tray of the information recording unit and inserted into the information recording unit to write predetermined information. It is. The recording medium on which the information has been written is discharged from the information recording unit by the medium tray. Immediately below the discharge position of the medium tray, a medium transport tray of the printing unit is on standby. A suction-type medium carrier stands by immediately above the discharge position of the medium tray, and the recording medium that has been recorded is suction-held by the medium carrier. Thereafter, the medium tray returns to the inside of the information recording unit. [0006] Thereafter, the elevating guide rises through the medium transport tray of the printing unit, and its leading end reaches just below the recording medium sucked and held by the medium carrier. When the recording medium is dropped from the medium carrier after this state is formed, the recording medium is in a state in which the liftable medium guide penetrates the through hole, and while being guided by the medium guide, the recording medium is positioned directly below. Falling into the empty media transport tray. Therefore, even if the head between the information recording unit and the printing unit is large, the recording medium can be reliably dropped to a predetermined position on the medium transport tray. As described above, in the plate-shaped recording medium processing system according to the present invention, the recording medium already recorded by the up-and-down type medium guide is placed on the medium of the printing unit located below the information recording unit located above. The transfer tray can be reliably dropped to a fixed position. Therefore, a layout in which the information recording unit and the printing unit are arranged vertically can be adopted, and the apparatus can be made smaller and more compact than when the information recording unit and the printing unit are arranged in a plane direction. That is, the portions having the highest dimensions in the processing system are a supply section for holding a large number of plate-shaped recording media such as CDs and a recovery section for recovering the recording media. The dimensions generally determine the height dimension of the device. However, since the height dimensions of the information recording section and the printing section are smaller than the supply section and the collecting section, by arranging these information recording section and the printing section vertically, the dead space inside the apparatus can be effectively used, As a result, the device can be made small and compact. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An example of a CD processing system to which the present invention is applied will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing a schematic configuration of a CD processing system according to the present embodiment, and FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram for explaining the operation of a vertically movable medium guide. Referring to these drawings, the processing system 1 of the present embodiment includes a supply hopper 3 in which a CD 2 having a through hole 2a formed in the center is stored, and a CD 2 supplied from the supply unit 3 having a predetermined size. A drive 4 of a CD writer for writing the information, an ink jet printer 5 for printing on the surface of the CD 2A after the information is written, and a collection hopper 6 for collecting the printed CD 2B. The CD 2 is supplied from the supply hopper 3 to the drive 4,
It is transported to the collection hopper 6 via the inkjet printer 5. The mechanism for transporting CD2 is C
A suction-type medium carrier 7, 8 having a D suction port is provided. The medium carrier 7 linearly reciprocates horizontally between the supply hopper 3 and the drive 4 along a guide (not shown) formed in the system case 9. The other medium carrier 8 horizontally linearly reciprocates between the ejection side of the printed CD in the ink jet printer 5 and the collection hopper 6 along a guide (not shown) formed in the system case 9. Here, the ink jet printer 5 is a line printer, and conveys a plate-shaped medium conveyance tray 52 via a printing position of the ink jet head 51 to thereby drive the CD 2 carried on the medium conveyance tray 52.
This is the type that prints on the surface of the. The medium transport tray 52 has a rectangular shape, and a circular concave portion 53 is formed at the center of the medium transport tray 52, and the medium transport tray 52 carries the CD2. A through hole 54 is formed at the center of the circular recess 53. The medium transport tray 52 reciprocates between a medium receiving position shown by a solid line in FIG. 1 and a medium discharge position shown by an imaginary line on the opposite side of the inkjet head 51. Above the ink jet printer 5, C
The drive 4 of the D writer is arranged. When the medium tray 41 of the drive 4 is at the discharge position shown in FIG. 1, the medium transport tray 52 at the medium receiving position is located below the medium tray 41. That is,
The center of the medium tray 41 is the concave portion 53 of the medium transport tray 52.
To match the center. Here, a vertically movable medium guide 10 is disposed immediately below the concave portion 53 in the medium transport tray 52 at the medium receiving position. The medium guide 10 is, for example, an elongate shaft configured to move up and down by a rack and pinion type driving mechanism. Normally, the elevating type media guide 10 is located at a standby position where the leading end is located immediately below the medium transport tray 52, and from this position, the leading end is located at a raised position located immediately below the medium tray 41 of the drive 4 above. It is possible to move up to. Next, in the supply hopper 3 in which the blank CDs 2 are stored, a large number of CDs 2 are stacked in the vertical direction, and the height position of the uppermost CD 2 is almost equal to the drive 4. At the height of the medium tray 41. The suction-type medium carrier 7 suction-holds the CD 2 located at the uppermost position of the supply hopper 3, and then moves horizontally to reach just above the medium tray 41 at the discharge position of the drive 4. The CD 2 is dropped on the medium tray 41 at the position. On the other hand, when the medium transport tray 52 of the ink jet printer 5 reaches the discharge position, the medium carrier 8 can be moved directly above it. Therefore, the moving path of the medium carrier 8 is set at a position one step lower than the moving path of the other medium carrier 7. Media transport tray 52
The medium carrier 8 that holds the printed CD 2B carried by the scanner 6 moves horizontally and reaches a position immediately above the collection hopper 6. The collection hopper 6 also stores printed CD2B in a vertically stacked state. Referring mainly to FIG. 2 and FIG.
D: media tray 4 of drive 4 in processing system 1
The operation of transferring the recorded CD 2A from 1 to the medium transport tray 52 of the ink jet printer 5 located therebelow will be described. First, the CD 2 located at the uppermost position of the supply hopper 3 is sucked and held by the medium carrier 7 and delivered to the medium tray 41 of the drive 4. After this,
The medium tray 41 is inserted into the drive 4 to write predetermined information. The medium carrier 7 is waiting at a position where the CD 2 has been delivered to the medium tray 41. In addition, the elevating type medium guide 10 is at a standby position in which the tip is located below the medium transport tray 52. When the medium tray 41 is ejected after information writing, the recorded CD 2 is sucked and held by the medium carrier 7 which has been waiting. In addition, an elevating medium guide 1
0 rises through the through hole 54 of the medium transport tray 52 of the ink jet printer 5,
Directly below. This state is shown in FIGS. 2 and 3 (a). Thereafter, the medium tray 41 is pulled into the drive 4, and thereafter, the medium carrier 7 drops the CD2A. When the CD 2A falls, an elevating medium guide 10 whose leading end is located immediately below the through hole 2a at the center thereof is inserted. Therefore, the CD 2A falls while being guided by the medium guide 10. The medium guide 10 extends through the concave through hole 54 of the medium transport tray 52 of the inkjet printer 5 disposed below the drive 4. Therefore, the medium guide 1
The CD 2 </ b> A that falls along 0 automatically and surely falls into the concave portion 53 of the medium transport tray 52. FIG.
(B) shows this operation. After the CD 2A is thus carried in the concave portion 53 of the medium transport tray 52, as shown in FIG. 2C, the liftable medium guide 10 descends and returns to the initial position. Thereafter, the conveyance of the medium conveyance tray 52 is started, and desired printing is performed on the surface of the CD 2A by the inkjet printer 5. The printed CD2B is the medium carrier 8
And is stored in the collection hopper 6. As described above, in the plate recording medium processing system according to the present invention, the information recording section and the ink jet printer are arranged vertically in the system case, and the vertically movable medium guide is used. Then, the recording medium on which recording has been performed by the information recording section located on the upper side is surely dropped to a predetermined position of a medium transport guide of the ink jet printer. Therefore, according to the processing system of the present invention,
By effectively utilizing the dead space in the system case as compared with the case where the ink jet printer and the information recording unit are arranged in the plane direction, the device can be made small and compact.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a schematic configuration diagram showing a configuration of a main part of a CD processing system to which the present invention is applied. FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing an operation of transferring a recorded recording medium from a medium tray of a drive to a medium transport tray of an ink jet printer located below using a vertically movable medium guide in the processing system of FIG. 1; . FIGS. 3 (a) to 3 (c) show a state in which a recording medium which has been recorded by using a vertically movable medium guide in the processing system of FIG. It is explanatory drawing which shows the operation | movement of delivery. [Description of Signs] 1 CD processing system 2 CD 2a Through hole 2A opened at the center of CD CD recorded 2B Printed CD 3 Supply hopper 4 CD writer drive 41 Media tray 5 Inkjet printer 51 Inkjet head 52 Media transport tray 53 Media transport tray CD holding recess 54 Through hole 6 formed in center of recess Recovery hopper 7, 8 Suction media carrier 9 System case 10 Elevating media guide

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims 1] A plate-shaped recording medium supply section having a through hole formed at the center, and information recording for writing predetermined information on the recording medium supplied from the supply section. Unit, a printing unit that prints on the surface of the recorded recording medium after information is written, a collection unit that collects the printed recording medium, and a recording medium that is transported from the supply unit to the information recording unit. in the processing system of the plate-like recording medium having a suction type of media carriers, the printing unit includes a media transport tray that conveys through the printing position of the recording medium 12 received by the media receiving position, the information recording section includes a medium tray capable of moving in the insertion position can be written information to the discharge position and the recording medium capable of delivering the recording medium, just above the medium conveying trays in the medium receiving position Being adapted to the medium tray is positioned in said discharge position, the medium receiving the recording medium to drop from the discharge position
Lifting media guides
And the media guide has a through hole formed in the media transport tray.
Through the hole and the through hole of the recording medium.
The medium guide has a tip located at the medium receiving position.
A standby position located immediately below the medium transport tray,
The penetration of the media transport tray at the media receiving position
The tip is in the discharge position with the tip penetrating the hole.
Can be raised and lowered between the raised position located directly below the media tray
Processing system of the plate-like recording medium is ability.