Photography – Fluid-treating apparatus – Dark cabinet
Reexamination Certificate
2000-08-04
2002-04-02
Rutledge, D. (Department: 2851)
Photography
Fluid-treating apparatus
Dark cabinet
C396S612000, C355S027000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06364546
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a photograph processing apparatus and, more particularly, to a photograph processing apparatus capable of processing a lengthy photosensitive material spliced at splicing portions. In the apparatus, a photosensitive-material-containing magazine contains the photosensitive material which is rolled up. The photosensitive material has a detecting slot longitudinally formed near; each of the splicing portions for detecting these portions.
2. Description of the Related Art
Such a photograph processing apparatus records, under exposure, a frame picture of a negative or a digital picture film onto a photosensitive material or develops and dries thus-exposed photosensitive material, to eject it as cut in photograph print from the apparatus. To process this photosensitive material, the photograph processing apparatus is adapted to be mounted at its predetermined portion with a photosensitive-material containing magazine.
In the photosensitive-material containing magazine, a lengthy photosensitive material is wound in roll as long as 100 and a few tens of meters in some cases. In processing a photograph, the photosensitive material is pulled out of the photosensitive-material magazine and conveyed during predetermined processing. Ideally, the photosensitive material should preferably be contained with no splicing portions in the photosensitive-material containing magazine; actually however, splicing portions may be provided for a manufacturing reason etc.
The following will describe splicing portions with reference to FIG.
3
. As shown in
FIG. 3
, a photosensitive material is cut with a cutter (cutting means) in front of and behind a splicing portion. Such a photosensitive material is hereinafter called splicing portion-attached photosensitive material
3
s
. The splicing portion-attached photosensitive material
3
s
comprises a splicing portion at which photosensitive material pieces are spliced in a longitudinal direction, and a detecting slot
3
a
for detecting the splicing portion
3
b
. At the splicing portion
3
b
, front and rear photosensitive material pieces are spliced by an appropriate method such as thermal fusion.
The detecting slot
3
a
is formed in the photosensitive material longitudinally (in a conveying direction), measuring x in the longitudinal direction and y in the conveying-width direction. The detecting slot size and position with respect to the splicing portion
3
b
are specified by the JIS Standards and the ISO Standards.
The following will briefly describe a configuration of a conveying means or a plurality of conveying means for conveying a photosensitive material
3
in a photograph processing apparatus, which conveying means is positioned near an ejecting port.
FIG. 5
is a side view of the conveying means T in the vicinity of the ejecting portion
10
, and
FIG. 6
is a plan view of the conveying means T shown in FIG.
5
.
The photosensitive material is conveyed in the arrow direction in the figure. The above-mentioned conveying means T comprises a driving roller
39
, a pressing roller
40
, a large-diameter roller
35
provided at a curved comer on a conveying path, a pair of pressing rollers
36
and
37
pressed against the large-diameter roller
35
, a driving roller set
30
, and a pressing roller set
31
. As shown in
FIG. 6
, the pressing roller set
31
comprises three pressing rollers of
31
a
,
31
b
, and
31
c
arranged in a conveying-width direction and supported by a supporting shaft
34
. The driving roller set
30
also comprises three driving rollers corresponding to the above-mentioned pressing rollers
31
a
-
31
c.
How the splicing portion-attached photosensitive material
3
s
is conveyed is explained as follows: it is conveyed over the large-diameter roller
35
and the driving roller set
30
, more specifically by the pressing roller
31
a
at the center among the pressing roller set
31
and the driving roller, in which the pressing roller
31
a
has its width size h a little smaller than a width size y of the detecting slot
3
a
(see FIG.
18
).
With this, therefore, when the splicing portion attached photosensitive material
3
s
is conveyed so that the detecting slot
3
a
may be positioned at the pressing roller
31
a
, this pressing roller
31
a
cannot transfer conveying force. To certainly convey the splicing portion-attached photosensitive material
3
s
even in such a case, a distance A has been large between the end of the detecting slot
3
a
and that of the photosensitive material
3
s
so that even if conveying force by the pressing roller
31
a
cannot be transferred, conveying force by the large-diameter roller
35
and the first pressing roller
36
on the upstream side can be transferred. That is, if, as shown in
FIG. 5
, a distance B as supposed to be a spacing between the large-diameter roller
35
and the pressing roller set
31
is set so that A<B, the splicing portion-attached photosensitive material
3
s
cannot be conveyed. Therefore, at least a relationship of A>B must be established.
The splicing portion-attached photosensitive material
3
s
cannot be used in printing and is to be discarded, so that the above-mentioned dimension A should have preferably been reduced as much as possible to minimize a resultant loss. Also, a suspected increase in the width of the pressing roller
31
a
is limited in view of a configuration shown in
FIG. 6
in which large-diameter rollers
32
a
-
32
c
are arranged next to the driving rollers
30
a
-
30
c
to give a robustness to the photosensitive material.
Such a suspected method that takes out the splicing portion-attached photosensitive material
3
s
from the apparatus by stopping photograph processing is troublesome because it involves suspending of the photograph processing.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In view of the above, it is an object of the present invention to provide a photograph processing apparatus capable of minimizing a loss in a photosensitive material used while maintaining a high processing efficiency.
To this end, a photograph processing apparatus according to the present invention features such a configuration that comprises: an exposing portion for recording, under exposure, a picture on a photosensitive material which is cut to a print size; a developing portion for developing the photosensitive material; a photosensitive-material-containing magazine for containing in roll a lengthy photosensitive material composed of pieces connected via respective splicing portions in the vicinity of which, for each, a detecting slot is longitudinally formed for detecting each splicing portion; a cutting means for cutting the photosensitive material drawn from the photosensitive-material-containing magazine to a predetermined size as a splicing portion-attached photosensitive material having the splicing portion and the detecting slot; a conveying means for conveying the thus-cut photosensitive material; a conveying roller which is provided in the conveying means and which has a width the same as or narrower than the detecting slot; and a width-directional shifting means for shifting in a conveyance-width direction the splicing portion-attached photosensitive material to a position such that the conveying roller may not encounter the detecting slot.
With this configuration, a lengthy photosensitive material is drawn from the photosensitive-material-containing magazine mounted on a photograph processing apparatus and then undergoes exposure and other processes consecutively. The lengthy photosensitive material is cut by the cutting means to a predetermined print size, specifically in such a manner that the cutting means cuts a portion including the splicing portion and the detecting slot as a splicing portion-attached photosensitive material. This splicing portion-attached photosensitive material, which is conveyed by the conveying means having a narrow conveying roller, is actually conveyed by the width-directional shifting means in a conveying-width direction to
Azuma Shinji
Oka Teruhito
Shiotani Takuya
Knobbe Martens Olson & Bear LLP
Noritsu Koki Co., Ltd.
Rutledge D.
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