JPH09150978A - Paper feeder of image forming device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To eliminate the humidity of a paper sheet by opening a ventilation hole in the bottom plate of a paper feeding cassette, providing a dehumidifying heater in the lower side of the paper feeding cassette of an lowermost stage so as to efficiently carry air heated by the dehumidifying heater to the upper paper feeding cassette. SOLUTION: A paper feeding cassette 10 is formed to be an drawer type with its upper side opened mainly by a bottom plate 19, left and right side plates 21 and 21 and front and rear plates 23 and 24. The paper feeding cassette 10 is provided with vertical side fences 12 and 12 and centrally positioned end fence 13 therein. The right end surface of a paper sheet 18 is brought into contact with the inner surface of the right side plate 21 of the paper feeding cassette 10. A number of holes 20 are opened in the bottom plate 19 of the paper feeding cassette 10 and air heated by a dehumidifying heater is efficiently sent upward. Of course, a hole is opened also in the bottom plate 19 in which the paper sheet 18 is placed in, the heated air is directly applied to the paper sheet 18 and thus a dehumidifying operation is performed.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

The present invention relates to a digital copying machine,
The present invention relates to a sheet feeding device of an image forming apparatus such as a printer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A conventional sheet feeding device of an image forming apparatus has a sheet feeding bank, which is called a sheet feeding bank, as a measure for preventing a transfer failure and a paper curl from being generated by absorbing moisture. Many devices have a built-in dehumidification heater.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of a sheet feeding device of a conventional image forming apparatus. The four-stage paper feed cassettes 1, 2, 3, and 4 are arranged in an overlapping manner. Each of the sheet feeding cassettes 1 to 4 is in the shape of a rectangular parallelepiped with an open top, and each of the sheet feeding cassettes 1 to 4 can be pulled out in front of the image forming apparatus. One sheet feeding motor 5 is arranged on the back side of the sheet feeding cassettes 1 to 4, and a raising motor 6 corresponding to the sheet feeding cassettes 1 to 4 is provided on the inner side.
7, 8 and 9 are arranged. A toner collecting motor 25 is attached near the back of the image forming apparatus.

One dehumidifying heater 14 is arranged below the uppermost sheet feeding cassette 1, and a transfer motor 16 and a back phaesence motor 17 are arranged above the uppermost sheet feeding cassette 1. Further, one dehumidifying heater 15 is arranged below the lowermost sheet feeding cassette 4. When the main switch of the image forming apparatus is off, the dehumidifying heater 14,
15 is turned on.

The power consumption of each dehumidifying heater is, for example, 18 W.
In general, the temperature rise of the dehumidifying heaters 14 and 15 is room temperature + maximum about 30 ° C., and the ambient temperature in the paper feed cassette is the highest on the uppermost paper feed cassette 1 and is about 60 ° C.
° C. Since the dehumidifying heater for the transfer belt is provided above the uppermost sheet feeding cassette, the highest temperature is obtained on the uppermost sheet feeding cassette 1 among the multistage sheet feeding cassettes.

[0006]

However, since the sheet feeding device of the conventional image forming apparatus has a structure of simply heating the dehumidifying heaters 14 and 15, the energy consumption is large and the dehumidifying efficiency of the sheet is poor. There's a problem.

In view of the above-mentioned conventional problems, the present invention is an image forming apparatus capable of efficiently carrying the air warmed by the dehumidifying heater to the upper sheet feeding cassette in the sheet feeding apparatus of the image forming apparatus to dehumidify the sheet. An object of the present invention is to provide a sheet feeding device.

[0008]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image forming apparatus including an image forming apparatus having a plurality of sheet feeding cassettes. In the paper feeding device, a ventilation hole is formed in the bottom plate of the paper feeding cassette, and a dehumidifying heater is installed below the lowermost paper feeding cassette to dehumidify the paper stored in the paper feeding cassette. To do.

In the paper feeding device of the image forming apparatus according to the second aspect of the present invention, the bottom plate of the paper feeding cassette is formed by inclining a hole, the ventilation direction is changed by the hole, and the warm air rising from below is raised. The feature is that the paper is guided in the direction of the paper stored in the paper feed cassette.

[0010]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION A sheet feeding device of an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.
Note that, in the following, the portions common to the conventional ones will be denoted by the common reference numerals, and the duplicated description will be omitted.

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a paper feed cassette used in the first embodiment of the paper feed device of the image forming apparatus according to the present invention. The paper feed cassette 10 is in the shape of a drawer having an open top, and is mainly formed by a bottom plate 19, left and right side plates 21, 21, a front plate 23, and a rear plate 24. The left and right side plates 21, 21 are provided with guide rails 11 for smoothly and horizontally pushing out and pushing in the image forming apparatus. The sheet feeding cassette of the present embodiment can store, for example, A3 size sheets, but in FIG. 1, it is assumed that A4 size sheets 18 are stored.

Inside the paper feeding cassette 10, movable vertical side fences 12, 12 and an end fence 13 located at the center are provided. A4 size paper 18 is positioned by the side fence 12 and the end fence 13. ing. The right end surface of the paper 18 is in contact with the inner surface of the right side plate 21 of the paper feed cassette 10. Bottom plate 1 of paper feed cassette 10
A large number of holes 20 are provided in 9 so that the air warmed by a dehumidifying heater (not shown) can be efficiently sent upward. Of course, the bottom plate of the portion containing the paper 18 is also perforated so that the warmed air directly hits the paper 18 to dehumidify it.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a paper feed cassette used in the second embodiment of the paper feed device of the image forming apparatus according to the present invention. In this paper feed cassette 10a, two linear louvers 22 are formed on the bottom plate 19 in parallel with each other.
Other configurations and operations are similar to those of the previous embodiment,
Description is omitted.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a paper feed cassette used in the third embodiment of the paper feed device of the image forming apparatus according to the present invention. In this paper feed cassette 10b, the louver 22 formed on the bottom plate 19 is tilted to the right in FIG.
Therefore, the warm air warmed and raised by the dehumidifying heater arranged below (not shown) is redirected to the right direction in the figure by the louver 22 and sent toward the paper 18, so that the paper 18 is efficiently dehumidified. To be done. Other configurations and operations are the same as those in the above-described embodiment, and thus the description thereof will be omitted.

[0015]

According to the paper feeding device of the image forming apparatus of the first aspect, the ventilation plate is provided in the bottom plate of the paper feeding cassette, and the dehumidifying heater is installed below the lowermost paper feeding cassette. Therefore, there is an effect that a small dehumidifying heater can be used to dehumidify the entire multi-stage paper feeding cassette, and warmed air can be efficiently carried to the upper paper feeding cassette to dehumidify the paper.

According to the paper feeding device of the image forming apparatus of the second aspect of the present invention, the paper sheet in which the warm air rising from below is changed by changing the ventilation direction by the hole opened in the bottom plate of the paper feeding cassette. In this case, since warm air is applied to the paper, it is possible to efficiently dehumidify the paper.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a paper feed cassette according to a first embodiment.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a paper feed cassette according to a second embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a sectional view of a paper feed cassette according to a second embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of a sheet feeding device of a conventional image forming apparatus.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1, 2, 3, 4 Paper feed cassette 5 Paper feed motor 6, 7, 8, 9 Lifting motor 10, 10a, 10b Paper feed cassette 11 Guide rail 12 Side fence 13 End fence 14, 15 Dehumidification heater 16 Transfer motor 17 Back Fence motor 18 Paper 19 Bottom plate 20 Hole 21 Side plate 22 Louver 23 Front plate 24 Rear plate 25 Toner recovery motor

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. In a sheet feeding device of an image forming apparatus having a plurality of sheet feeding cassettes, a vent hole is formed in a bottom plate of the sheet feeding cassette, and a dehumidifying heater is installed below the lowermost sheet feeding cassette. A sheet feeding device of an image forming apparatus, which dehumidifies the sheet stored in the sheet feeding cassette. 2. A bottom plate of the paper feed cassette is formed with an inclined hole, the ventilation direction is changed by the hole, and the warm air rising from below is guided toward the paper stored in the paper feed cassette. The sheet feeding device of the image forming apparatus according to claim 1.