Apparatus for dispensing tickets, cards and the like from a stack

Abstract

An apparatus for dispensing articles such as tickets and cards includes a cabinet and a plurality of article dispensing assemblies inside the cabinet. Each article dispensing assembly includes a base and a frame for enclosing the articles to be dispensed in a stack. The bases are mounted on a pair of vertical support plates. A gate is disposed behind each frame for receiving articles from its associated frame and allowing only one article at a time to pass through. A toothed blade is disposed underneath each frame and a motor driven rack and pinion is coupled to the toothed blade for bringing the toothed blade into engagement with the lowermost article in the stack, moving said toothed blade so that the lowermost article is transported from the stack into the gate, bringing the toothed blade out of engagement with the article and then moving the toothed blade back to engage the next article in the stack. A removable weight is seated on top of each stack to push the stack down against the toothed blade and a plurality of exit rollers are located behind the gates for pulling tickets out of the gates of the article dispensing assemblies. In one embodiment of the invention each frame is hingedly mounted on its base. In another embodiment of the invention each frame is removably mounted on its base rather than being hingedly mounted on its base and includes an open top through which articles are loaded, a rear wall underneath which articles exit the frame, a cover for covering the top, a gate for controlling passage of articles from the underneath of the rear wall, a first locking mechanism for locking the cover in place over the top and a second locking mechanism for locking the frame in place on the base of the article dispensing assembly, the second locking mechanism also controlling the position of the gate on the frame.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.