JPH07300262A - Image forming device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To minimize the unnecessary space liable to be generated in a device main body, particularly due to the positional relation between an image formation section and a roll paper feed section. CONSTITUTION:Roll papers 12a, 12b and feed inlets of the roll papers 12a, 12b into an image formation section are linearly located, pivotally movable units of the roll papers 12a, 12b are loaded on a roll paper feed section 1, the first roll paper 12a is located on the upper stage, and the second roll paper 12b is located on the lower stage. The first roll paper 12a is detoured as the conveyance path of the second roll paper 12b to the common conveying roller 22 arranged on the image formation section, and a large-diameter roller resolving the kink of the roll paper during conveyance is provided.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention uses a plurality of roll papers as a transfer material, selectively pulls and cuts the roll papers, and then conveys the roll papers to an image forming section to obtain a transfer image. Image forming apparatus such as a copying machine and a printer. In particular, the present invention relates to an image forming apparatus capable of selectively pulling out a plurality of roll papers in a limited small space and efficiently transporting them to an image forming unit.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art One of a plurality of roll papers arranged in the lower part of the main body is selectively pulled out and conveyed to an image forming part arranged in the upper and lower parts of the main body functionally and structurally. An apparatus for forming a transfer image is known. As shown in FIG. 2, for example, the respective roll papers are arranged side by side in the vertical direction, and the roll paper units 45 and 46 that can be pulled out (slide) in the horizontal direction A, respectively.
Is loaded into. At the time of paper feeding, one of the selected roll papers is pulled out and conveyed to the image forming unit 40 located diagonally above the roll paper unit through the conveyance paths 47 and 48 formed at the front position of the roll paper. .

[0003]

In such a structure, as shown in FIG. 2, large spaces are formed above the roll paper portion and below the image forming portion, respectively, and other devices are provided in these spaces. Although it is efficiently designed to place some components such as a computer and a PC board, some unnecessary space is inevitable, and as a result,
It remains as one of the problems to be solved in making the entire device compact.

The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and provides an image forming apparatus having a simple and efficient transport route for a plurality of roll papers and minimizing the space of the apparatus main body. To challenge. Another object is to provide an image forming apparatus capable of correcting the curl of roll paper during transportation.

[0005]

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, at least first and second roll papers according to the present invention are loaded one above the other, and one of the selected roll papers is pulled out and shared. In the image forming apparatus that supplies the image to the image forming unit by the conveying rollers, the roll papers are loaded in upper and lower units pivotally attached to the main body of the apparatus, respectively. The roll paper and the second roll paper are arranged side by side in the order of up and down, the first roll paper is linearly aligned with the common conveying roller above the second roll paper, and the second roll paper is in front of the first roll paper. While correcting the curling habit by the large diameter roller arranged,
And is conveyed to the common conveying roller.

[0006]

In such a structure, the first roll paper provided on the upper stage of the roll paper feed section is pulled out and conveyed almost linearly to the common paper feed roller located above it. The second roll paper provided in the lower stage of the roll paper feeding unit is fed to the common conveyance roller via the large-diameter roller provided so as to bypass the first roll paper. Such a roll paper transport path realizes space saving of the apparatus. In addition, at the time of replacement or maintenance of the roll paper, the unit for loading the roll paper is pivoted to the front side of the apparatus and opened to perform them.

[0007]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT A preferred embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of an image forming apparatus according to the present invention. An image forming section 3 by a well-known xerographic method, for example, is arranged on an upper portion of an apparatus body 2, and the image forming section is formed on a lower portion of the apparatus body 2. A roll paper feed unit 1 for transporting roll paper is arranged at 3.

The image forming section 3 projects a raw image light image by a corona charger 5 that uniformly charges the surface of the image carrier 4 with the image carrier 4 as the center to form an electrostatic latent image on the image carrier 4. An optical device 6 for forming, a developing device 7 for developing the latent image to form a toner image, a transfer device 8 for transferring the toner image onto a transfer material sent from the roll paper feeding unit 1, and a surface of the image carrier 4. Cleaner 9 for removing the residual developer after the transfer to the image carrier, and an eraser lamp 1 for uniformly removing the surface potential of the surface of the image carrier 4
0 and 0 are arranged so that they sequentially act on the image carrier 4. Further, a fixing device 11 that fixes the transfer material onto which the toner image has been transferred to form a permanent image is arranged.

The roll paper feeding unit 1 has first and second units 14a and 14b which are vertically arranged,
Roll papers 12a and 12b are loaded on the mounting plates 13a and 13b of the respective units. When loaded, the roll papers are aligned vertically. Units 14a, 14b
Axis 1 on the lower front side (lower left in the figure) of each
5a and 15b pivotally support the apparatus main body 2 in the up-down direction so that the handle provided on the outside of the unit pivots it counterclockwise to the front side of the apparatus main body, that is, as shown in FIG. You can open it to the left as you see. With this opening, the roll paper can be replaced or the paper feeding unit can be maintained. It should be noted that a suitable clamping device locks the unit when it is closed and a suitable stopper limits the opening angle of the unit.

A roller 18 having a large diameter (for example, larger than the core of the roll paper) is provided at a position in front of the first roll paper 12a of the apparatus main body 2 and is large enough to correct the roll paper curl. Has been. The large-diameter roller 18 may have a structure in which a hollow aluminum pipe is squeezed at both ends to form a shaft, or a molded product made of plastic. The second roll paper 12b is
As will be described later, the paper feed roller 23 located above the paper feed roller 23.
b, 24b, and is sent to the roller 18 along the transport path 27 located below the first roll paper 12a, and the roller 18 is rotated halfway and the common transport located above the first roll paper 12a. It is sent to a roller (for example, a timing roller) 22. As is apparent from the figure, the roller 18 conveys the roll paper 12b while curving the roll paper 12b in the direction opposite to the curl and correcting the curl.

Each roll paper 12a, 12b is placed in a unit 14
The holder 20 is inserted through the cores 19 of the roll papers 12a and 12b so as to be exchangeably and rotatably held in the rolls a and 14b. The holder 20 presses and holds the roll paper core 19 from the inner surface side, and the shaft portions at both ends thereof are guided from above the paper surface into a groove 21 cut out from above in the mounting plates 13a and 13b of the unit. It is rotatably mounted.

As a portion of the paper conveying path from the roll paper feeding unit 1 to the image forming unit 3, a conveyance roller 2 common to the first and second roll papers is provided above the first raw paper 12a.
2 is provided at a relatively front position of the apparatus main body. The common conveyance roller 22 is for feeding the roll paper conveyed from the paper supply section to between the image carrier 4 in the image forming section 3 and the transfer device 8 (transfer section), and the conveyance path is For the purpose of shortening, it is preferably provided near the transfer portion. As described above, the positions of at least two roll papers in the roll paper feeding unit 1 are set to the common transport roller 22 as shown in the figure.
Then, the first roll paper 12a and the second roll paper 12b are arranged linearly in the vertical direction, and the space around them can be minimized.

The transport path of the roll paper accompanying the above-mentioned arrangement of the roll paper will be further described. The first roll paper 12
The conveyance from a to the common conveyance roller 22 is performed linearly (at the shortest distance) via the paper feed roller 25a. The paper feed roller 25a has a drive roller 23a and a pressure contact roller 24a.

On the other hand, the second roll paper 12b loaded in the second unit 14b is pulled out by the paper feed roller 25b, half-turns the large-diameter roller 18 to change the direction, and is conveyed through the transport rollers 24c and 25c. It is sent to the common carrying roller 22. In the figure, reference numeral 26 is a counter roller which is pressed against and follows the large-diameter roller 18, and the roll paper is sandwiched between the roller 18 and the roller 18 to be conveyed. Also, reference numeral 24
Reference numerals c and 25c denote transport rollers. Units 14a, 14
Part of the mounting plates 13a and 13b of b functions as a guide for guiding the roll paper in a predetermined direction.

Next, the transport operation of each roll paper will be described. The leading end of the first roll paper 12a located on the upper stage of the roll paper feeding unit 1 is pulled out by the paper feed roller 25a located on the front side of the unit 14a, and the common transport roller 22 is provided.
Be transported to.

The leading end of the second roll paper 12b located in the lower stage of the roll paper feeder 1 is pulled out by the transport roller 25b located on the front side of the unit 14b, and then the first roll paper 12b.
The large-diameter roller 18 is reached through a conveyance path formed between the lower surface of the mounting plate 13a and the guide 27 so as to bypass the roll paper 12a. The roll paper changes its course by rotating the large-diameter roller 18 halfway. At this time, the roll paper 12b is curved in a direction opposite to the curl direction, so that the curl is corrected. The leading end of the roll paper 12b is further conveyed, passes the conveyance roller 25c, and reaches the common conveyance roller 22.

The roll paper to be used can be arbitrarily selected by the operator on the operation panel formed on the upper part of the apparatus main body. In order to quickly select / switch the roll paper, for example, the leading end of the selected roll paper 12 is brought to the position of the common conveyance roller 22, and the roll paper 1 not selected is selected.
For 2, the paper feed roller 25, the large-diameter roller 18 and / or the roll paper is reversely rotated to retract the leading end of the roll paper from the common transport roller 22.

The image forming unit for forming a transfer image on the roll paper will be briefly described. The original is conveyed by the original conveying device 28 at a speed synchronized with the rotation of the image carrier 4. A document image of a document passing through the optical device 6 is projected onto the image carrier 4 which is uniformly charged, and an electrostatic latent image is formed on the image carrier 4. This electrostatic latent image is visualized by the toner in the developing device 7 to form a toner image on the image carrier 4. The roll paper 12 (transfer material) is conveyed between the transfer device 8 and the image carrier 4 in synchronism with the operation until the toner image is formed, and the toner image is transferred onto the roll paper 12. After that, the roll paper 12 is conveyed to the fixing device 11 by the transfer material conveying device 29, the toner image is fixed by the fixing device 11, and the roll paper 12 is conveyed to the outside of the device. During this time, cutter 3
0 detects the size of the original and cuts the transfer material into a desired size. After the transfer, the image carrier 4 is prepared for the next image formation by cleaning the residual toner on the surface of the image carrier 4 with the cleaner 9 and discharging the surface of the image carrier 4 with the eraser lamp 10.

In the above example, two roll papers are arranged, but the present invention can be applied to an apparatus in which a larger number of roll papers, two or more, are arranged.

[0020]

According to the present invention, a common conveying roller (for example, a timing roller), a first roll paper, and a second roll paper are sequentially arranged in the vertical direction, and a unit for loading the roll paper is pivoted. It is possible to realize a space saving by adopting a configuration of opening and closing by means of this, and it is possible to easily correct the curl of the roll paper by using a large-diameter reversing roller in the conveying path. It is possible to efficiently obtain a large space for maintenance.

[0021]

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side sectional view showing an embodiment according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a side sectional view showing a conventional example.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Roll Paper Feeding Section 3 Image Forming Section 4 Image Carrier 12a, b Roll Paper 13a, b Mounting Plate 14a, b Unit 18 Roller 22 Common Conveying Roller

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. An image forming apparatus in which at least first and second roll papers are vertically loaded, and one of the selected roll papers is drawn out and is supplied to an image forming unit by a common conveyance roller. , The roll papers are respectively loaded in upper and lower units pivotally attached to the main body of the apparatus, and the common transport roller, the first roll paper, and the second roll paper are arranged in order in the vertical direction. Located, first
The roll paper is linear to the common conveyor roller above it,
The second roll paper is conveyed to the common conveyance roller while correcting the curl of the second roll paper by a large-diameter roller arranged in front of the first roll paper and bypassing the first roll paper. A characteristic image forming apparatus.