Image forming apparatus and sorting method
AssigneeKYOCERA Document Solutions Inc.
InventorHideyuki OGASAWARA
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Provided is an image forming apparatus and a sorting method allowing paper sheets to be sorted by size or thickness from a bundle of documents that have been already printed with no need for adding a sensor, or the like, or during the time for printing preparation, or the like. The image forming apparatus includes a first detecting part, a paper discharging part and a control part. The first detecting part detects the pass of an edge part of the document. The control part determines the length of a document along the direction of conveyance from the time required from the moment when the document reaches the first detecting part to the moment when it pass the first detecting part, determining the sorting destination.
Claims14
An image forming apparatus, comprising:
- a paper feeding part that accommodates a plurality of documents,
- a registration roller pair that conveys a document fed out from the paper feeding part to an image forming part at a specified speed,
- a first detecting part for detecting the pass of an edge part of the document immediately before being conveyed to the image forming part,
- a paper discharging part that discharges the document conveyed after having passed the image forming part,
- a plurality of paper delivery trays that accumulate the document discharged to the paper discharging part,
- a storing part for storing a piece of characteristic information related to the document that is accumulated on each of the plurality of paper delivery trays,
- a moving part for moving anyone of the plurality of paper delivery trays or all of the plurality of paper delivery trays to a specified position,
- a control part that controls the moving part, and
- an inputting part for inputting various numerical values or various instruction commands to the control part,
- the control part
- determining a length of the document in a direction of conveyance from the time required from the moment when the document conveyed at the specified speed has reached the first detecting part to the moment when the document passes the first detecting part,
- determining any one of the plurality of paper delivery trays as a sorting destination on the basis of the length of each of the plurality of documents along the direction of conveyance, and the piece of characteristic information that has been previously stored in the storing part or otherwise is stored in a successive manner, and
- moving the paper delivery tray as the sorting destination to a position opposed to the paper discharging part.
A sorting method, being used with an image forming apparatus including:
- a paper feeding part that accommodates a plurality of documents,
- a registration roller pair that conveys a document fed out from the paper feeding part to an image forming part at a specified speed,
- a first detecting part for detecting the pass of an edge part of the document immediately before being conveyed to the image forming part,
- a paper discharging part that discharges the document conveyed after having passed the image forming part,
- a plurality of paper delivery trays that accumulate the document discharged to the paper discharging part,
- a storing part for storing a piece of characteristic information related to the document that is accumulated on each of the plurality of paper delivery trays,
- a moving part for moving anyone of the plurality of paper delivery trays or all of the plurality of paper delivery trays to a specified position,
- a control part that controls the moving part, and
- an inputting part for inputting various numerical values or various instruction commands to the control part,
- comprising:
- a first step of determining a length of the document along the direction of conveyance from the time required from the moment when the document conveyed at the specified speed has reached the first detecting part to the moment when the document passes the first detecting part,
- a second step of specifying the sorting destination of the document on the basis of the length of each of the plurality of documents along the direction of conveyance, and the piece of characteristic information that has been previously stored in the storing part or otherwise is stored in a successive manner, and
- a third step of moving the paper delivery tray as the sorting destination of the document that has been specified in the second step to a position opposed to the paper discharging part, and
- a fourth step of discharging the document from the paper discharging part.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.