Sheet registration within a media inverter
AssigneeXerox Corporation
InventorsRobert Clark, Robert Lofthus
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Parallel printing systems and methods incorporate inverter assemblies for not only inverting media during transport through the system but also to register the media and to provide a velocity buffer transport with different drive velocities. The inverter assemblies can include the capability to optionally deskew the media while providing lateral (cross-process) registration corrections. The method comprises simultaneously combining the inverting function selectively with deskewing, side registering, and/or velocity buffering functions.
Claims25
A printing system comprising:
- a marking engine and a document transport path highway;
- an inverter including a registration system having a pair of independently driven reversing inverter rollers;
- said registration system includes a translating frame for translating said reversing inverter rollers wherein said inverter rollers are differentially driven while being translated by said translating frame for inverting and registering a document along a media path.
An inverter apparatus comprising:
- at least two nip drive rollers for grasping and inverting the document;
- variable speed process direction motors for differentially driving separate ones of the nip drive rollers at variable speeds;
- and,
- sensors for sensing if the document is skewed and laterally offset during ingress of the document to the inverter and during egress of the document from the inverter.
An inverter apparatus comprising:
- an inverter frame;
- at least two nip drive rollers and at least two idle rollers opposed thereto for grasping and inverting the document;
- variable speed motors for differentially driving separate ones of the nip drive rollers at variable speeds;
- a translating frame supporting the nip drive rollers and the idle rollers;
- and,
- a translating motor associated with the translating frame for selectively laterally shifting the drive rollers and idle rollers relative to said inverter frame.
A method comprising:
- transporting the document into the inverter assembly at a first speed;
- sensing deskew of the document with at least two sensors;
- sensing lateral registration of the document with a third sensor;
- inverting the document in the inverter assembly;
- registering the document within the inverter assembly wherein the registering comprises simultaneously cross-process translating and deskewing of the document in a forward direction and in a reverse direction.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.