JP5002141B2 - Damper apparatus, apparatus equipped with the same, and image forming apparatus - Google Patents

Description

  BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a damper device for a supporting shaft opening / closing body and an image forming apparatus, and more particularly, to an apparatus main body and a rotation unit configured to be opened and closed in a rotating direction around a supporting shaft provided in the apparatus main body The present invention relates to a damper device attached to the apparatus, an apparatus including the damper device, and an image forming apparatus.

  The image forming apparatus may include an image forming apparatus main body and a rotation unit such as a reversing unit configured to be rotatable about the axis of the apparatus main body and openable / closable. An image reading unit, an image forming unit, a paper supply unit, and the like are disposed in the apparatus main body of such an image forming apparatus, and optional devices such as a reversing unit and a manual feed unit may be employed as the rotation unit. Such a rotation unit has an openable and closable structure that allows easy access to the inside for maintenance of the internal device and paper jam clearing processing. A damper device that suppresses the rotation speed of the opening / closing portion is provided between the apparatus main body and the rotation member. Further, it is desirable that such a damper device has a configuration that does not hinder the operability of the rotating unit and the workability inside the device such as maintenance.

  In general, as the above-described damper device, there is a device in which a link mechanism constituted by a sheet metal is arranged between the device main body and the rotation unit, and a damper mechanism for preventing the link mechanism from being opened / closed rapidly is arranged in this link mechanism. .

Patent Document 1 discloses a structure that employs such a damper device. This is because the pressure arm that pushes up the bottom plate is fixed to the pressure shaft, the spring-loaded arm fixed to the pressure shaft is rotated by the spring, and the pressure arm is rotated in the same direction. Yes, the bottom plate locks the protruding piece on the lower surface with the bottom plate release slider, projects the pin on the spring-loaded arm, fixes the pin to the damper fixed to the housing, and feeds the paper feed tray to the main body of the copier When the bottom plate is unlocked by the bottom plate release slider, the bottom plate is lifted through the pressurizing arm by the pressure applied by the spring. At this time, the bottom plate slowly rises due to the action of the damper, and is applied to the corner claws. Impact force is alleviated.
JP-A-11-227955

However, the above-described damper device made of sheet metal requires a large space for folding the link mechanism when the rotating unit is closed, and when the rotating unit is opened, the link mechanism is unfolded to perform maintenance and other workability inside the apparatus. The operability is not smooth.

  In the image forming apparatus, various types of rotating units are attached to the image forming apparatus main body. As one of such rotating units, there is a double-sided unit that reverses transfer paper in order to perform double-sided printing. The double-sided unit is equipped with a transfer unit to simplify the jam-clearing process to eliminate paper jams, and the weight is large, so it is necessary to improve the operability and maintenance such as operability and maintenance. Therefore, there is a demand for a damper device that can reduce the cost.

  Therefore, the present invention has been made in view of the above-described conventional problems, and the damper device is a simple mechanism, the operability of the opening / closing unit, the workability inside the device such as maintenance, improvement of safety, and space saving. The purpose is to reduce costs.

The invention of claim 1
In a damper device provided in an apparatus having an apparatus main body and a double-sided unit configured to be openable and closable in a rotation direction around a support shaft in the apparatus main body,
At the bottom of the duplex unit,
A coil spring member that is an elastic member that expands and contracts in the longitudinal direction;
A wire-like member which is a linear connecting member having one end connected to one end of the coil spring member;
A pulley that is a deflection member that changes the erection direction of the wire-like member ;
A pin member that is a locking member for locking the other end of the coil spring member;
On the device body side, provided with another pin member that is a locking member for locking one end of the wire member,
The coil spring member, the wire-like member, the pulley, and the both pin members are arranged in a substantially horizontal state below the double-sided unit, and the wire-like member is deflected at right angles by the pulley, and The damper device is characterized in that the upper portion of the duplex unit is pivotally biased so as to be closed obliquely upward.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the damper device according to the first aspect , the coil spring member as the elastic member is arranged substantially parallel to the axis of the support shaft.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the damper device according to the first or second aspect, a pulley that is the deflection member and a wire-shaped member that is the linear connecting member are disposed in the double-sided unit close to the support shaft. It is characterized by that.

A fourth aspect of the present invention is an apparatus comprising the damper device according to any one of the first to third aspects.

A fifth aspect of the present invention is an image forming apparatus comprising the damper device according to any one of the first to third aspects , wherein the apparatus main body is an image forming apparatus main body, and the duplex unit is an additional apparatus.

According to the present invention, the damper device can be installed inside the double-sided unit, the damper device can have a simple configuration, and the operability of the double-sided unit, workability inside the device such as maintenance, safety Improvement, space saving, and cost reduction can be achieved.

  The best mode for carrying out the present invention will be described below with reference to the embodiments shown in the drawings.

Embodiments of an image forming apparatus according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. A front view of the image forming apparatus 1 according to the embodiment, FIG. 2 is a side view showing a state where the damper device is attached to the image forming apparatus according to an embodiment, FIG. 3 is a unit in an image forming apparatus according to a reference example plan showing the closed state diagram, FIG. 4 is an image forming apparatus according to the reference example, a plan view showing a state in which the unit is open, Fig. 5 when attaching the damper device in an image forming equipment according to the embodiment FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing an example of a fixing method of the pin member and the spring member of the damper device according to the embodiment, and FIG. 7 is a perspective view of the damper device according to the embodiment. FIG. 8 is a perspective view showing a state in which the wire member of the damper device according to the embodiment is deflected by a pulley.

As shown in FIG. 1, the image forming apparatus 10 according to this example includes an image forming unit 11, a document reading unit 12, and a paper supply unit 13 in the image forming apparatus main body 1. This is an in-cylinder discharge type in which a paper discharge unit 14 is disposed between the two. Also, this is the image forming apparatus main body 1 and the support shaft 2 is provided, duplex unit 3 is rotating unit, as illustrated, the axis in the closed Ji so that rotates thereabove obliquely upward It is supported. In such an image forming apparatus 10, the duplex unit 3 is closed to the image forming apparatus main body 1 when the image forming apparatus 10 is used, and is opened (represented by a broken line in FIG. 1) when maintenance or jam is eliminated. The

In this example, a damper device 20 is disposed between the image forming apparatus main body 1 and the duplex unit 3. In the present example, the main part of the damper device 20 is disposed in the vicinity of the support shaft 2 in the duplex unit 3 so as to be entirely horizontal. The damper device 20 includes a coil spring member 21 that is an elastic member, a wire member 22 that is a linear connection member, a pulley 23 that is a deflection member, and pin members 24 and 25 that are locking members.

In this example, as shown in FIG. 2, the coil spring member 21 is disposed parallel to the axis of the supporting shaft 2, the coil spring member 21, as shown in FIG. 6, is engaged with one end Gapi down member 24 .

Further, in this embodiment, it is mounted so that the pulley 23 is deflected member supporting shaft 2 near the same height position and the pin member 25 for locking the coil spring member 21. The pulley 23 is rotatable about a rotation axis perpendicular to the axis of the coil spring member 21. Further, one end of a wire-like member 22 is attached to the other end of the coil spring member 21 and extends in the direction of the duplex unit 3 through the pulley 23. In other words, the wire-like member 22 extends horizontally from the coil spring member 21 by the pulley 23, is direction-changed at a substantially right angle by the pulley 23, and is locked to the pin member 25 in the double-sided unit 3 toward the double-sided unit 3.

  In this example, a hook portion 21 a is formed at one end of the coil spring member 21 and is locked so as to be hooked on the pin member 24. The pin member 24 has a convex ring portion 24a for preventing the coil spring member 21 from coming off. Further, the other end of the wire-like member 22 is fixed to a pin member 25 disposed on the inner wall of the duplex unit 3 as shown in FIG. In this example, one end of the wire-like member 22 is fixed with a caulking portion 22b to form an annular portion 22a, and the annular member 22a is engaged with the pin member 25 to be locked. The pin member 25 is formed with a convex ring portion 25a for preventing the wire-like member 22 from coming off.

  As described above, in this example, as shown in FIGS. 2 and 5, the coil spring member 21, the wire-like member 22, the pulley 23, and the pin members 24 and 25 of the damper device 20 are spaced apart from the support shaft 2. Instead, they are arranged in close proximity. That is, when the damper device 20 is arranged close to the support shaft 2 as in this example, the movement dimension of the wire-like member is shorter than when the damper device is arranged away from the support shaft 2, and the coil spring member 21 The required extension dimension is reduced, and the overall length of the coil spring member 21 can be shortened. In FIG. 5, the length (11 in the figure) in the front view of the wire-like member 22 when the duplex unit 3 is in the open state, and the length of the wire-like member (reference numeral 41) when the damper device is attached to the upper part. (L2) was shown. Thus, by attaching the damper device in the vicinity of the support shaft 2, the dimensions of the coil spring member 21 and the wire-like member 22 can be reduced.

According to the reference example, when the duplex unit 3 is changed from the closed state (the state shown in FIG. 3) to the opened state (the state shown in FIG. 4), the coil spring member 21 is extended. For this reason, the double-sided unit 3 is biased in the closing direction by elasticity, and the rotational momentum of the double-sided unit 3 can be buffered. The same applies to this embodiment.

  In this example, the pulley 23 is described as an example of the deflection member. However, the deflection member is not limited to the pulley, and a resin guide member may be used. The guide member is desirably made of a resin having a sufficient round shape and low frictional resistance, such as polyacetal resin (POM), in order to smooth the movement of the wire-like member 22.

FIG. 9 is a plan view showing a state in which the unit is closed in the image forming apparatus according to the present embodiment, and FIG. 10 is a plan view showing a state in which the unit is opened in the image forming apparatus shown in FIG.

In this example, the main part of the damper device 30 is arranged in the lower part in the duplex unit 3. The damper device 30 of this example includes a coil spring member 31 that is an elastic member, a wire member 32 that is a linear coupling member, a pulley 33 that is a deflection member, and pin members 34 and 35 that are locking members. . In this example, as shown in FIGS. 9 and 10, the damper device 30 is disposed below the duplex unit 3 so as to be in a substantially horizontal state. That is, the coil spring member 31 is disposed inside the double-side unit 3 in the vicinity of the support shaft 2 in parallel with the axis of the support shaft 2, and one end thereof is locked to a pin member 35 provided on the inner wall of the double-side unit 3. . Co Irubane member 31 at one end to form a hook portion of, but it is assumed that locking as hooked on the pin member 35, may be by other methods.

Further, in this example, in the duplex unit 3, a pulley 33, which is a deflection member, is attached in the vicinity of the support shaft 2 so as to be at the same height as the pin member 35 that locks the coil spring member 31. . The pulley 33 is rotatable about a rotation axis perpendicular to the axis of the coil spring member 31. Further, one end of a wire-like member 32 is attached to the other end of the coil spring member 31 and extends in the direction of the image forming apparatus main body 1 through the pulley 33. That is, the wire-like member 32 extends horizontally from the coil spring member 31 by the pulley 33, is changed in direction substantially at right angles by the pulley 33, and is locked to the pin member 34 in the image forming apparatus main body 1 toward the image forming apparatus main body 1. Is done.

When both surface units 3 from the closed state to the open state, since the wire-like member 32 is pulled while stretching the coil spring member 31 elastically, condition duplex unit 3 from the closed state (the state in FIG. 9) to open (FIG. 10 state) and Do Rutoki, the coil spring member 5 is stretched. For this reason, the duplex unit 3 is urged in the closing direction by elasticity, and the rotational force of the duplex unit 3 is buffered.

Since both sides unit 3 side provided coil spring member 31 and the pulley 33, when the duplex unit 3 is optional, it is possible to reduce the cost without the need to attach the damper device to the image forming apparatus main body 1.

Moreover, it can be shorter the necessary length of the wire-like member than when disposed away Da damper device 30 from the support shaft 2, thus may be shorter overall length of the coil spring member 31. Further, it is possible to arrange the small damper device of the projected area in relatively surplus space duplex unit 3 a small space. Furthermore, since the wire-like member 32 only needs to be slightly exposed below the double-sided unit 3 when the double-sided unit 3 is opened, the workability when the unit is opened is improved without interfering with the double-sided unit. be able to.

1 is a front view of an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment. 1 is a side view illustrating a state in which a damper device is attached to an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment. FIG. 6 is a plan view showing a state in which a unit is closed in an image forming apparatus according to a reference example. In the image forming apparatus according to the reference example, it is a plan view showing a state in which the unit is open. It is a front view showing a state of arrangement of the wire over member when fitted with a damper device in different positions of the image forming apparatus according to the embodiment. It is the perspective view which showed an example of the fixing method of the pin member and spring member of the damper apparatus which concerns on an Example. It is the perspective view which showed an example of the fixing method of the wire-shaped member of the damper apparatus which concerns on an Example. It is a perspective view which shows the state by which the wire-shaped member of the damper apparatus which concerns on an Example is deflected by the pulley. It is a plan view showing a state in which the unit is closed in the image type apparatus according to the actual施例. FIG. 10 is a plan view showing a state where the unit is open in the image forming apparatus shown in FIG. 9.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Image forming apparatus main body 2 ... Spindle 3 ... Double-sided unit 5 ... Coil spring member 10 ... Image forming apparatus 11 ... Image forming part 12 ... Document reading part 13 ...・ Paper supply unit 14... Paper discharge unit 20... Damper device 21... Coil spring member 21 a... Hook unit 22. ··· Pulley 24 ··· Pin member 24a ··· Convex ring portion 25 ··· Pin member 25a ··· Convex ring portion 30 ··· Damper device 31 ··· Coil spring member 32 · · · Wire-like member 33 ..Pull pulley 34 ... Pin member 35 ... Pin member

Claims (5)

In a damper device provided in an apparatus having an apparatus main body and a double-sided unit configured to be openable and closable in a rotation direction around a support shaft in the apparatus main body,
At the bottom of the duplex unit,
A coil spring member that is an elastic member that expands and contracts in the longitudinal direction;
A wire-like member which is a linear connecting member having one end connected to one end of the coil spring member;
A pulley that is a deflection member that changes the erection direction of the wire-like member ;
A pin member that is a locking member for locking the other end of the coil spring member;
On the device body side, provided with another pin member that is a locking member for locking one end of the wire member,
The coil spring member, the wire-like member, the pulley, and the both pin members are arranged in a substantially horizontal state below the double-sided unit, and the wire-like member is deflected at right angles by the pulley, and A damper device characterized by rotating and energizing so that an upper part of a duplex unit is closed obliquely upward.

  2. The damper device according to claim 1, wherein the coil spring member, which is the elastic member, is disposed substantially parallel to the axis of the support shaft. 3. The damper device according to claim 1 , wherein a pulley that is the deflection member and a wire member that is the linear connecting member are disposed in the double-sided unit close to the support shaft . Apparatus characterized by comprising any one of the damper device 請 Motomeko 1-3. Claims 1 to include any of the damper device 3, the device body is an image forming apparatus, an image forming apparatus wherein the duplex unit is an addition unit.