JPH06100184A - Tray device for image forming device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To store the smaller sized paper by classifying it into the longitudinal two rows and increase the paper storing capacity of the tray in a paper feeding tray capable of storing the larger sized paper. CONSTITUTION:Two bottoms plates 3, 4 are arranged in a paper feeding tray 1 in a longitudinally divided condition, and a carrying belt device 10 is provided between the plates 3, 4. The carrying belt device 10 is used to move the paper from the plate 4 on the rear side toward the plate 3 on the front side, and the paper is moved in the condition where two plates are set in the lowered position. The front and rear plates are provided in an individually vertically movable manner, and the paper feeding condition is set by elevating the plate 3 on the front side for the smaller sized paper, while the plate 4 on the rear side is also elevated interlockingly with the plate 3 on the front side for the larger sized paper.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a paper feed tray used in an image forming apparatus such as an electrophotographic copying machine, and more particularly, it has two bottom plates capable of accommodating large-sized paper before and after the paper feed direction. The present invention relates to a paper feed tray that is divided into two parts and is configured so that the paper on the rear side can be moved in the tray after the paper on the front side has been sent out to continue the paper feeding operation.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In an image forming apparatus such as an electrophotographic copying machine or a printer, a universal type tray capable of accommodating paper of an arbitrary size is used in addition to a paper tray for accommodating a standard size of paper. May be used. In the universal type tray, for example,
There are known ones such as those disclosed in JP-A-0-16579. In the above-mentioned conventional paper feed tray, a bottom plate on which a sheet is placed is swingably provided, and a side guide is movably provided so as to regulate a side portion of the accommodated sheet. Then, the paper is placed on the bottom plate and the paper is pressed by the side guides for positioning,
The image forming apparatus is configured so that it can be set at a sheet feeding position and perform a sheet feeding operation.

In addition to the above-mentioned conventional paper feed tray, there is a paper feed tray capable of accommodating a large amount of paper, for example, as shown in Japanese Utility Model Laid-Open No. 64-535. In the large-capacity paper feed tray, a bottom plate on which the paper is placed can be provided so as to be vertically movable and tiltable, and the paper placed on the plate is fed by raising the bottom plate. The paper is positioned so that it can be fed toward the roller member of the apparatus. Then, by using these trays and the like, it is possible to store paper of any size in one tray, and it is possible to store a large number of trays such as a paper feed tray that stores only standard-size paper exclusively. The advantage that it is not necessary to use can be exhibited.

[0004]

In the paper feed tray as described above, for example, even a tray capable of accommodating A3 size papers can accommodate A4 or A5 size papers. When you store a sheet of paper, you will still have a large margin on the side of the tray. However, a general universal type tray is configured to accommodate the maximum size of paper that can be used in the copying machine, and there is a problem that it is always used with an extra space.

Therefore, in order to effectively use the extra space of the tray as described above, for example, JP-A-60-
As shown in Japanese Patent No. 238855, it is conceivable to store the paper in two rows in the width direction of the paper feed tray. However, with the tray of the conventional example, although it is possible to configure a paper feed tray capable of accommodating a large amount of small size paper, it is not possible to configure it as a universal tray. However, there is a problem that it is difficult to accommodate one type of large size paper. Further, in the paper feed tray, when the paper stored on one side is fed out, it is necessary to move the tray in the width direction and set another deposit at the paper feed position before performing the paper feeding operation. is there.

[0006]

It is an object of the present invention to solve the above-mentioned problems of the conventional paper feed trays. For a tray capable of accommodating a large size paper, two stacks of small size paper are arranged in front and behind. It is an object of the present invention to provide a sheet feeding tray that stores the sheet as a sheet, and moves the sheet on the rear side to the sheet feeding position after the sheet on the front side is sent out so that the sheet feeding operation can be continued.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION According to the present invention, a means for accommodating a sheet of an arbitrary size and positioning the sheet by a side guide is provided, and a bottom plate on which the sheet is placed can be moved up and down. Then, the present invention relates to a paper feed tray configured so that the roller device of the paper feed device performs the paper feeding operation at the position where the paper is raised. In the present invention, the bottom plate of the paper feed tray is provided in front of and behind the paper feed direction by dividing the bottom plate into two parts, and an operation for raising each bottom plate separately and a mechanism for interlocking the raising mechanism are provided. In the lower part of the paper feed tray, a conveyor belt device is arranged in parallel with the paper feed direction in correspondence with the position where the two bottom plates are lowered, and a small-sized paper sheet
When all the front side sheets are fed out in the state of being accommodated in one bottom plate, the sheets accommodated in the rear side bottom plate can be moved toward the front side bottom plate to continue the feeding operation. Is configured as follows. Further, in the paper feeding tray of the present invention, a large-sized paper is accommodated in a state of straddling two bottom plates, and is raised in a horizontal state through an interlocking mechanism of the two bottom plates, so that a general paper feeding tray The paper feeding operation can be performed in the same manner as in the above case.

As described above, in a paper feed tray capable of accommodating large-sized paper, even when two bottom plates are provided inside the tray, the two bottom plates can be raised in conjunction with each other. Thus, it is possible to carry out the action of feeding a large size sheet. When feeding small-sized paper, first feed the front paper, and then use the belt device located in the tray to move the rear paper toward the paper feed position. Since it is possible, it is possible to automatically move the paper inside the tray. Even when copying is performed using a small size sheet, a large number of sheets can be accommodated at once and the operability of the electrophotographic copying machine can be improved.

[0009]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS A sheet feeding tray device of an image forming apparatus of the present invention will be described with reference to the illustrated example. As shown in FIG. 1, in the paper feed tray 1 of the present invention, a space capable of accommodating a large size paper is arranged inside the frame 2. Then, two bottom plates 3 and 4 are arranged in the front and rear portions in the paper feeding direction with respect to the paper accommodation space of the tray. The side guides 5 are used to position the side surface of the paper stored in the tray.
, And press the side of the paper with the side guide, as in the case of a general type tray.
The paper can be positioned.

Further, in the paper feed tray 1, the conveyor belt device 10 is arranged parallel to the two bottom plates 3 and 4 in the paper feeding direction, and the conveyor belt device is arranged. Therefore, the opening 6 is provided in the bottom plate. Further, a paper feeding device 8 is arranged with respect to the paper feeding tray 1, and a paper feeding roller device provided in the paper feeding device 8 and a paper separating mechanism can be used to separate and feed paper. To be able to. Also,
A winding mechanism is arranged for the two bottom plates 3 and 4 as shown in FIG. The bottom plate winding device winds the ends of the wires 16 and 17 around the winding pulley 15 arranged on the side of the paper feed tray.

The take-up pulley 15 can be provided with a mechanism for separately taking up the wires 16 and 17 corresponding to the two plates. The two plates are independently taken up to raise the paper. To be able to Therefore, when feeding a small size sheet in the state of being accommodated in each bottom plate, the front plate 3
Only the wire is wound up by the wire 16 and is raised by the paper feeding device. In addition, 2 large sheets of paper
When the two bottom plates are supported, the wires 16 and 17 may be interlocked with each other to be wound around the take-up pulley 15 to raise a large-sized sheet in a horizontal state.

As shown in FIG. 2, the conveyor belt device 10 arranged in the paper feed tray of the present invention has the front bottom plate 3 and the rear bottom plate 4 at the lowermost position. It is arranged correspondingly. As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the conveyor belt device 10 arranged in the paper feed tray is provided with a drive pulley 11 for arranging a belt having a relatively wide width in front of and behind the moving direction of the paper. A system is used in which the drive pulley 11 is driven by a motor 13 while being bridged over the driven pulley 12. A pulse motor can be used as the drive motor 13, and when the paper is moved from the rear plate 4 toward the front plate 3, the control device feeds the paper to the motor. The pulse required for the sheet is applied so that the sheet can be transported inside the tray.

In the paper feed tray 1 of the present invention configured as described above, paper can be fed in the state shown in FIGS. The example shown in FIG. 4 is, for example,
It shows the case of feeding A3 size paper.
The paper P is placed over the two bottom plates 3 and 4, and the paper can be set at a position corresponding to the paper feeding device 8 by simultaneously raising the two bottom plates. Then, in this case, when all the sheets are sent out, the two bottom plates are simultaneously lowered so that the sheets are replenished.

On the other hand, in the example shown in FIG. 5, when feeding a small size sheet, the front and rear bottom plates 3,
4 shows the case where sheets of A4 size are placed. As shown in FIG. 5, when small size sheets P1 and P2 are supported on the respective plates,
For each plate, the operating state of the take-up pulley is set so as to move up and down independently. Then, first, the bottom plate 3 on the front side is raised to perform the operation of feeding the paper P1. In the state shown in FIG. 5,
When the paper P1 placed on the bottom plate 3 is completely fed, a detection signal from a sensor (not shown) causes
When it is determined that there is no paper on the bottom plate 3,
The plate 3 is lowered to the bottom.

The bottom plate 3 without paper
On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 6, the conveyance belt device 10 is operated from the bottom plate 4 on the rear side to send out the paper P2. Then, the paper P2 is moved to the front bottom plate 3 by the conveyor belt device 10.
When the positioning of the sheet is completed, the bottom plate 3 in which the sheet is newly stored raises the sheet toward the sheet feeding device and sets the state in which the sheet can be fed.
As described above, by placing small-sized sheets of paper as the two deposits on the two bottom plates, these sheets of paper are automatically moved inside the tray and the copying operation is continued. be able to.

Further, in the paper feed tray configured as described above, the sizes of the two bottom plates can be arbitrarily set, and the size is half the maximum size of paper that can be used in the copying machine. If the sheet can be supported by the front bottom plate, the size of the rear bottom plate can be arbitrarily set. Further, in the paper feed tray of the present invention, the conveyance belt device for conveying the paper inside the tray may be of any width or width as long as it can move the paper from the rear plate to the front plate. The length and the like can be set arbitrarily.

In addition to the above construction, the tray of the present invention is
As a mechanism for moving the two bottom plates up and down, in addition to the mechanism of winding the wires provided on the two plates by the winding pulley, respectively, a winding mechanism is provided only on the front plate, and It is also possible to use a mechanism that operates the connection mechanism and moves it up and down in a linked state. In addition, when moving the paper to the front side in the tray, a mechanism for releasing the pressed state by the side guide is provided, and the side guide is separated from the side of the paper by using a means such as actuating a solenoid. It is also possible to perform the pressing operation by the side guide after the sheet is moved to the front plate.

[0018]

Since the paper feed tray device of the image forming apparatus of the present invention is configured as described above, in the paper feed tray capable of accommodating a large size paper, the bottom placed inside the tray. Even when two plates are provided, the two bottom plates can be interlocked and raised to perform the action of feeding a large size sheet. When feeding small-sized paper, first feed the front paper, and then use the belt device located in the tray to move the rear paper toward the paper feed position. Since it is possible, it is possible to automatically move the paper inside the tray. Even when copying using a small size paper, a large number of paper
It can be accommodated once, and the operability of the electrophotographic copying machine can be improved.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a plan view of a paper feed tray of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view of the paper feed tray of FIG.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of a vertical movement mechanism of a bottom plate.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of a state in which a large size sheet is fed.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram of a state in which a small size sheet is fed.

FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram of a state in which the sheet is moved from the bottom plate on the rear side toward the bottom plate on the front side.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 paper feed tray, 2 frame, 3/4 bottom plate, 5 side guides, 8 paper feeder, 10 conveyor belt device, 15 winding pulley, 16/17 wire.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A means for accommodating a sheet of an arbitrary size and positioning the sheet by a side guide is provided, and a bottom plate on which the sheet is placed is configured to be movable up and down, and at a position where the sheet is raised, In a paper feeding tray configured to perform a paper feeding operation by a roller device of a paper feeding device, a bottom plate of the paper feeding tray is
The front and rear parts are divided into two parts, and an operation for individually raising each bottom plate and a mechanism for interlocking the raising mechanism are configured. The two bottom plates are lowered below the paper feed tray. Corresponding to the position, the conveyor belt device is arranged parallel to the paper feed direction, and when all the front side sheets are sent out while the small size sheets are stored in the two bottom plates, they are stored in the rear side bottom plate. The sheet feeding tray device of the image forming apparatus, wherein the sheet is moved toward the bottom plate on the front side so that the sheet feeding operation can be continued.