JPS6124291B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a method for sorting output sheets in a printing press or similar device.

Printing machines, such as rotary offset presses or rotary mimeograph machines, process relatively large quantities of printed matter. Furthermore, an electrophotographic copying machine may also perform a relatively large amount of copying. When sheets such as printing paper or copy paper are discharged from the main body of the apparatus after processing, it is extremely convenient for later handling if they are sorted by unit number. For example, if you obtain 1,200 printed sheets, sorting them into 100-sheet units will make it easier to confirm the exact number of sheets, and is extremely advantageous when binding a book.

On the other hand, the total number of printed materials to be printed by printing machines, etc. varies widely.
Sometimes it's 1200 pieces, sometimes it's 400 pieces. In this case, for example, assuming the total number of sheets to be processed is 1200,
If the number of sheets to be sorted is 100 sheets, then the sheets will be sorted into 12 bundles. If you do this, for example, A
Printed matter can be divided according to the specifications of the destination, such as 8 bundles for destination B and 4 bundles for destination B. For example, if the total number of sheets to be processed is 400, the number of sheets to be sorted is set to 50.
If it is made into sheets, it can be sorted into eight bundles, which can meet the specifications of the destination as described above, and is advantageous when checking the number of sheets and binding.

The present invention has been made in view of these points, and provides a method for sorting discharged sheets in which sheets are sorted by unit number for an arbitrary number of sheets to be processed.

The present invention will be explained below with reference to an illustrated embodiment. FIG. 1 is an external configuration diagram showing an example of a rotary offset printing machine. Note that the present invention can be applied to a rotary type offset printing machine, a rotary type copying machine, an electrophotographic copying machine, etc. in addition to a rotary type offset printing machine; however, for convenience, the present invention will be described with reference to a rotary type offset printing machine. Explain.

In FIG. 1, a printing press main body 1 is equipped with a paper feed tray 2 and a paper discharge tray 3. As shown in FIG. Here, before printing, a predetermined number of sheets of printing paper, for example 1200 sheets, are placed on the paper feed tray 2. Then, as printing is started, the printing paper on the paper feed tray is fed into the main body one by one from the top by rotating a paper feed roller (not shown). Printed paper printed within the apparatus is sent out by a pair of discharge rollers 4 and stacked one after another on a paper discharge table 3.

As shown in FIG. 2, a pin 5 for ejecting and positioning printed paper is installed on the paper ejection tray 3, and the printed paper is guided by the pin and stacked. The paper ejection table 3 is fixed to the upper end of a shaft 6 installed inside the main body, and is able to swing freely in the horizontal direction about this shaft. A pin 7 is installed facing downward at the bottom of the paper output tray 3, and a shaft 8 is attached to this pin 7.
One arm end of a drive arm 9, which is pivotally connected to a device board (not shown), is engaged. The other arm end of the arm 9 and the one arm end of the rod 11 are connected by a pin 12, and when the rod 11 is pulled in the direction of the arrow, the drive arm 9 pivots around the shaft 8 in the direction of the arrow. do. As a result, the paper discharge table 3 rotates by an angle θ about the shaft 6.

Here, for the 1200 sheets of printed paper stored on the paper feed tray 2, when the number of printed sheets reaches the sorting unit number, for example 100 sheets, that is, 100 sheets are placed on the paper output tray 3. When the printed paper is stored, the rod 11 is pulled in response to a sorting command signal, which will be described later, and the paper discharge tray 3 is rotated by an angle θ via the drive arm 9. With this configuration, so to speak, by moving the rod 11 forward or backward for each sorting unit number, the printed sheets can be sorted into units of, for example, 100 sheets, as shown in FIG.

In this way, by switching the rotational position of the paper discharge tray 3, the printed paper is sorted into units of number of sheets.Next, a specific means for switching will be described. First, as shown in Figure 4,
The total number of printed sheets is ranked, for example, in three levels. Then, the number of sheets to be sorted is set for each rank. In other words, for example, if the total number of printed sheets is 1000 or more, set the sorting unit number to 100,
In the range of 200 sheets to 200 sheets, the number of sheets to be sorted is set to 50 sheets, and when the number is 200 sheets or less, the number of sheets to be sorted is set to 10 sheets. In other words, the mode is set in several stages, this is programmed in advance using, for example, a microcomputer, and the desired number of sheets to be processed is input into the data to make a calculation judgment, and the number of sheets to be sorted is determined by external operation. It is possible to automatically sort the sheets according to the number of sheets to be processed without performing any steps.

Incidentally, in recent years, with the remarkable development of semiconductor manufacturing technology, extremely inexpensive microcomputers have been developed that are capable of performing calculation, judgment, matching, and other processing functions on a single chip. If this type of microcomputer is mounted on a mechanical device and the processing process of the mechanical device is controlled by an appropriate combination of software and hardware, control will be simplified and multifunctional processing will be easily achieved. It became possible to do so.

By using such a microcomputer to calculate and determine the number of sheets to be sorted as described above,
The sorting can be performed with high reliability. FIG. 5 shows the hardware configuration of this type of microcomputer. That is, in the figure, the central processing unit 14 is composed of an arithmetic unit 15, an index register 16, an accumulator 17, a program counter 18, a stack pointer 19, an instruction register 20, and a decoding control unit 21. Note that the reference numeral 22 indicates read-only memory (hereinafter referred to as ROM).
Reference numeral 3 indicates a random access memory (hereinafter referred to as RAM), and reference numeral 24 indicates an input/output control section. And these central processing units 14,
A device in which the ROM 22, RAM 23, etc. are integrated is called a one-chip microcomputer.

Control by such a microcomputer is generally performed as follows. That is, for example, a printing process program is stored in the ROM 22, and its address is the program counter 1.
8, and starts from the specified address at the same time as the power is turned on. The printing process is executed by a program written in the ROM 22, set in the instruction register 20 read from the ROM 22, and decoded by the decoding control unit 21. All operations are performed using accumulator 17 as one operand. That is, when an arithmetic instruction is set in the instruction register 20, an operand is read out from the RAM 3 according to the address field of this instruction register, and an arithmetic operation between this and the contents of the accumulator is executed in the arithmetic unit 15. This result is then stored in the accumulator 17. The input/output control unit 24 has a function of selecting an external device through the input/output control unit using this input/output port, and transferring the contents of the accumulator to the outside and data flags from the external device to the accumulator. achieve. The index register 16 is used for address modification, and the staff pointer 19 is also used for so-called nesting of subroutines.

If the sorting process described above is performed using a microcomputer that achieves the functions described above, specifically, the process will be as follows. That is, in FIG. 6, the input/output control section 24 of the microcomputer receives switching signals from the operation of the print start switch _SW1 and the ten-key switch, and in response, the input/output control section 24 receives switching signals from the operation of the ten-key switch. outputs a signal for displaying the number of sheets. In other words, if we assume that the number of sheets to be printed is 1,200, if we press the ten key switch in response to this number of sheets, the display section 25 will display the following information:
1200 is displayed. Note that a well-known light emitting diode or the like is used as this display device.

By the way, FIG. 7 shows the general flow of the printing system including the sorting process according to the present invention. When the control system is powered on, the microcomputer shown in FIG. The computer starts running, and the ROM 22 executes the program written in it. At this time, first, in an initial check, it is checked whether printing is possible. That is, it checks whether printing paper is placed on the paper feed table, whether etching liquid or ink is supplied in the required amount, and whether the movable parts of the apparatus are at the initial position. If these are not in predetermined conditions, the apparatus is operated to return the movable parts to their initial positions, or the etching liquid or ink is replenished.

When the preparation process is completed by carrying out the above-mentioned operations, the person in charge of printing is made aware of the fact that data input is possible using a display means such as a lamp. In this state, the ten key switch shown in FIG. 6 is pressed to input this switching signal to the input/output control section 24. That is, if the number of sheets to be printed is 1,200, the number key switch is pressed in response to this number to display 1,200 on the display section 25. At the same time, the data is stored in index register 16. The number of sheets for each sorting unit according to rank shown in FIG. 4 is also stored in the index register 16.
is stored in advance. In this state, when the print start switch SW ₁ shown in FIG. 6 is pressed, the printing process is started, and each process such as ink kneading, inking, transfer, and paper feeding is sequentially advanced. That is, in FIG. 1, printing papers are sequentially fed one by one from a paper feed tray 2, printed, and then stacked on a paper discharge tray 3.

Here, if the total number of printed sheets is now 1200 sheets, the number of sorted sheets is 100 as shown in Figure 4.
It is determined that Also, if the number is between 200 and 1000, the number is 50, if the number is less than 200, the number is 10, and so on. Note that this arithmetic determination is performed by the arithmetic unit 15 shown in FIG. Then, the number of printed sheets is counted using a counting means to be described later, and when, for example, the number of printed sheets on the paper output tray reaches 100 sheets, a sorting command signal is generated and the rod 11 shown in FIG. 2 is activated. . As a result, the paper discharge table 3 rotates and changes its position, and the printed paper is sorted into units of number of sheets. In this case, the display method by the display unit 25 shown in FIG. 6 may be as follows. That is, the display unit 25 first displays the total number of prints, for example 1200. After that, the display is erased, and the number of sheets to be sorted, 100, is displayed while blinking. Then, after this, the display is erased and 0 is displayed, and the count signal is activated to 1.2.3.4...
…………100 is displayed sequentially as time passes, up to the number of sorting units of 100. In this way, it is possible to judge how many sheets the sorting unit number is at the present moment, and when it will be estimated from the present moment that the sorting unit number will be reached.

Next, the sorting control system according to the present invention will be specifically described. FIG. 8 shows a detailed control flow of the sorting routine, which can also be called software for performing sorting control. In other words, the control flow in the figure is divided into three modes: one mode is when the total number of prints is 1,000 or more, another is when it is between 200 and 1,000, and another is when it is less than 200. It is divided into

Now, assuming that the number of sheets to be printed is 1200, this data is input in step 1. Then, this input data is transferred to the B register. Note that this B register is a count register for input data. Next, in step 1-1, the input data in the B register is compared with the count number in the A register, that is, the total sheet count register. This A register will be explained later, but when it counts 1200 pieces, B and A
If they agree with each other, proceed to the next step. This will be explained in detail later, but since no substantial printing has occurred yet in any case, A is 0 and the process therefore proceeds to the next step 1-2. Here, it is determined whether an interrupt switch (described later) has been turned on, and if not, the process proceeds to step 2. In step 2, the size of the contents of the B register and the unit number of sheets 1000 is determined. That is, since the total number of sheets is 1200, the determination condition is satisfied and the process proceeds to the next step 3. In step 3, if a paper discharge signal is input, that is, if one sheet of printed paper is discharged from the printing machine, the C and A registers are each set to +1. Of these, the A register is used to count the total number of sheets. When the A register counts 1200 sheets, B and A match each other in step 1-1, and the next step is started assuming that all input data has been consumed. For example, proceed to the cleaning process. Note that register C is a register for counting the number of sheets to be sorted when the total number of sheets is 1000 or more.

At the same time as the paper ejection signal is input, the A register is
1 and set the C register to + in step 4.
Set it to 1 and put this result back into the C register. Next, in step 5, the count in the C register and the number of sheets to be sorted are compared, and if they do not match, the process is fed back to step 1. and,
When the number of sheets of printed paper discharged reaches 100 sheets while repeating these control cycles, in other words, when the number of sheets for sorting is reached, a sorting command signal is generated in step 6 and the sheets are discharged as shown in FIG. Switch the position of stand 3. By repeating this series of control cycles, the output printed paper is automatically sorted into 100-sheet increments. On the other hand, the A register in step 4 is the total number of sheets printed.
When 1200 sheets are counted, B=A in step 1-1, and it is assumed that all printing has been substantially completed, and the process proceeds to the next step, for example, a step for cleaning the ink image on the peripheral surface of the transfer cylinder.

Next, if the number of sheets to be printed is in the range of 200 to 1000 sheets, for example, 800 sheets, this data is input in step 1, and depending on the result of the judgment in step 2, the process proceeds to the next step 7. After that, the control process described above is carried out in the same way, and the ejected printed paper is sorted into units of 50 sheets. If the number of sheets to be printed is 200 or less, the process goes through step 1, step 1-1, step 2, and step 7, and then proceeds to step 12. Then, through a similar process, the discharged printed sheets are sorted into groups of 10 sheets. Note that the determinations in step 2, step 7, and step 12 are performed by the arithmetic unit 15 shown in FIG. Further, counting of the number of sheets by each register is similarly performed by the calculation unit 15.

In this way, by simply inputting the desired number of sheets to be printed, the number of sheets to be sorted is automatically determined according to this number without any external operation, and sorting is performed automatically. . In contrast, traditional sorting methods usually
In addition to setting the total number of sheets to be printed using a counter, the number of sheets to be sorted is also set, which makes operations redundant and makes it easy to forget to set the number of sheets to be sorted. However, the method of the present invention can eliminate such problems.

According to the control method described above, the number of sheets to be sorted as shown in FIG. 4 is fixedly set. In other words, these data are programmed in advance. On the other hand, there are cases where it is desired to set these values arbitrarily. To deal with this, an interrupt request register 26 is provided as shown in FIG. That is, when manually inputting sorting data without using the automatic sorting mode described above, the manual interrupt switch _SW2 is turned on. That is,
When the interrupt switch SW ₂ (indicated by I) on the operation panel of the printing press shown in FIG. 10 is pressed, the interrupt display section 27 lights up, thereby recognizing that the automatic mode has been switched to the manual mode. As soon as the interrupt switch SW ₂ is pressed, the computer program leaves the main routine and switches to the interrupt processing routine, ie, the manual sorting routine, as shown in FIG.

Next, when the person in charge of printing inputs the number of sheets in an arbitrary sorting unit by pressing the numeric key switch 29, the display unit 25 clears the numeric display during auto mode and flashes the previous numeric value. displayed while doing so. FIG. 11 shows an example in which the manual sorting unit number is 30 sheets, and when the number of ejected printed sheets reaches 30 sheets in this mode,
After the aforementioned sorting is performed, the process automatically returns to the main routine which is automatic. Incidentally, FIG. 8 shows that when the aforementioned interrupt switch is turned on, the routine is switched to the manual sorting routine (FIG. 11). In Fig. 10, if you want to change the input data during manual operation, turn on the interrupt switch SW ₂ again and turn on the clear switch SW ₃ to cancel the data, and in this state, input the new numerical value again. In. According to such a control system, the number of sheets to be sorted can be set arbitrarily and selectively, so that the degree of freedom in sorting work can be increased.

In addition, as the position switching device for the ejected printed paper, we used a device configured as shown in Figure 2, but in addition, a pin facing the ejected position of the printed paper that can move forward and backward can be used to change the number of sheets per sorting unit. When the paper gets old, this pin is moved forward and the last printed paper is brought into contact with this pin to change its direction.
It is also possible to use a device that allows the collator to be moved in a timely manner, or a device that allows partitioning tape to be inserted. Furthermore, although the present invention has been described using a rotary offset printing machine as an example, it is of course applicable to other rotary type mimeographing machines, electrophotographic copying machines, etc.

As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to provide a method for sorting discharged sheets such as printing paper, which can automatically and correctly sort the sheets by unit number for any number of sheets to be processed.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is an external configuration diagram showing an example of a rotary offset printing machine, Fig. 2 is a perspective view showing an example of a sorting device used in the present invention, and Fig. 3 is a diagram showing how printing paper is sorted by the number of sorting units. A perspective view showing an aspect;
FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the sorting contents of the sorting unit number of sheets relative to the total number of printed sheets, and FIG. 5 is a hardware configuration diagram of the microcomputer used in the present invention.
FIG. 6 is a configuration diagram showing the relationship between the switching section and the display section that input/output to the input/output control section of the microcomputer, and FIG. 7 is a diagram showing the general flow of the printing system including the sorting process. Figure 8 is a detailed flow diagram of the sorting routine, Figure 9 is a configuration diagram of a microcomputer with an interrupt request register installed, Figure 10 is a diagram showing the operation panel of the printing press, and Figure 11 is a diagram of the main routine and manual. FIG. 3 is a flow diagram showing the interaction with the sorting routine. 1... Processing device, 10... Sorting device as sorting means.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. A method for sorting these sheets into sorting unit numbers when sequentially discharging the total number of sheets processed in a processing device main body one by one, comprising:
When processing an arbitrary number of sheets by storing in advance each set number of sheets to be processed, which ranks the total number of sheets to be processed into several levels within a predetermined range, and the sorting unit number of sheets corresponding to each set number of sheets to be processed. , the number of sheets to be sorted according to the number of sheets to be processed is determined by calculating and judging this arbitrary number of sheets to be processed and the set number of sheets to be processed and determining the belonging range for the arbitrary number of sheets to be processed; A method for sorting discharged sheets, characterized in that the number of sheets to be processed is counted by a counting means, and when the number of sheets is counted to the sorting unit number, the sheet sorting means is activated by this count signal. 2. A method for sorting these sheets into sorting unit numbers when discharging the total number of sheets processed in the main body of the processing device one by one,
When processing an arbitrary number of sheets by storing in advance each set number of sheets to be processed, which ranks the total number of sheets to be processed into several levels within a predetermined range, and the sorting unit number of sheets corresponding to each set number of sheets to be processed. , the number of sheets to be sorted according to the number of sheets to be processed is determined by calculating and judging this arbitrary number of sheets to be processed and the set number of sheets to be processed and determining the belonging range for the arbitrary number of sheets to be processed; When the number of sheets to be processed is counted by the counting means and reaches the number of sheets to be sorted, this count signal activates the sheet sorting means, and when the interrupt switch is turned on for this automatic sorting mode, the above-mentioned sorting is started. A method for sorting discharged sheets characterized by switching to a manual sorting mode in which the unit number of sheets can be set to an arbitrary value, and returning to the automatic sorting mode after completing sorting in this mode.