JPS58220052A - Device for widening distance beteen bins in sorter - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To enable widening of a distance between bins and reduce the size of a sorter, by vertically movably mounting each bin and providing a pair of two vertically movable bin supporting devices which support the bin at the adjacent stage below a bin intending to house sheets and the bin at the adjacent stage above said bin intending to house sheets. CONSTITUTION:A sorter, into which sheets are fed through a sheet conveying guide 2, is constituted such that bins 7 are located in a multistage, and in which case, in order to widen a distance between the bins 7 so as to match the position of a vertically movable indexer 4, ratchet blocks 8 and 9 are used as a pair of two bin supporting devices. The block 8 raises the bin 7, located at the adjacent stage above the bin 7 intending to house sheets, to a level higher than that of the normal stationary position, and the block 9 operates so that it causes a subsequent bin at the adjacent stage therebelow to wait below the bin intending to house the sheets. The blocks 8 and 9 are coupled to endless wires 10 and 11 rotationally moved through running of motors 16 and 17, moved vertically along rails 22 and 23, and are provided with ratchets 24 and 25 swung by solenoides 28 and 29.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention is directed to an apparatus for increasing the ton spacing of a sorter.
do.

In order to downsize a sorter equipped with a large number of bins, the interval between the bins is set as small as possible, and the opening of each bin is enlarged sequentially when paper is loaded, thereby compensating for the mechanical precision of the inch width and preventing sorter ψ jams. Alternatively, preventing malfunctions has been commonly practiced in the past.

However, conventional sorters that only enlarge the bin opening when paper is loaded are insufficient to meet the demand for increasing the number of bins without increasing the size of the sorter. It was also impossible to satisfy the requirement for automatic stapling after collation.

The present invention has been made in view of the problems of the conventional sorters as described above, and provides a sorter having a large number of bins arranged vertically and parallel to each other with required spacing.
A support device that maintains each bottle parallel to the position of the feet and allows it to be raised and lowered freely, and supports the upper row of the bottles adjacent above and below at a height higher than the position of the head and feet, and the lower row of the bottles. a set of two supporting devices waiting to support the
and a lifting device for raising and lowering the two supporting devices independently, and the lifting device alternately supports the two supporting devices from the desired position of the bottle to a high place and waits for the support. An object of the present invention is to provide a sorter bin spacing enlarging device that can be easily operated.

The present invention will be explained in detail below with reference to drawings showing embodiments.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a schematic arrangement of a sorter bin spacing enlarging device according to the present invention.

That is, a pair of paper transport rolls 1 and a paper transport guide 2 are installed on the left side of the figure, sandwiching the paper transport roll pair 1 and the nip thereof, so that the paper discharged from a copier or the like (not shown) is fed into the path of the head and foot of the sorter. It has become.

Directly below the bonded end of the front he guide 2 is a split endless belt 3 which rotates at times, and an indexer 4 can be moved up and down through the interval between the belts 3.

The indexer 4 is divided into a base part and a ceiling part, and both parts are joined together at the side ends. One end of a belt 5 such as a Mylar sheet is fixed to the ceiling part, and the other end is attached with a suitable winding material. It is designed to be rolled into the housing w6 by spring force.

As the indexer descends, the belt 5 comes into sliding contact with the split endless belt 3, is unwound from the winding device 6, and is fed between the belts 3 and 50. The sheets are discharged from the gap between the base of the indexer 4 and the ceiling and are sequentially stored in a large number of bins 7.7[deg.] provided along the belt 3.

In the sorter configured as described above, each of the bins 1, T,
In order to expand the spacing between .

and 9 are used. That is, the front bar 8 raises the bin one step above the bin in which paper is stored higher than the position where the bin is normally stopped at W, and the rear bar 9 waits below the bin in which paper is stored. . Both ratchet blocks 8 and 9 are raised and lowered by separate endless wires 10 and 11, respectively, and are driven by the bins 7.7.・・・・・・
Pulley/idler pair 1 installed at the top and bottom of...
This is carried out using motors 16 and 17 which have built-in clutches and brakes connected to 2/13 and 14/15.

Note that FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view taken along line AA in FIG. 1, and as shown in this figure, each of the bottles 1, 7, . The ratchet blocks 8 and 9 need to be arranged in at least 3 locations in order to raise the bins to the Y row and to provide a sufficient distance between the bin and the bin one level above it when storing paper. There is.

' Also, each of the above-mentioned bottles 7.7. ......are mutually spaced parallel to each other'? At least three spacers 18.1B, . Constructed so that it can be raised and lowered.

Furthermore, each of the bins 717. A paper stopper 20 for regulating the lead edge of the stored paper is protruded from the rear side of the paper stacking surface in the paper advancing direction, and a paper stopper 20 is protruded from the back side of the paper stacking surface of A regulating plate 21 at the edge is provided to help align the sheets stacked in each bin.

Next, each of the bins 1.7. The structure of the ratchet blocks 8 and 9 that raise and lower the... will be explained.

FIGS. 3 and 4 are a flat view and a cross-sectional view taken along line B-B of an embodiment of the ratchet block, respectively. Said ratchet blocks 8 and 9 are slidably engaged.

ratchets 24 and 25 are rotatably attached to the tips of the ratchet blocks 8 and 9 using pins 26 and 21, and solenoids 28 and 29 are fixed to appropriate positions on these walls, respectively, and the ronds of both solenoids and levers 30 and 3 extending from said ratchets 24 and 25;
1 is rotatably connected to the bottle.

Further, the ratchets 24 and 25 are provided with springs 32 and 33 provided on the rods of the solenoids 28 and 29, respectively.
The bin 7 is always held in the position shown by the solid line in FIG.
．． 7. When the solenoids 28 and 29 operate, they rotate to the position indicated by the dotted line in the figure, and their tips touch the bins 7, 7, .・
It is set to move away from...

The wires 10 and 11 for raising and lowering the ratchet blocks 8 and 9 are constructed so that they can be fixed to the side walls of both blocks at any position t or a with appropriate metal fittings.

The operation of the bin interval enlarging device of the present invention constructed as described above will be described below.

FIG. 5 (al to 0) is an explanatory diagram of the operation, and (&) indicates a certain fall while paper is being put into the first bin.

At this time, the ratchet flocks 8 and 9 are the first
The ratchet block 8 waits to support the bottom of the second bin, and at the same time as the paper input is completed, the ratchet block 8
is raised by a predetermined distance as shown in 03) to provide sufficient space between the second bin and the first bin.

Next, when the paper input into the second bin is completed, the ratchet block 9 is raised as shown in (c), and the ratchet block 9, which has a built-in clutch and brake, is raised between the first and second bins. Power of blocks 8 and 9 5j
Controlled by 1B and 17 brakes.

As described above, when the second bin is raised and paper feeding into the third bin is started, the ratchet block 8 is lowered almost simultaneously to the bottom surface of the fourth bin, as shown in (d). However, at this time, since the ratchet 24 provided on the ratchet block 8 and the rod of the solenoid 28 can rotate against the spring 32, this does not pose another problem.

At the same time as the paper input into the third bin is completed (e).

As shown in (f), the ratchet 8 raises the third bottle, and the ratchet 9 lowers and waits at the bottom of the fourth bottle. After repeating the above operations and loading the paper into the last bin (the 10th bin in the figure),
The previous %Q indexer 4, which has been lowered for a while along each bottle opening, rises, and the ratchet blocks 8 and 9 are raised accordingly (the ratchet blocks 8 and 9 are controlled so as to return to the positions shown in aJ).

At this time, the ratchet blocks 8 and 9 are set to the ratchets 24 and 25 by the solenoids 28 and 29.
As mentioned above, the tip is rotated so that its tip does not interfere with each bottle.

It is difficult to control the ratchet block as explained above using a combination of discrete electronic circuits, but it is extremely easy to do so using a program using a microprocessor built into the copying machine to which the sorter is connected. Therefore, detailed explanation will be omitted.

It should be noted that the mechanism for raising and lowering each bin of the sorter does not necessarily require the use of a ratchet block as described above, but may be performed using force, for example, rotation of a screw block as shown in FIG.

That is, screw blocks '34 and 35 each having a spiral cut around the periphery of the cylinder are splined.

Similar to the ratchet block described above, the splined shafts 36 and 37 are rotated after the shafts 36 and 37 are cauterized, and the spirals of the previous day are engaged with one end of each bottle that is in instant contact with the top and bottom, respectively. The bottle will move up and down.

Moreover, the lifting and lowering of the screen fist blocks 34 and 35 is as follows:
A screw erected near the spline shaft.
The forks 40 and 41 provided on the shafts 38 and 39 may synchronize the raising and lowering of the indexer.

Furthermore, it goes without saying that the present invention can be applied not only to a type of sorter in which an indexer moves up and down, but also to a type of sorter in which paper guides are provided at each bin opening, and sheets are sequentially stored in each bin by opening and closing the guides. Nor.

Further, in the embodiment, only the construction has been described for a type in which sheets are inputted sequentially from the upper bin, but it is also possible to configure the bin to be used sequentially from the lower bin.

Since the present invention is configured and operates as described above, it is possible to narrow the spacing between the pins of the sorter to its maximum limit, and it is possible to increase the number of bins without increasing the size of the sorter. It has a remarkable effect.

14 again! Since the automatic stapler can be inserted by increasing the interval between the r bins so that they are parallel to each other, it also has the effect of facilitating the addition of an automatic stapler to the sorter, which was virtually impossible in the past. .

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Fig. 1 is a schematic diagram of the sorter to which the bin interval enlarging device of the present invention is applied, Fig. 2 is a plan view showing its A-A cross section, and Figs. 3 and 4 are examples of the bin interval enlarging device. A plan view and a cross-sectional view taken along the line B-B showing the configuration of the embodiment, FIG. l' to explain the configuration
It is a t1 side view. Issue 7 in the figure --- Bins 8, 9 and 34.35 --- Bin support device 12.13 and 14.15 --- Lifting device for the bottle support device Applicant: Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd. No. 3 [1] Figure 4

Claims (1)

[Claims] In a sorter in which a large number of bins are arranged vertically and parallel to each other with head-to-foot intervals, each bin except the bottom bin is raised and lowered by a head-foot distance parallel to the position of the front foot. A set of two bin support devices that are movable and stand by to support the upper bin and to support the lower bin among the vertically adjacent bins, and to independently raise and lower the two support devices. and a lifting device, in which one of the supporting devices is on standby to support the bin into which paper is input, while the other supports the upper bin at a higher location than the head and foot position, After the feeding is completed, the other supporting device descends and waits to support the lower bin in which the paper is fed, and the supporting device in standby holds the bin in which the paper is fed to the position of the head and foot. The Book of Cups 2 to support you in a higher place
A sorter bin spacing expanding device whose purpose is to drive a set of individual support devices.