Cutting – Tool engages work during dwell of intermittent workfeed – Plural tools successively actuated at same station
Reexamination Certificate
1999-09-24
2001-07-10
Peterson, Kenneth E. (Department: 3724)
Cutting
Tool engages work during dwell of intermittent workfeed
Plural tools successively actuated at same station
C083S263000, C083S687000, C083S948000, C083S236000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06257112
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for manufacturing photographic filmstrips from a long strip of photographic film, especially for manufacturing photographic filmstrips having one or two perforations and sections of data per picture frame along one or both of lateral sides thereof by perforating, sections of recording data and cutting the long film.
2. Background Art
Leader-advancing type photographic film cassettes have been disclosed, e.g., in U.S. Pat. No. 4,846,418, in which the whole length of a filmstrip is contained within a cassette shell, and a film leader of the filmstrip can be advanced to the outside of the cassette shell by rotating a spool of the cassette. With this type of film cassette, a camera need not have the sprocket wheel that has conventionally been used for feeding the film leader to the take-up spool of the camera. Once the film leader has been engaged with the take-up spool, the filmstrip may be advanced by rotating the take-up spool. Therefore, the filmstrip of the leader-advancing type cassette need not have a lot of successive perforations which conventional 135-type filmstrips have for engagement with the sprocket wheel or the take-up spool.
Still, in order to advance the filmstrip one frame after each exposure, the filmstrip of the leader advancing type cassette has at least a perforation per picture frame. The perforation is intended to be detected by a photo-sensor in the camera to determine each frame exposure location and position it in an exposure aperture of the camera. Since these perforations for frame positioning are disposed in association with the frame exposure locations, the filmstrip of the leader advancing type cassette, a hereinafter referred to as a new type filmstrip, does not have a positioning perforation in its leader and trailer where no picture frame is to be recorded. Hereinafter, a section which extends over the frame exposure locations of each individual filmstrip will be referred to as a recording section.
For providing perforations only in the recording sections of the filmstrips to be made from the long film, it is not appropriate to use a conventional perforating method for the 135-type film, such as disclosed in JPA 61-214999 and JPY 4-2800, wherein perforations are formed at constant intervals all along the long film while the long film is continuously transported.
For this reason, apparatuses for manufacturing the new type of filmstrip have been suggested, one of which uses a die set having a number of punches and dies corresponding to the number of frame exposure locations to be provided in the individual filmstrips formed from the long film. The apparatus makes the corresponding number of perforations in one punching operation in the recording section of each individual filmstrip. Hereinafter, the number of frame exposure locations per filmstrip will be referred to as the film frame number. A similar method has conventionally been applied to manufacturing 110-type filmstrips.
In
FIG. 13
showing such an apparatus, the long film
12
is fed from a roll
10
to a first vacuum suction chamber
15
through dancer roller
13
and a sub-feed rollers
14
. The suction chamber
15
transiently stores an appropriate length of the long film
12
before being fed to the die set
17
through a pass roller
16
.
The die set
17
has a punch holder
19
with the same number of punches
18
as the film frame number, and a die plate
21
with the corresponding number of dies
20
. The punches and dies
18
and
20
are arranged at the same intervals as the frame exposure locations. An air cylinder
22
is driven to move the punch holder
19
down to the die plate
21
while the long film
12
stops on the die plate
21
, making the same number of perforations as the film frame number at one time.
Downstream of the die set
17
are disposed a first vacuum suction drum
24
, a second vacuum suction chamber
25
, a second vacuum suction drum
26
, a side-printer
27
and a cutter
28
in serial fashion. The first and second suction drums
24
and
26
have suction holes formed through respective peripheral surfaces, and are driven by servo motors
30
and
32
, respectively. Thus, the suction drums
24
and
26
transport the film
12
while sucking it on the peripheral surfaces thereof.
While the first suction drum
24
is driven by the servo motor
30
, an encoder
31
connected to the servo motor
30
monitors the rotational amount of the drum
24
to detect the transported length of the film
12
. The drum
24
starts rotating after each die-punching operation for forming the perforations P in the film
12
, and stops rotating when the film
12
is transported by a unit length which is predetermined in accordance with the film frame number. Thus the next recording section to be perforated is positioned in the die set
17
.
The perforated section of the film
12
is transported through the first suction drum
24
to the second suction chamber
25
to transiently store an appropriate length of the film
12
before being fed to the cutter
28
. The film
12
is transported from the suction chamber
25
to the cutter
28
through the second suction drum
26
, while an encoder
33
connected to the servo motor
32
monitors the rotational amount of the second suction drum
26
to detect, the transported length of the film
12
. The detection signal from the encoder
33
is sent to the side-printer
27
.
In synchronism with the detection signal, the side-printer
27
optically records data such as the name of film manufacturer, frame serial numbers and the like as latent images of characters and bar codes along one or both of lateral sides of the film
12
while the film
12
is being transported through the second suction drum
26
. The side-printer
27
is movable toward a peripheral position of the second suction drum
26
where the transported film
12
is tightly held, so that the side-printer
27
faces the photosensitive emulsion surface of the film
12
at a constant distance. The peripheral position may be referred to as a side-print position.
The second suction drum
26
stops rotating when it has transported the film
12
by the predetermined unit length. Then, the cutter
28
is actuated to cut the film
12
into individual filmstrips.
Meanwhile, the new type filmstrip may have variations in the film frame number like conventional filmstrips. To cope with the different film frame numbers, the apparatus as shown in
FIG. 13
is provided with interchangeable punch holders having different numbers of punches. One of the punch holders is selected in correspondence with the film frame number of the filmstrips designated to be produced. Also the unit length for the transport of the film
12
through the suction drums
24
and
26
is changed in accordance with the selected film frame number. Although the film length extending from the die set
17
to the cutter
28
changes with the change of the unit length, the second suction chamber
25
absorbs the variation by changing the storing length of the film
12
. It is to be noted that the side-print position is unchanged regardless of the film frame number. Of course, the number of times of recording as well as a side-print end position vary depending on the film frame number, as a side-print end position.
Since the above-described apparatus needs two suction drums
24
and
26
, two servo motors
30
and
32
, and two encoders
31
and
33
for transporting the film
12
by the unit length relative to the die set
17
and the cutter
28
, respectively, its mechanism and control system are complicated. Moreover, since the drums
24
and
26
must have a diameter large enough to ensure the suction of the film
12
, the distance between the cutter
28
and side-printer
27
, and thus the length of the film
12
from a cut position B to the side-print position C must correspondingly be long, as is shown in
FIG. 14
, wherein the cut position B is a position to cut trailing ends
6
of individual filmstrips
5
, tha
Kambara Takayuki
Wakabayashi Akira
Fuji Photo Film Co. , Ltd.
Peterson Kenneth E.
Sughrue Mion Zinn Macpeak & Seas, PLLC
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