JPS627482A - Thickness decision device - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] This bulletin contains application data before electronic filing, so abstract data is not recorded.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Technical Field of the Invention] The present invention relates to a thickness determination device for determining the thickness of a mail item being conveyed in a mail processing device, such as a mail sorting device.

[Technical background of the invention and its problems] In general, in a sorting device, there is a very high possibility that mail that has become thick due to foreign matter, etc., or mail that has become jammed in the device. For this reason, in view of the availability of the apparatus, the above-mentioned mail items are rejected in advance. However, as shown in FIG. 6, the thickness of the mail can be reduced by turning on and off a microswitch (not shown) according to the movement of the moving roller 31.
or more) or thin (5 mm or less). Items determined to be thick are excluded. However, with such a determination device, it is difficult to reduce the width (gap) between the movable roller 31 and the fixed roller 32 to 5 mrn or less, so it is difficult to determine the extremely thin (1 mm or less) mail that is likely to get jammed. The drawback was that it was not possible.

[Purpose of the Invention] This invention has been made in view of the above points, and its purpose is to provide a thickness determination device that can determine even extremely thin paper sheets with a simple configuration. This is what we are trying to provide.

[Summary of the Invention] In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the present invention optically detects the paper sheets with a first detection means provided on the paper sheet conveyance path, and also detects the paper sheets with a first detection means provided on the conveyance path. , the paper sheet is optically detected by a second detection means having a different detection sensitivity from the first detection means, and the detection results of the first detection means and the detection results of the second detection means are compared. However, the thickness of the paper sheet is determined according to the comparison result.

[Embodiment of the Invention] An embodiment of the invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 schematically shows the configuration of a thickness determining device according to the present invention. That is, the mail P is conveyed along the conveyance path 1 in the direction of arrow a in the figure. This conveyance path 1 is composed of conveyor belts 2 and 3.

The transport path 1 is provided with first and second detectors (photoelectric switches) 4.5. The first detector 4 has a well-known configuration including a light emitting element 6 and a light receiving element 7. Further, the second detector 5 includes a light emitting element 8, a light receiving element 9, and a filter 10 made of an acrylic plate or the like. The optical axis of the first detector 4 and the second
The optical axis of the detector 5 intersects with the detector 5 on the conveyance path 1, and the same point on the mail P being conveyed on the conveyance path 1 is illuminated. The first detector 4 is
The sensitivity is adjusted to such a level that the irradiation light from the light emitting element 6 is blocked (not transmitted) no matter how thin (1 mm or less) mail is handled. The second detector 5 has a filter 1 that has a sensitivity that allows the irradiation light from the light emitting element 8 to pass through (not block) the thin (1 mm or less) mail P.
It is adjusted by 0. To adjust the sensitivity of the above irradiation light,
This may be done using a light amount adjustment volume (not shown) of the light emitting element 8. Thereby, by arbitrarily changing the sensitivity using the filter 10 or the light amount adjustment volume, it is possible to arbitrarily adjust the standard for determining the thickness of various mail items.

A gate 11 is provided near the end of the conveyance path 1 . This gate 11 guides the mail P from the conveyance path 1 to the conveyance path 12 or the removal conveyance path 13 by moving in the directions of arrows bi and b2 in accordance with the drive of a drive circuit (not shown). . The conveyance path 12 is constituted by the conveyance belt 2 and the belt 14,
The removal conveyor belt 13 is composed of the conveyor belt 3 and the belt 14.

FIG. 2 shows the main parts of the electric circuit.

That is, the light receiving element 7 of the first and second detectors 4.5
．． The outputs of 9 are each supplied to an exclusive OR circuit (EOR circuit) 22 via an inverter circuit 2012). The output of this FOR circuit 22 is supplied to a drive circuit 23. This drive circuit 23 moves the gate 11 according to a signal supplied from the EOR circuit 22. For example, when the rOJ signal is supplied from the EOR circuit 22, the gate 11 is moved in the direction of arrow b1 to guide the mail P to the transport path 12 side, and the EOR circuit 22
When the "1" signal is supplied from the mailbox 2, the gate 11 is moved in the direction of the arrow b2 to guide the mail P to the removal conveyance path 13 side.

Next, the operation in the above configuration will be explained. For example, now, a mail P is conveyed along the conveyance path 1 in the direction of arrow a. Then, the tip of the mail P is detected by the first and second detectors 4.5.
corresponds to the optical axis of At this time, the mail P being transported is
For example, as shown in FIG. 3, when the thickness is more than a predetermined thickness (1 mm), the light emitted from the light emitting element 6 and
The light is blocked and is not guided to the light receiving element 7.9. Then, since no signal is output from the light receiving element 7.9, F
A “0” signal is output from the OR circuit 22. As a result, the drive circuit 23 moves the gate 11 toward the transport path 12 (bl). As a result, the mail P is guided from the conveyance path 1 to the conveyance path 12, and is sent to a rear sorting device (not shown).
transported to the side.

Further, if the mail P conveyed through the conveyance path 1 is
As shown in the figure, when the thickness is less than a predetermined thickness (1 mm), the irradiated light from the light emitting element 6 is blocked by the above-mentioned mail P and is not guided to the light receiving element 7, but the irradiated light from the light emitting element 8 is The light passes through the mail P and is guided to the light receiving element 9. Then, since a signal is output only from the light receiving element 9, a "1" signal is output from the EOR circuit 22. Thereby, the drive circuit 23 moves the gate 11 toward the removal transport path 13 (b2). As a result, the mail P is guided from the conveyance path 1 to the rejection conveyance path 13 and conveyed to the rejection collection box (not shown).

The signal waveforms of the above-mentioned main parts are shown in FIGS. 5(a) and (b).
) as shown.

However, if the light from the light-emitting element 6 is blocked by the mail P and the light from the light-emitting element 8 is transmitted, that is, the light-receiving element 7 does not output a signal, and the light-receiving element 9 outputs a signal. In this case, the above mail P has a standard thickness of 1
If it is determined that the mail piece is thinner than mm, and if the light from the light emitting element 6.8 is blocked by the mail piece P, that is, if no signal is output from the light receiving element 7.9, the mail piece P is It is determined that the mail is thicker than 1 mm.

As mentioned above, the detection sensitivity (output) of one detector is set so that it responds to (blocks light) all mail, and the detection sensitivity of the other detector is used as the standard for the thickness of mail. It now responds only to mail items that exceed the thickness of .

Therefore, by setting the standard thickness of the mail to an extremely thin mail, even extremely thin mail can be detected with a simple configuration.

In the above embodiment, the thickness of the mail was described as being detected, but the present invention is not limited to this, and the invention is not limited to this. It can also be applied to detecting

Although the embodiment has been described using detectors with different detection sensitivities (outputs), the detection sensitivities of high-output detectors may be lowered to their respective optimal sensitivities using filters or the like.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to provide a thickness determination device that can determine even extremely thin mail with a simple configuration.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

1 to 5 show an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 1 is a diagram schematically showing the configuration of the thickness determination device according to the invention, and FIG. 2 is a diagram showing the main parts of the electric circuit. A schematic block diagram, FIG. 3 is a diagram to explain the operation when a thick mail is conveyed, and FIG. 4 is a diagram to explain the operation when a thin mail is conveyed. The diagrams shown in Figure 5 show the signal waveforms of the main parts. Figure (a) is a signal waveform diagram for a thick mail item, Figure (b) is a signal waveform diagram for a thin mail item, and Figure 6. 1 is a plan view schematically showing the configuration of a conventional thickness determination device. 1... Conveyance path, 4.5... Detector, 6.8... Light emitting element, 7.9... Light receiving element, 1Q... Filter,
11...gate, 20.2)...inverter circuit,
22... Exclusive OR circuit, 23... Drive circuit. Applicant's representative Patent attorney Takehiko Suzue Figure 2 Figure 4 C (b) EOR revision 22 each No. Ca) Figure 5

Claims (4)

[Claims] (1) In a thickness determination device that determines the thickness of paper sheets conveyed on a conveyance path, a first detection means provided on the conveyance path and optically detects the paper sheets; a second detection means for optically detecting the paper sheet and having a different detection sensitivity from the first detection means; a detection result of the first detection means and a detection result of the second detection means; 1. A thickness determination device comprising: determination means for comparing the thickness of the substrate and determining the thickness according to the comparison result. (2) The first detection means detects paper sheets regardless of their thickness, and the second detection means detects paper sheets with a predetermined thickness or more. A thickness determination device according to claim 1, characterized in that: (3) The determination means determines that the paper sheet is a thick paper sheet when the detection signal is supplied by the first and second detection means,
2. The thickness determination device according to claim 1, wherein the device determines that the paper sheet is thin when a detection signal is supplied only from the second detection means. (4) The thickness determination device according to claim 1, wherein the optical axes of the first and second detection means intersect on the conveyance path.