Adjustable Regulating Guides for Sheet Conveyance Alignment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing sheet conveying apparatuses, such as those described in JP 2007-217096A, face issues when handling sheets of varying lengths, as they can cause damage due to improper alignment and pressure distribution, particularly when long sheets are conveyed, leading to potential damage and misalignment during the conveyance process.
Innovation Solution
A sheet conveying apparatus with an endless conveying belt, rotatable balls, and adjustable regulating guides that move between different guide positions to accommodate sheets of various lengths, ensuring proper alignment and pressure distribution by supporting the sheet ends with guide surfaces and support surfaces, preventing damage and misalignment.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If sheets of all sizes are uniformly conveyed by a conveying belt with a fixed reference guide to correct side registration and side skew, then alignment precision is improved, but sheet damage occurs when long sheets are conveyed
Solution Approach 1:
The regulating guides are made movable along the conveying direction, transitioning from a fixed reference guide to a dynamic system. The guides can be positioned at different locations depending on sheet length, allowing the system to adapt its configuration. This resolves the contradiction by enabling both precise alignment (when guides are positioned appropriately) and sheet protection (by retracting guides for long sheets to prevent improper nipping and damage).
Solution Approach 2:
The position parameter of the regulating guides is changed based on sheet length. For short sheets, guides are positioned to provide side registration correction; for long sheets, guides are retracted to avoid damage. This parameter adjustment allows the system to optimize performance for different sheet sizes, resolving the contradiction between alignment precision and sheet damage prevention.
2Manufacturing precision
If regulating guides are positioned to support sheet end edges for side registration correction, then alignment accuracy is improved, but long sheets may be damaged due to improper nipping
Solution Approach 1:
The regulating guides are made dynamically positionable along the conveying direction, allowing the system to adjust their location based on sheet length. This dynamic adjustment enables the system to provide side skew correction when appropriate (for shorter sheets) while retracting the guides to prevent damage when conveying long sheets, thus resolving the contradiction between alignment accuracy and sheet integrity.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary positioning of the regulating guides based on detected sheet length before the sheet reaches the conveying belt. This preliminary action ensures that guides are in the correct position to provide side skew correction for shorter sheets or are retracted to prevent damage for long sheets, resolving the contradiction before the sheet conveying process begins.
Data Source
AI summary
A pair of regulating guides is disposed on both sides of a conveying belt in a sheet width direction Y, each having a support surface that supports an end edge in the width direction of the sheet conveyed while being nipped by the conveying belt and balls and a guide surface that faces the end edge of the sheet in the width direction. Each of the pair of regulating guides is movable to a first guide position at which the end edge of the sheet in the width direction is supported by the support surface and guided by the guide surface and to a second guide position at which the end edge of the sheet in the sheet width direction is supported by the support surface and which is retracting further away from the end edge in the sheet width direction than the guide position.