Scanner carriage lamp reflector and method of using same

A carriage unit having a cover with an elongated slot disposed therein, said slot having a sufficient length to extend across an entire horizontal dimension of a defined field of view scanning area and a sufficient width to define a document illumination area within the defined field of view scanning area and a housing having an elongated groove disposed adjacent and opposite said elongated slot, said groove having another sufficient length to extend across the entire horizontal dimension of the defined field of view scanning area, comprising:

• a high intensity lamp having a central portion sandwiched between a pair of end portions and being mounted above said groove for illuminating the document illumination area;
• said lamp providing bright intensity light at about its central portion and a substantially dimmer intensity light at about its end portions;
• a flexible reflector disposed within the groove for reflecting light from said lamp forwardly to illuminate the document illumination area and for substantially equalizing the distribution of light across the entire document illumination area;
• a pair of spaced apart reflective end portions for strongly reflecting the dimmer intensity light at about the end portions of said lamp;
• an elongated narrow reflective center portion sandwiched between a pair of elongated non reflective center portions for weakly reflecting the bright intensity light at about the central portion of said lamp;
• wherein said elongated reflective central portion is contiguous with said pair of reflective end portions;
• and
• wherein one of said non-reflective elongated center portions is substantially narrower than the other one of said non-reflective elongated center portions.