Collating punch system

A paper punching and collating system, comprising:

• a sheet transport mechanism having an inlet and an outlet;
• a plurality of paper feeding mechanisms, disposed at the inlet, configured to selectively supply a plurality of types of finished sheet media, having a front side and a back side, to the sheet transport mechanism;
• an accumulator, disposed at the outlet, positioned to receive the sheets of media from the sheet transport mechanism front side-down, having a stopping and aligning mechanism, configured to gather and align a selected number of the sheets of media into a lift;
• a punching die assembly, positioned to receive the lift of sheets from the accumulator as a unit, configured to punch binding holes of a selected configuration in an edge of the sheets of the lift, and to discharge the punched lift;
• and
• a controller, coupled to and configured to selectively actuate the sheet transport mechanism, the sheet feeding mechanisms, the accumulator and the punching die assembly, whereby collated lifts of sheets of multiple types are sequentially gathered and punched according to a selected book configuration programmed into the controller.

A method for punching and collating sheets of media in an automatic punching and collating system having a multi-source media intake mechanism provided with multiple types of media, comprising:

• receiving media sheets one at a time in a programmed book order from the multi-source media intake mechanism into a stopping and aligning mechanism;
• accumulating a selected number of the media sheets in the book order into a collated stack in the stopping and aligning mechanism;
• punching binding holes in the aligned stack of media sheets using a punching die assembly positioned to receive the collated stack discharged from the stopping and aligning mechanism, producing a collated punched stack;
• and
• discharging the collated punched stack from the automatic punching and collating system using a discharge mechanism.