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US 7,458,571 B2Granted
Sheet feeding apparatus, and image forming apparatus
AssigneeBrother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorDaisuke Ogawa
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
When a print request signal for a single sheet is input after a sheet feeding cassette has been reset, lapse of a reference time “t” is waited after switching of a sheet feeding roller has been performed. After a sheet-pressing plate has been lifted from a loading position to a feeding position, rotational driving of the sheet feeding roller is performed, thereby effecting sheet-feeding operation. When a print request signal for a second sheet or subsequent sheets is input, the sheet-pressing plate has already been in the feeding position, and hence the rotational driving of the sheet feeding roller is performed immediately after switching of the paper-feeding roller 12 has been performed.
Claims14
A sheet feeding apparatus comprising:
- a main body;
- a housing cassette that has a loading section on which a sheet is loaded and is provided to be movable in a vertical direction, the housing cassette being attached to the main body to be drawable therefrom;
- a delivery roller that is provided to be movable in the vertical direction relative to the main body and rotates while remaining in contact with an upper surface of the sheet loaded on the loading section to deliver the sheet downstream with respect to a conveying direction of the sheet;
- an elevation mechanism that elevates the loading section on condition that a moving position of the delivery roller is a predetermined height or less while the delivery roller stays in a feed position where the delivery roller contacts with the sheet loaded on the loading section;
- a position switching mechanism that switches between an initial position where the delivery roller is separated from the loading section and the feed position;
- a drive unit that causes the position switching mechanism to perform switching operation for switching the delivery roller from the initial position to the feed position in accordance with a sheet feeding start signal and subsequently rotationally drives the delivery roller;
- a determination unit that determines whether or not operation for attaching the housing cassette to the main body is performed;
- and
- a timing control unit that controls a timing, at which the rotational driving is started from the switching operation, to be later in each case where it is determined by the determination unit that the attachment operation is performed, compared to a timing when it is determined by the determination unit that the attachment operation is not performed.
6 more elements
An image forming apparatus comprising:
- a sheet feeding apparatus that accommodates and feeds a sheet;
- and
- an image forming section that forms an image on the sheet fed from the sheet feeding apparatus,
- wherein the sheet feeding apparatus comprises:
- a main body;
- a housing cassette that has a loading section on which a sheet is loaded and is provided to be movable in a vertical direction, the housing cassette being attached to the main body to be drawable therefrom;
- a delivery roller that is provided to be movable in the vertical direction relative to the main body and rotates while remaining in contact with an upper surface of the sheet loaded on the loading section to deliver the sheet downstream with respect to a conveying direction of the sheet;
- an elevation mechanism that elevates the loading section on condition that a moving position of the delivery roller is a predetermined height or less while the delivery roller stays in a feed position where the delivery roller contacts with the sheet loaded on the loading section;
- a position switching mechanism that switches between an initial position where the delivery roller is separated from the loading section and the feed position;
- a drive unit that causes the position switching mechanism to perform switching operation for switching the delivery roller from the initial position to the feed position in accordance with a sheet feeding start signal and subsequently rotationally drives the delivery roller;
- a determination unit that determines whether or not operation for attaching the housing cassette to the main body is performed;
- and
- a timing control unit that controls a timing, at which the rotational driving is started from the switching operation, to be later in each case where it is determined by the determination unit that the attachment operation is performed, compared to a timing when it is determined by the determination unit that the attachment operation is not performed.
10 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.