JPH07157151A - Document feeder - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To solve the problem of the occupation space becoming large because of the opening length of a guide member becoming long and being impossible to provide a large drop step difference on a document outlet and a paper discharge tray. CONSTITUTION:This is a document feeder which is contrived to discharge an inserted document by making it take a U-turn around a guide member 3 fitted around a supporting shaft 5 in a rotatable manner and which has a section of the guide member 3 modified to a shape near to a circle (a round shape), or to be more definite, to have its sectional form made closely to a circle on the whole imitating its base end part approximately to a semicircle and its tip part closely to a trapezoid with its lower side rising upward.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a document feeding apparatus applied to a document reading section of a facsimile machine or the like.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a facsimile apparatus, an original reading unit has an entrance and an exit for reading originals, and a fed original fed from an upper entrance is made a U-turn and discharged from an lower exit. There is one in the format. In this type of document feeder, a main body having a built-in scanner for reading an image of a fed document and a guide member (guide bracket) that guides a fed document around it and forms a document conveyance path between the main body and the main body. ) And a cover, which is attached to the guide member and forms a document conveyance path continuous with the above-mentioned conveyance path between the guide member and the guide member, and the cover and the guide member are provided when a document jam occurs. Since it is necessary to open the original transport path, the originals can be attached rotatably around the respective support shafts.

FIG. 6 shows an example of a conventional structure of a scanner section in a facsimile apparatus adopting the original U-turn method. A shows a main body, B shows a horizontally long U-turn guide member, and C shows a cover. A document (not shown) inserted from the upper entrance E by the paper feed tray D is first fed in by a feed roller a and a separation roller b provided on the guide member B and the cover C.
And the sheets are separated one by one and fed into the conveyance path c.
Then, the fed-in original is U-turned by the feed roller d provided at the base end portion of the guide member B and the conveyor belt e attached to the roller d, and fed into the conveyance path f on the main body A side. A document image is read by a scanner built in the main body A side. Then, the read document is sent out by the feed rollers g and h provided in opposition to the main body A and the guide member B, and is discharged onto the discharge tray G from the lower outlet F. There is.

[0004]

However, in the case of adopting the U-turn method, it is necessary to secure a certain document conveyance length for reading a document. Therefore, in the case of adopting the above-mentioned reading section structure. Inevitably, the lateral width of the guide member B becomes long, and then the opening length when the guide member B is opened around the support shaft i to a stable position (dashed line in FIG. 6) when the jam is released, etc. It is recognized that the size of the device becomes large and the space occupied by the entire device becomes large.

Further, with the horizontally long guide member B, if the paper feed tray D and the paper discharge tray G are to be accommodated in the vertical dimension of the scanner unit, the step difference of the document from the outlet F to the paper discharge tray G can be made large. Some defects are also recognized.

The present invention provides an improved document feeding apparatus which can solve the above problems when the U-turn system is adopted for reading a document.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION A document feeder according to the present invention is a document feeder configured to make a U-turn of a fed document around a guide member rotatably mounted around a support shaft and eject the document. In the feeding device, the cross section of the guide member has a shape approximate to a circle, more specifically, as a whole, the base end portion has a substantially semicircular shape, and the tip end has a substantially trapezoidal shape in which a lower side rises upward. It is formed in a cross-sectional shape similar to a circle.

[0008]

[Operation] If the cross-sectional shape of the guide member is approximated to a circle,
The width of the guide member is short and the opening length when the guide member is opened becomes small. Further, in this way, the opening portions of the document inlet and the document outlet can be made closer to each other in the vertical direction to increase the drop level of the document discharged from the outlet onto the paper discharge tray.

[0009]

1 to 5 show an embodiment of a document feeding apparatus (unit) according to the present invention.

In the drawings, 1 is a main body, 2 is a bracket provided on both sides of the main body 1, 3 is a guide member (guide bracket) provided in the main body 1, and 4 is a cover which covers the guide member 3 and is attached. Show. The guide member 3 and the cover 4 are rotatably attached around the coaxial support shaft 5 at the rear end of the body bracket 2, and the support shaft 5
With the fulcrum as a fulcrum, they can be opened and closed individually according to the situation such as jam occurrence (Figs. 2 and 3).

Here, the guide member 3 is formed so that its cross-sectional shape approximates a circle. More specifically, as shown in FIG. 5, the base end portion 3A has a substantially semicircular shape, and the tip end portion 3B has a shape that resembles a substantially trapezoid in which the lower side rises upward. It consists of

Around the guide member 3, in order to make a U-turn of the fed-in document (arrow P in FIG. 5) around the guide member 3 and discharge it, a conveyance path is provided between the lower main body 1. 6b
And a cover 4 which is openably and closably attached to the upper side, and forms a transfer path 6a continuous with the transfer path 6b in the cover closed state.

A document is fed into the conveying path 6a from an entrance 7 which is opened at an upper portion of the front surface of the main body, and after the document is read by the conveying path 6b on the main body side, an outlet 8 which is opened at a lower portion of the front surface of the main body. Documents are ejected from. That is, the document (not shown) set in the paper feed tray 9 inserted into the entrance 7 of the transport path 6a is fed by the feed roller 10 provided on the cover 4 side, and then the guide member 3 is first fed.
And the separating roller 12 provided on the cover 4 and the separating roller 12 separate the sheets one by one and feed them into the conveying path 6a. Next, the document fed into the transport path 6a is
The feed rollers 13 and 14 provided in opposition to the guide member 3 and the cover 4, and the feed rollers 15 and 16 provided in opposition to the guide member 3 and the main body 1, are fed to the conveyance path 6b and provided on the main body 1 side. The document image is read through the read window 17 thus read. Thus, the read document is sent out by the feed rollers 18 and 19 and the extract rollers 20 and 21 which are provided in opposition to the guide member 3 and the main body 1, and is inserted directly below the exit 8 of the transport path 6b. The paper is discharged onto the paper discharge tray 22.

In addition, in FIG. 1, reference numeral 23 denotes a motor which is a driving source of the roller group, and 24 denotes a paper sensor, both of which are installed inside the hollow guide member 3.

With the document feeder configured as described above, it is possible to solve the problems of the above-mentioned conventional structure. That is, if the cross-sectional shape of the guide member 3 is approximated to a circular shape from a horizontally long shape, the lateral width of the guide member 3 may be relatively short if the document conveyance length required for reading the document is constant, and as a result, as shown in FIG. As shown in FIG. 5, the opening length when the guide member 3 is opened can be small. If the guide member 3 has a round cross-sectional shape, the guide member 3 can be stably held even if the opening angle is small, as shown in FIG. Furthermore, if the guide member 3 and the cover 4 are coaxially attached as in the embodiment, the guide member 3 when opened can be completely stored in the open / close space of the cover 4, and the installation space can be reduced. It can contribute further.

Another advantage of the guide member 3 having a round shape is that the opening portions of the document inlet 7 and the document outlet 8 are made to approach each other vertically, and as shown in FIG. It is possible to set a large drop step h of the document discharged from the outlet 8 onto the discharge tray 22 within the range of the dimension H. As a result, it is possible to improve the discharge and stacking of documents.

In addition, it is convenient to make the guide member 3 round so as to increase the U-turn radius of the document, which is convenient for reading the document, and the inner space of the guide member 3 can be positively utilized. As an advantage.

[0018]

As described above, in the document feeder according to the present invention, the guide member is improved in cross section, so that the lateral width of the guide member is shortened and the opening length when the guide member is opened. To improve the document ejection and stacking by making the document entrance and exit openings close to each other vertically and increasing the drop step ejected from the exit onto the output tray. It is possible to obtain an improvement effect such as being possible.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side sectional view showing an embodiment of a document feeding device (unit).

FIG. 2 is a simplified cross-sectional view showing a cover open state of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a simplified cross-sectional view showing an opened state of a cover and a guide member of FIG.

4 is a partially cutaway perspective view of the document feeder of FIG. 1 as seen from the front.

FIG. 5 is a view showing a cross-sectional shape of an improved guide member.

FIG. 6 is a side sectional view showing a conventional document feeding device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Main body 2 Bracket 3 Guide member 3A Base end part 3B Tip part 4 Cover 5 Support shafts 6a and 6b Transport path 7 Inlet 8 Outlet

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A document feeder for feeding a document into a U-turn around a guide member rotatably mounted around a support shaft and ejecting the document. An original feeding device, which is formed in a shape close to a circle.