High speed document handler

Abstract

Disclosed is a document handler and feeder device for performing high speed separating and transporting of documents, such as business forms. The document handling unit is equipped with friction type feed rollers and a lipped contour plate over which documents must pass. The feed rollers contact and transport a foremost document from a gravity-feed document hopper. High speed tracking belts, are mounted over grooves or tracks, which extend along a track plate and through the lip of the contour plate. The feed rolls force the leading edge of the foremost document into the lip where the document engages the bottom side of the belts so that it is nipped between the belts and the contour plate causing the document to move into the tracking grooves. The contour plate has a transition radius between its lip and the base of the document hopper upon which the foremost document rests. This radius is about 1/4 the radius of the feed rolls which drive the foremost document up to the lip located above the hopper base a distance of about 2/3 the radius of the contour plate.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.