JPH06267234A - Disk cartridge cleaning device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide a small-sized disk cartridge cleaning device capable of cleaning a disk cartridge in simpler operation in terms of a disk having its hub on the recording surface side only. CONSTITUTION:The device is equipped with a cartridge case in an opened book shape consisting of two connected plate-like parts 1a and 1b for housing the disk cartridge, and is provided with a lever 2 and a spring 3 for opening a shutter of the disk cartridge when the disk cartridge is inserted into the cartridge case. In addition, a circumferential surface of a columnar magnet for attracting the hub of the information recording medium incorporated into the disk cartridge in the vertical direction is constituted into a pinion shape, while a rack is constituted to enable the pinion shaped circumferential surface to move under intermesh with each other.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a cleaning device for cleaning the surface of an information recording medium rotatably supported in a disk cartridge, and more particularly to a cartridge case type compact disk cartridge cleaning device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In magneto-optical discs, optical discs, etc., there is a problem that an error occurs during recording / reproduction due to dust adhering to the disc surface which is an information recording medium. In order to reduce this error, the disk is shaped like a cartridge (disk cartridge)
The shutter of the disc cartridge is rotatably housed therein and is closed during storage and when not in use.However, when the disc cartridge is loaded into the disc drive device, the shutter opens to expose the disc surface. At this time, dust is likely to adhere to the disc surface. From such a point, some cleaning devices for removing dust adhering to the disk surface have been proposed and put into practical use. They are intended for discs of the type in which the hub provided at the center of the disc is on both sides of the disc.

[0003]

As described above, the conventional disk cartridge cleaning device has a problem that only the type disk having the hub on both sides of the disk is targeted or the device is large. there were.

[0004]

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION The present invention solves the problems of the prior art as described above, and also proposes a patent application by the same applicant.
An object of the present invention is to further improve the disk cartridge cleaning device for a disk in which the hub disclosed in No. 337937 exists only on one side of the disk, and to provide a small disk cartridge cleaning device that can be cleaned by a simpler operation. I am trying.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above object, the present invention is a disk cartridge cleaning device for cleaning the surface of an information recording medium rotatably supported in a disk cartridge, the cleaning device being closed. The cartridge case has two case pieces having a shape capable of accommodating the disk cartridge when it is in a state of being openably and closably supported. One of the case pieces operates in conjunction with the operation of inserting the disk cartridge. A lever for opening the shutter of the disc cartridge and a spring for returning the lever to the initial position. The pinion gear is rotatably supported on one of the case pieces and always meshes with the pinion gear. A rack gear having a gear portion is supported so as to be capable of advancing and retreating, and the above information recording medium is The pinion gear is provided with a magnet that can be attracted to the hub, and the information recording that is attracted by the pinion gear and the hub when the rack gear is advanced and retracted while the disk cartridge is housed in both case pieces and the pinion gear is rotated The medium rotates, the rack gear is formed in a fan shape, and the rack gear is configured to be rotatable about a rotation shaft at a main position, and a window portion is provided on one case piece constituting the cartridge case, The window portion is arranged at a position where it can face the information recording medium exposed when the shutter of the disc cartridge is opened,
A cleaning member is removably inserted in the window, and the cleaning member is detachably fixed to the window, and the cleaning surface is the surface of the information recording medium with the cleaning member fixed. It is characterized in that it is configured to perform cleaning by sliding contact with the cleaning member, and to be provided with a stain sample for clarifying the replacement time of the cleaning member.

[0006]

Since the lever 2 and the spring that operate to open the shutter 8 of the disk cartridge 6 when the disk cartridge 6 is inserted into the cartridge case 1 are provided, the operator can save the time and effort of opening the shutter. Can be held open. In addition, the hub 13 of the information recording medium 10 built in the disc cartridge 6
Of the columnar magnet having a flat surface portion for vertically adsorbing the flat surface is formed into a pinion shape, a rack meshing with the peripheral surface of the pinion shape is configured to be movable, and the window portion 5 is formed in the cartridge case 1. Equipped with a cleaning member
The cleaning member 21 is inserted into the window 5 with the longitudinal direction of 21 aligned with the radial direction of the information recording medium 10, and the cleaning member 21 is detachably fixed to the window 5, and the cleaning member 21 is fixed. Since the cleaning is performed in this state, the information recording medium 10 can be cleaned simply by pressing the cartridge case 1 with one hand and moving the rack with the other hand.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an embodiment of a cleaning device to which the present invention is applied. This cleaning device has the same shape and dimensions as a commercially available cartridge case, and reference numeral 1 is a spread book-shaped cartridge case composed of two plate-like parts (case pieces 1a and 1b) that are openably and closably connected. Reference numeral 2 is a lever that is pushed by the disk cartridge and tilts when the disk cartridge is inserted. Reference numeral 3 is a coil spring (torsion spring) that gives a restoring force to the tilted lever. Reference numeral 4 denotes a shaft for connecting the plate-like case pieces 1a and 1b forming the cartridge case and opening and closing the cartridge case 1, and two sets of hemispherical shapes formed on the case pieces 1a and 1b, respectively. Consists of irregularities. Reference numeral 5 denotes a cleaning member 21 so that the surface of the information recording medium 10 housed in the case can be cleaned when the cartridge case is closed.
(See FIG. 9) It is a window portion provided for inserting.

FIG. 2 is an enlarged view of an essential part for explaining the operation of the lever 2 and the coil spring 3 shown in FIG. 1, and shows a circle in FIG. When the disc cartridge 6 is not inserted, the lever 2 moves to the coil spring 3
Is in a protruding state as shown in FIG. When the disk cartridge 6 (FIG. 2) is inserted from the end of the case piece 1a (from the upper right in FIG. 1), that is, from the insertion direction A shown in FIG. The roller 2a is pushed by the edge of the disk cartridge 6, and the lever 2 moves to the coil spring 3
The cartridge case 1 rotates about an axis 7 near the corner of the cartridge case 1 and tilts as shown in FIG. At this time,
Since a restoring force is applied to the lever 2 by the coil spring 3, the roller 2 at the tip of the lever 2 is pressed against the lower edge 6a of the disc cartridge 6 as shown in the figure. That is, as the disc cartridge 6 is inserted downward in the figure, the tip of the lever 2 moves while sliding the lower edge of the disc cartridge 6 in the direction of the arrow in the figure. At that time, the tip of the lever 2 pushes the bar 9 integrally protruding from the shutter 8, and the shutter 8 starts to open as shown in FIG.
When the disc cartridge 6 is finally inserted to the final storage completion position as shown in FIG. 3, the lever 2 is completely tilted, at which time the shutter 8 is opened to a predetermined position and the disc 10 is exposed. The roller 2a at the tip of the lever 2 may be made of resin or metal, but it is necessary that the roller 2a is made of a material that easily slides along the edge 6a of the cartridge 6.

The disk cartridge 6 includes a case piece 1a,
It is fixed by closing 1b. At this time, the position of the window portion 5 is preset so that the opening portion 6b (the portion where the shutter 8 is opened) of the disc cartridge 6 and the window portion 5 on the cartridge case 1 overlap. Therefore, Fig. 4
As shown in, the information recording medium 10 is exposed to the outside of the case through the opening 6b and the window 5. Therefore, as will be described later, the cleaning member 21 is provided in the opening 6b and the window 5.
It is possible to clean the information recording medium 10 by inserting and seating it to bring it into contact with the surface of the information recording medium 10 and rotating the information recording medium 10.

In FIG. 4, reference numeral 11 is a pinion gear including a magnet inside. The pinion gear 11 is rotatably supported at the center of the case piece 1a of the cartridge case 1 as shown in the vertical sectional view of FIG.
Having twelve. This projection 12 is a hub 13 provided at the center of the information recording medium 10 (attached to and detached from the spindle of the recording / reproducing apparatus).
The pinion gear 11 is completely fixed to the center of the information recording medium 10 by being fitted into the hole 13a provided in the center of the information recording medium and attracted by the magnetic force of the cylindrical magnet 11a on the pinion gear side. Therefore, when the pinion gear 11 is rotated, the information recording medium 10 is rotated.

As a mechanism for rotating the pinion gear 11, a rack gear 14 is illustrated in FIGS. 4 and 6. The rack gear 14 has a linear shape and slides in the arrow direction in FIG. 4 along a rail (groove) 15 linearly provided on the case piece 1a. The handle 16 provided on the rack gear 14 is for gripping this and sliding the rack gear 14. That is, the gear portion of the rack gear 14 and the pinion gear 1
Since the gear portion of No. 1 is always meshed, the rack gear 14
By moving back and forth in the direction of the arrow, the pinion gear 11 rotates, and as a result, the information recording medium 10 also rotates.

FIG. 7 is a perspective view of another embodiment according to the present invention in which the rack gear is formed in an arc shape (fan shape) and is rotatably supported on the case piece 1a. In the figure, an arcuate rack gear 17 rotates in the direction of the arrow in the figure about a rotary shaft 18 (the position of the fan), and at that time, the pinion gear 11 that meshes with the gear parts rotates. In the figure, the handle 19 is a projection for pinching the handle 19 to rotate the rack gear 17. FIG. 8 is an enlarged view of the rack gear and the pinion gear portion of FIG. 7. As shown in FIG. 8, stoppers 20 are provided at both ends of the arcuate rack gear 17. This is to prevent the pinion gear 11 from coming off the arcuate rack gear 17. As described above, by using the pinion gear and the rack gear, it is possible to give the information recording medium 10 a rotation closer to a constant speed rotation than directly rotating the magnet with a finger.

FIG. 9 is a perspective view showing a state in which the cleaning member 21 is inserted into the window portion 5 of the cartridge case 1. FIG. 4 or FIG. 7 with the information recording medium 10 exposed, and FIG.
As is clear from a comparison of the two, the cleaning member 21 is in the longitudinal direction (strictly speaking, the cleaning member 21 is the information recording medium 10).
The cleaning member 21 is inserted so that the longitudinal direction of the portion in contact with the) coincides with the radial direction of the information recording medium 10.
When the cleaning member 21 is inserted, the length of the contact portion with the information recording medium 10 in the longitudinal direction is preferably equal to or more than the width of the recording area of the information recording medium 10.

FIG. 10 is a sectional view taken along line AA of FIG. The cleaning member 21 is a pad made of an elastic material, and is fixed to the window 5 of the cartridge case 1 as shown in the figure. When the case piece 1a is closed on the case piece 1b, the information recording medium 10 is opened through the opening 6b. Touch the recording surface and touch it softly. The soft pressing is possible because the cleaning member 21 is an elastic body such as sponge.
When the cleaning member 21 is fixed to the cartridge case 1, the cleaning member 21 may be pressed into the cartridge case 1. Since the cleaning member is an elastic body as described above, the press-fitting is easy and the holding force is sufficient. If the cleaning member 21 is fixed to the cartridge case 1 as described above, it is not necessary to hold the cleaning member 21 by hand at the time of cleaning, which facilitates the cleaning operation.

FIG. 11 shows a cleaning member 21 which can be detachably fixed to the window 5 of the cartridge case.
It is another example of. In the figure, 22 is a pad, 23 is a resin block, and 24 is a hook provided on the resin block. As shown in the sectional view of FIG. 12, the pad 22 has a protrusion 22
By pressing a into the recess of the resin block 23, it is fixed to the resin block. In this embodiment, when the cleaning member 21 is inserted into the window portion 5 of the cartridge case,
When the hook 24 is elastically deformed, the hook 24 is press-fitted into the inner peripheral edge portion of the window portion 5, and when detached, the hook 24 is pushed to detach the resin block, and the pad 22 is removed.

In FIG. 13, a stain sample 25, which serves as a reference for determining when to replace the cleaning member 21 depending on the stain state of the cleaning member 21, is attached to the same cartridge case surface as the bottom surface side of the cleaning member 21. This is an example. As the stain sample 25, for example, the same material as the pad 22 is used, the stain state is clearly shown by dividing it into several concentration stages, and it is possible to directly compare with the pad, thereby accurately determining the replacement time. It was made possible. As the stain sample 25, the surface of the pad for disposal, which has been used until then and has reached the limit of stain, may be cut off and attached.

At the time of cleaning, first, the disk cartridge 6 is inserted into the cartridge case 1, the cartridge case is closed, and the side having the pinion gear 11 is the upper surface,
When the cartridge case 1 is held by one hand and the grip is grasped by the other hand, and the rack gear is moved to rotate the information recording medium 10 once, the information recording medium 10 is pressed by the cleaning member 21 pressed against the information recording medium 10. The entire recording surface of is wiped off. In the case where the information recording medium 10 is not sufficient to rotate once, if the rack gear is alternately moved in the opposite direction, the information recording medium 10 correspondingly changes its rotation direction for each rotation, and But you can wipe the recording surface. When the cleaning member 21 is too short to clean the entire width of the recording surface at one time, the cleaning member 21 may be configured to be movable in the radial direction of the information recording medium 10 along the window 5. The entire cleaning can be performed by moving the cleaning member 21 and rotating the information recording medium 10 again. However, normally, the length of the cleaning member 21 is set long so that the width of the recording surface in the radial direction can be covered by one cleaning so as to avoid such inefficiency.

[0018]

As described above, according to the present invention,
A disk cartridge cleaning device can be realized with almost the size of a cartridge case, cleaning can be started only by inserting a disk cartridge, and cleaning can be performed simply by moving a rack gear with one hand, so that cleaning can be easily performed. It should be noted that this cleaning device can be created by making a necessary improvement to the existing cartridge case.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing an embodiment of a cleaning device to which the present invention is applied.

FIG. 2 is an enlarged view of a main part of the embodiment shown in FIG.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing one state of the embodiment shown in FIG.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view showing another embodiment of the present invention.

5 is a cross-sectional view showing the main parts of FIG.

FIG. 6 is a top view showing a main part of FIG.

FIG. 7 is a perspective view showing another embodiment of the present invention.

8 is a top view showing a main part of FIG. 7. FIG.

FIG. 9 is a perspective view showing another embodiment of the present invention.

10 is a cross-sectional view taken along the line AA of FIG.

FIG. 11 is a perspective view showing another embodiment of the main part of FIG.

12 is a cross-sectional view of FIG.

FIG. 13 is a perspective view showing another embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 ... Cartridge case, 2 ... Lever, 3 ... Coil spring, 4 ... Shaft, 5 ... Window part, 6 ... Disk cartridge, 7 ... Rotation shaft, 8 ... Shutter, 9 ... Bar, 10 ... Information recording medium, 11 ... Pinion gear , 12 ... Protrusion, 13 ... Hub, 14 ...
Rack gear, 15 ... Rail, 16 ... Handle, 17 ... Arc rack gear, 18 ... Rotating shaft, 19 ... Handle, 20 ... Stopper, 21 ... Cleaning member, 22 ... Pad, 23 ... Resin block, 24 ... Hook, 25 ... Dirt sample.

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A disk cartridge cleaning device for cleaning the surface of an information recording medium rotatably supported in the disk cartridge, wherein the cleaning device is capable of accommodating the disk cartridge in an internal space when in a closed state. It is composed of a cartridge case in which two case pieces each having a shape are pivotally supported so as to be openable and closable, and one of the case pieces has a lever that operates in conjunction with the operation of inserting the disk cartridge to open a shutter of the disk cartridge. A disk cartridge cleaning device comprising a spring for returning the lever to an initial position. 2. A pinion gear is rotatably supported on one of the case pieces, and a rack gear having a gear portion that constantly meshes with the pinion gear is movably supported.
A magnet that can be attracted to the hub of the information recording medium is provided in the pinion gear, and when the rack gear is advanced and retracted while the disk cartridge is housed in both case pieces and the pinion gear is rotated, the magnet is attracted by the pinion gear and the hub. The disk cartridge cleaning device according to claim 1, wherein the information recording medium is configured to rotate. 3. The disk cartridge cleaning device according to claim 2, wherein the rack gear is formed in a fan shape and is configured to be rotatable around a rotation shaft at a main position of the fan. 4. A window portion is provided on one case piece constituting the cartridge case, and the window portion is arranged at a position facing the information recording medium exposed when the shutter of the disk cartridge is opened. The disk cartridge cleaning device according to claim 1, 2 or 3, wherein a cleaning member is detachably inserted into the window portion. 5. A cleaning member is removably fixed to the window portion, and cleaning is performed by sliding the cleaning surface in contact with the surface of the information recording medium with the cleaning member fixed. The disk cartridge cleaning device according to claim 4. 6. The disk cartridge cleaning device according to claim 4, wherein the cleaning member has a stain sample for clarifying the replacement time of the cleaning member.