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(11) | EP 0 295 636 A2 |
| (12) | EUROPEAN PATENT APPLICATION |
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| (54) | Paper stacking device |
| (57) In a paper stacking device provided with impellers (23) for beating down a paper
(A1, A2, A3) rear end to a stack position (10), a paper position regulating member
(16) for regulating a paper front end according to paper sizes is adjustably disposed
at the front end of the paper stack position, so that the paper rear ends can uniformly
beaten down by the impellers, irrespective of paper sizes, thus improving paper stacking
speed. |
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Field of the Invention
[0001] The present invention relates to a paper stacking device incorporated in a cash dispensing machine, an automatic money exchange machine, etc. used for financial business. In these stacking devices, bills conveyed one by one from a bill cartridge disposed within a machine are temporarily stacked at a bill stacking portion; when a predetermined number of bills have been stacked, a predetermined amount of these stacked bills are discharged through a bill discharge slot, for instance, in response to a command.
Description of the Prior Art
[0002] In the case of the above-mentioned bill-stacking device, it is required to stack bills one upon another at high speed; that is, it is necessary to reduce the duration of flight of bills fed to the stacking portion by quickly placing bills at a predetermined stack position.
[0003] As one example of methods of reducing the duration of flight of bills, impellers are arranged at a bill feed-in side in order to beat down each rear end of each bill.
[0004] In the above method using impellers, bills can be stacked at predetermined position at high speed when the size of the bills is uniform. However, since there exist various sizes of bills, there exists a problem in that when the impellers are located according to large-sized bills, small-sized bills cannot effectively be caught by the impeller and therefore the bills cannot be stacked at the stack position at high speed, thus resulting in a long duration of flight of bill, collision or entanglement of the preceding and succeeding bills, malarrangement of stacked bills, etc.
[0005] In summary, in the prior-art paper stacking device provided with impellers, it is impossible to reliably stack paper (e.g. bills) of different sizes (e.g. kinds of money) at high speed.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0006] With these problems in mind, therefore, it is the primary object of the present invention to provide a paper stacking device which can stack paper of various sizes at high speed.
[0007] To achieve the above-mentioned object, in a paper stacking device in which impellers for beating a paper rear end to a stack position side are provided in a paper feed-in portion for feeding paper fed from the preceding stage to the stack position to stack paper one upon another, a predetermined number of sheets of paper stacked at the stack position being fed to a succeeding stage in stacked condition, the present invention is characterized in that a regulating member for regulating a front end position of paper fed to the paper stack position is provided in such a way as to be adjustably moved along the paper feed direction according to sizes of the paper to be fed and to be advanced to or retracted from the stack position.
[0008] In the paper stacking device of the present invention, the regulating member is adjustably located to an appropriate position according to the size of paper before the paper is stacked. When paper is fed to the stacking position under these conditions, since the front end of paper is regulated by this regulating member and simultaneously the rear end of paper is beaten down by the impellers, it is possible to stack paper at the stack position at high speed.
[0009] After a predetermined number of sheets of paper has been stacked, the regulating member is retreated to feed out the paper stacked at the stack position to the next stage.
[0010] Further, a predetermined number of sheets are stacked for each paper size. Further, paper of different size is stacked after the regulating member has been adjusted to a predetermined position. Since the paper end is regulated to a predetermined position by adjusting the position of the regulating member, the impellers can stably and uniformly beat down the rear end of paper of various sizes.
[0011] According to the present invention, therefore, since paper of different sizes can be beaten down by the impellers under almost the same conditions, it is possible to stack paper of any different sizes reliably at high speed.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0012]
Fig. 1 is a diagrammatical illustration showing an embodiment of the paper stacking device of the present invention; and
Fig. 2 is a partial plan view of the device shown in Fig. 1.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENT
[0013] An embodiment of the present invention will be described hereinbelow in detail. Figs. 1 and 2 show a bill stacking device, in which a bill stack portion 10 is formed on the upper flat surfaces of a plurality of stack belts 11 arranged in parallel to each other and reeved around three pulleys 12, 13 and 14. Bills A including different sizes A1, A2 and A3 are placed at the stack position with the lateral (width) directions of bills arranged in the bill feed direction. Further, a stopper 15 is disposed on the right side (in Fig. 1) of the stack position with the lower end thereof extending downward passing through gaps between the belts 11 to arrange the rear ends of bills.
[0014] On the feed-out side of the stack position, there is provided a bill position regulating member 16 for movably adjusting stack position of bills, in such a way as to be pivoted according to the size of the bill A. That is, when the bill is small as designated by A1, the regulating member 16 is pivoted clockwise to a position b1; when the bill is middle as designated by A2, the regulating member 16 is pivoted counterclockwise to a position b2; and when the bill is large as designated by A3, the regulating member 16 is pivoted further counterclockwise to a position b3. Further, when this regulating member 16 can also be pivoted further counterclockwise to a position b4 below the stack position 10, this regulating member 16 is disabled.
[0015] The base portion of the above regulating member 16 is fixed to a pivotal shaft 17 pivotably supported by a frame. A lever 18 is fixed to one end of this pivotal shaft 17. A cam 19 is fixed to a drive shaft 20 pivotally supported by the frame, in such a way as to be brought into contact with the lever 18. This drive shaft 20 is driven by a motor 21 to a predetermined angular position by an appropriate transmission mechanism (not shown).
[0016] On the circumferential surface of the cam 19, four contact points C1, C2, C3 and C4 are provided. When the cam 19 is pivoted to locate the regulating member 16 to the position b1, the contact point C1 is in contact with the lever 18; when the cam 19 is pivoted to locate the regulating member 16 to the position b2, the contact point C2 is in contact with the lever 18; when the cam 19 is pivoted to locate the regulating member 16 to the position b3, the contact point C3 is in contact with the lever 18; and when the cam 19 is pivoted to locate the regulating member 16 to the position b4, the contact point C4 is in contact with the lever 18. The motor 21 is driven so as to pivot the regulating member 16 via the cam 19 to each predetermined position. Further, a spring (not shown) is provided so that the lever 18 is elastically brought into contact with the circumferential surface of the cam 19.
[0017] A rotary shaft 22 is pivotally supported by the frame above the stopper 15 at the stack position. A plurality of impellers 23 having plural vanes (made of thin soft rubber material) are fixed to this rotary shaft 22 at regular intervals. When these impellers 23 are rotated, the vanes beat down the rear end of a bill A fed to the stack position 10.
[0018] A plurality of pulleys 26 are fixed to the rotary shaft 22 between the two impellers 33. Bill convey belts 24 and 25 are reeved around these pulleys 26. Further, upper belts 24 are arranged beyond the stack position 10 and reeved around the feed-out side pulleys 27, although not shown in Fig. 2.
[0019] The above bill convey belts 24 and 25 are arranged in the lateral direction of the device, in order to feed bills of various sizes conveyed from a bill delivering portion of a bill container (not shown) by sandwiching a bill between the two belts 24 and 25 to the position of the pulley 26.
[0020] At the upper portion of the bill convey belts 24 and 25, a double bill sensor 29 is disposed in contact with a roller 28. This double bill sensor 29 detects when two or more bills are conveyed together in stacked condition.
[0021] A plurality of bill conveying belts 30 and 31 are arranged on the bill feed-out side from the bill stack position 10. A bill collection space is formed between the rear end of the belt 31 and the front end of the belt 11 (or the bill stack position 10) , as shown by dashed lines in Fig. 1. Further, a sorting flapper 32 is disposed within this bill collection space and pivoted by a solenoid to selectively convey bills A to a feed-out passage side or a collection side. Further, within the bill collection space, a roller 33 is disposed in contact with the stack belt 11, and a bill collection box 34 is disposed under the bill collection space. A bill discharge slot or chute, for instance, is provided at the succeeding stage of the feed-out belts 30 and 31.
[0022] The operation of the bill stacking device constructed as described above will be described hereinbelow. The bills A of various sizes are stacked beginning from the minimum-sized bills A1 in sequence to the maximum-sized bills A3. In more detail, when the number of bills of each size A1 to A3 to be discharged has been determined, the minimum-sized bills A1 are first conveyed and stacked. In this case, the lever 18 is in contact with the contact point C1 of the cam 19 and therefore the regulating member 16 is adjusted to a position b1 to determine the bill stack position.
[0023] When bills are conveyed, bills A1 fed-out from the preceding stage are conveyed being sandwiched between the two conveying belts 24 and 25 to the bill stack position. When bills are being conveyed, double bill conveyance is checked by the double bill sensor 29. When the bill is stacked, the front end of the bill A1 is located by the regulating member 16, while the rear end of the bill A1 is beaten down by the impellers 23, so that it is possible to stack bills at high speed.
[0024] The above-mentioned operation is repeated until a predetermined number of bills A1 are stacked at the stack position 10.
[0025] After the minimum-sized bills A1 have been stacked, the medium-sized bills A2 are then stacked. In this case, the cam 19 is pivoted to such a position that the contact point C2 is brought into contact with the lever 18, so that the regulating member 16 is also moved to a position b2. In the same way, the front end of the bill A2 is positioned by the regulating member 16, while the rear end of the bill A2 is beaten down by the impellers 23. In this operation, it should be noted that since the front end of the bill A2 is arranged by the regulating member 16 pivoted counterclockwise, the rear end of the bill A2 is beaten down by the impellers 23 at the same position as in the bills A1. When a predetermined number of the medium-sized bills A2 are stacked in order at the stack position 10, the maximum-sized bills A3 are stacked finally in the same way as in the bills A1 and A2.
[0026] After bills of various sizes have been stacked, if the transaction is interrupted and therefore the stacked bills are required to be collected, the sorting flapper 32 is pivoted to convey the stacked bills toward the collection passage. Further, if the stacked bills are required to be discharged, the flapper 32 is kept as it is to discharge bills through the bill discharge passage.
[0027] Thereafter, the cam 19 is pivoted to such a position that the contact point C4 is brought into contact with the lever 18, since the regulating member 16 is retracted below the stack position 10, when the stacking belts 11 and the conveying belts 30 and 31 are driven in the feed-out direction, it is possible to collect or discharge bills A stacked at the stack position into the collection box 34 or the discharge chute.
[0028] As described above, in the above embodiment, since the regulating members 16 can be adjusted to each predetermined position b1, b2 or b3 according to the size of bills, bills of various sizes can be beaten down by the impellers under almost the same optimum conditions, so that it is possible to reliably stack bills of various sizes at stack position at high speed.
1. A paper stacking device, comprising:
(a) a paper stacking portion (10, 11) for temporarily stacking paper (A1, A2, A3);
(b) paper feeding-an means (24, 25) for feeding paper into said paper stacking portion through a first end of said stacking portion;
(c) paper feeding-out means (30, 31) for feeding the temporarily stacked paper out of said paper stacking portion through a second end of said stacking portion;
(d) a rotating impeller (23) , disposed near the first end of said stacking portion, for beating down the paper fed into said stacking portion; and
(e) paper position regulating means (16), disposed near the second end of said stacking portion and movable in a direction between the first and second ends, for regulating a paper front end position according to a size of paper to be stacked at said stacking portion.
2. The paper stacking device as defined in claim 1, wherein said paper position regulating
means is advanced to or retracted from the paper stacking portion.
3. The paper stacking device as defined in claim 1, wherein said paper position regulating
means is a pivotal member.
4. The paper stacking device as defined in claim 1 further comprising:
(a) a lever (18) fixed to a rotary axle (17) to which a part of said regulating means is fixed; and
(b) a cam (19) rotatable in contact with said lever to adjustably pivot said regulating means to a predetermined angular position.
5. A method of stacking paper by a paper stacking device having:
paper stacking portion for temporarily stacking paper;
paper feeding-in means for feeding paper into said paper stacking portion through a first end of said stacking portion;
paper feeding-out means for feeding the temporarily stacked paper out of said paper stacking portion through a second end of said stacking portion;
a rotating impeller, disposed near the first end of said stacking portion, for beating down the paper fed into said stacking portion; and
paper position regulating means, disposed near the second end of said stacking portion
and movable in a direction between the first and second ends, for regulating a paper
front end portion according to a size of paper to be stacked at said stacking portion,
the method comprising the steps of:
when paper of plural sizes is stacked in said paper stacking portion,
(a) feeding minimum-sized paper into the paper stacking portion;
(b) feeding different-sized paper into the paper stacking portion in order by adjusting the paper position regulating means according to sizes of paper to be stacked.
6. The method of claim 5, wherein said paper position regulating means is retreated when
paper temporarily stacked is fed out of the paper stacking portion by paper feeding-out
means.