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US 9,754,195 B2Granted
Image forming apparatus with a reader with changeable positions
AssigneeBrother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorKentaro Murayama
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An image forming apparatus including a wireless tag reader is described. The wireless tag reader is configured to be located in a first position to read wireless tags associated with consumables when the consumables are inserted into, stationary in, or removed from the image forming apparatus, and in a second position to read wireless tags outside of the image forming apparatus.
Claims9
An image forming apparatus comprising:
- an image forming unit configured to form an image on a recording medium;
- a sheet supply tray disposed below the image forming unit and configured to store the recording medium fed to the image forming unit;
- a wireless communications unit disposed above the sheet supply tray;
- a wireless communications unit holder configured to hold the wireless communications unit in a first position within the image forming apparatus;
- and
- a moving unit configured to move the wireless communications unit holder to rotate vertically about a rotation axis between the first position where the wireless communications unit has a first directional communication range extending in a first direction and a second position where the wireless communications unit has a second directional communication range extending in a second direction different from the first direction,
- wherein the wireless communications unit is configured to, when in the first position, wirelessly communicate with a wireless device located in the first directional communication range, and is configured to, when in the second position, wirelessly communicate with a wireless device located in the second directional communication range, and
- wherein the moving unit includes a release member configured to release the wireless communications unit holder from being held in the first position and to thereby allow the wireless communications unit to move to the second position.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.