Sheet feeding or delivering – Special articles – Envelope
Reexamination Certificate
2001-04-02
2003-10-07
Ellis, Christopher P. (Department: 3651)
Sheet feeding or delivering
Special articles
Envelope
C271S003120, C271S129000, C271S031100, C271S149000, C198S474100, C198S479100, C198S728000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06629691
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to, in a paper-leaves division system for use, for example, in postal organizations or the like, a paper-leaves transferring apparatus suitably employable in separating a plurality of paper leaves such as mail, deposited together in a bundle, to convey them one by one to a partitioning section.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the recent years, a mail division apparatus, which includes a recognizing function for reading a bar-code attached to mail or a character recognizing function for reading destination information such as a postal code to divide the mail automatically on the basis of these destination information, has been put in practical use. Such a paper-leaves division apparatus, which is made to handle mail or the like (which will be referred to hereinafter to “paper leaves”), has been required to meet requirements such as space-saving, labor-saving, cost reduction and fast operation. A means to realize the fast operation of these requirements has been required to eliminate the occurrence of troubles in the middle of the conveyance and further to accomplish the conveyance and the partitioning operation more promptly and accurately.
In general, such a type of paper-leaves division apparatus is designed to separate a plurality of paper leaves to be divided, deposited together in a bundle in a stand-up condition in a depositing section and fed to a separating/supplying section, one by one and subsequently send them successively toward the downstream side. The separating/supplying section is equipped with a separating/supplying belt so that the paper leaves are carried in the stand-up condition until arriving at a contact position with the separating/supplying belt and, when reaching the separating/supplying belt position, they are almost vertically fed in an upward direction, i.e., toward the downstream side, in a state attached onto the separating/supplying belt by vacuum suction. In addition, the movement of the paper leaves from the depositing section to the separating/supplying section is accomplished by a paper-leaves conveying means equipped with an arm for supporting side surfaces of the paper leaves.
In the paper-leaves conveying means, the arm is made to protrude and retreat into/from the interior of the depositing section, and protrudes into the interior of the depositing section when the paper leaves are sent to a paper-leaves feeding position at which the separating/supplying belt lies, and supports the side surfaces of the paper leaves in that state, thus enabling the paper leaves to shift toward the paper leaves feeding position. In addition, when the paper leaves approach the paper-leaves feeding position, the arm retreats gradually. Thereafter, the paper leaves are handed over to the separating/supplying belt to be fed to the downstream side by the separating/supplying belt.
Accordingly, if the separating/supplying section cannot achieve the separation of the paper leaves properly and promptly, then this has great influence on the handling ability, for that difficulty is encountered in handling a large number of paper leaves at a high speed.
In addition, if the repeated operations such as the transfer of the paper leaves to the separating/supplying section and the separation of the paper leaves in the separating/supplying section are not conducted promptly and accurately, this has adverse effect on the subsequent address information reading accuracy and conveying/partitioning operations.
The above-mentioned paper-leaves conveying means with the conventional construction has no choice other than the arm retreating gradually as the paper leaves approach the paper-leaves feeding position, and since the arm cannot reach the separating/supplying belt in the protruding state immediately before the paper leaves come into contact with the separating/supplying belt, the paper leaves can frequently fall into an backwardly inclined condition to fall down immediately before the paper-leaves feeding position. For this reason, in order to bring the paper leaves, inclinable backwardly to fall down, into contact with the separating/supplying belt, there is a need for an operator to raise up the paper leaves at the paper-leaves feeding position or to directly support the paper leaves by hand immediately before the paper-leaves feeding position, which creates problems in safety, lowered work efficiency and increased burden on the operator. In addition, in the case of the conventional mechanism/system, when the arm retreats gradually in response to the paper leaves approaching the paper-leaves feeding position, the conveying speed reduces or gains with respect to a desired speed before the paper-leaves feeding position so that the interval of the paper leaves lengthens or shortens before the paper-leaves feeding position to deviate from a proper value. For example, in a case in which a speed for when the paper leaves are successively conveyed to the paper-leaves feeding position is higher than a speed for when the paper leaves are fed toward the downstream side at the paper-leaves feeding position, the paper leaves can jam at the paper-leaves feeding position. In such a case, the preceding paper leaves are interposed between the belt surface of the separating/supplying belt and the succeeding paper leaves conveyed afterwards, and the load to be imposed increases to make difficult the smooth feeding operation at the separating/supplying belt. The worst of it may be that simultaneous feeding of two paper leaves occurs (overlap transportation).
As mentioned above, when a large number of paper leaves are conveyed fast and consecutively, the paper leaves can be fed in an overlapped condition in the separating/supplying section or fed at a distribution-impossible interval, which may cause a trouble that a partitioning operation of the paper leaves to be conducted in the middle of the conveyance does not correctly take place. Moreover, even in a case in which the overlap transportation does not occur at that time in the separating/supplying section, the interval of the paper leaves becomes unstable during the conveyance in the paper-leaves conveying path, and the interval between one paper leaf and another subsequent paper leaf lengthens or shortens extremely, which may cause the overlap transportation of the paper leaves or the occurrence of the distribution-impossible space, thus leading to the trouble that difficulty is experienced in conducting a proper partitioning operation for the paper leaves in the middle of the conveyance. Still moreover, since the paper leaves can have arbitrary and diverse thickness, if the paper-leaves conveying means is operated at a constant speed without considering the thickness of the paper leaves, at the feeding of thick paper leaves, a large space occurs thereafter to produce a wasteful time of several seconds in the following feeding, which can lower the handling ability of the machine.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention has been developed in consideration of the above-mentioned problems, and it is therefore an object of the invention to provide a paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system, which is capable of feeding the paper leaves smoothly without placing a full-time operator at the paper-leaves feeding position and of eliminating the work requiring the hands of the operators for improving the safety and cutting the number of persons.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a paper-leaves feeding apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system, which is capable of feeding the paper leaves smoothly at the paper-leaves feeding position.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system, which has a construction capable of conveying the paper leaves to the paper-leaves feeding position where the paper leaves are separated and fed one by one to the downstream side, and of conducting a prompt and proper separ
Nakamoto Akihiko
Niiyama Yuichi
Shibata Nobuo
Shimasaki Akira
Deuble Mark A.
Ellis Christopher P.
Matsushita Electric - Industrial Co., Ltd.
McDermott & Will & Emery
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