Abstract: A pickup member forwards a document at a forwarding position where the pickup member is brought in contact with a bunch of stacked sheets, and is retracted from the forwarding position after the leading end of the document is forwarded. Before the rear end of the document previously forwarded passes through the pickup member, the pickup member is moved to the forwarding position and positioned thereat for forwarding the following document. A rotative member of a pair of separating members is rotated with a first velocity to transport a document forwarded by the pickup member to a downstream side, and a transport member is rotationally driven with a second velocity to further forward the document transported from the separating member to the downstream side.

Abstract: An aggregate material processing plant (1) has an input hopper (5) communicating with a screen box (8) which provides three material separations. The finest material is delivered through a longitudinal conveyor (11). The two other grades are delivered to hoppers (12) (13) which feed lateral conveyors (20). Each lateral conveyor (20) has a head section (22) which pivots relative to a tail section (21) about an axis which is perpendicular to the plane of the conveyor belt (27). In addition, part of the tail section (21) pivots about an axis which extends longitudinally so that whole conveyor can be mounted in the transport position within the lateral confines of the chassis and the height of other parts of the plant.

Abstract: A belt feeding device including a plurality of belt feeding rolls, a belt wrapped around the rolls, and at least a pair of guide members each having an edge guide surface against which either side edge of the belt abuts in crosswise movement of the belt. The outer circumferential surface of each roll is formed with a plurality of ring-shaped slits axially spaced a distance w from each other, each of the slits having a depth h and a width m. The values of h, m, and w are set so that a load to an axial displacement of the belt wrapped around the rolls at a position of each guide member becomes 80 N/mm or less. Accordingly, an edge force acting between either side edge of the belt and the corresponding guide member against which the side edge of the belt abuts can be reduced to 15N or less.

Abstract: An apparatus and method for deskewing sheets as they are transported along a path. An intake roller assembly and an urged roller assembly are positioned along the path. The urge roller assembly bears upon a sheet with a forced selected so that the urge roller will slip if the sheet is blocked before the sheet is damaged. A rotatable element having a pair of stop elements in an upstream and a pair of deflecting elements at a downstream end is pivotable mounted beneath the path and rotates in a plane normal to the path, and is bias so that the deflecting elements intersect the path and the stop element are clear from the path. When the intake roller assembly drives a sheet against the deflecting elements the rotatable element rotates as the sheet rides over the deflecting element so that the stop elements intersect the path. If the sheet is skewed, that is if one edge is advanced, that edge will encounter the stop elements first.

Abstract: An elevator suspended by ropes is provided with a rotating elevator motor placed in a counterweight of the elevator. The motor has a traction sheave. A gear system is not necessarily needed, because the structure and placement of the motor allow the use of a motor having a large diameter and a high torque. Because the length of the motor remains small, the motor and counterweight can be accommodated in a space normally reserved for a counterweight in the elevator shaft. The motor shaft lies in the counterweight substantially midway between the guide rails. The number of ropes is equal on both sides of a plane going through a center of the guide rails.

Abstract: A force motivating a strut to incline itself in the running direction (front-and-rear direction) of a movable main body is produced by impact stress caused by accelerating, decelerating or stopping the operation of a delivery device. Such force can securely be received by a bottom frame structure as well as by a reinforcing structure of the portions of projected corner members protruding in the running direction which are formed integrally with a cylindrical body of the strut at respective corners thereof. A force motivating the strut to incline itself in the direction orthogonal to the running direction is produced by inward/outward load delivery operation by means of a delivery instrument provided on a carriage. Such force can also securely be received by the bottom frame structure as well as by the reinforcing structure of the portions of the projected corner members protruding in the orthogonal direction.

Abstract: A sheet conveying apparatus for use in an image forming apparatus such as a copying machine has a sheet conveyance path defining member that defines a curved path along which a sheet is conveyed, a conveyor roller for conveying the sheet along the curved path, a reference position regulating member that engages with a reference side edge of the sheet so as to regulate the sheet position in the breadthwise direction of the sheet during conveyance of the sheet along the curved path, and a guide member for restricting the position of the reference side edge of the sheet in the direction of thickness of the sheet pressed onto the position regulating member. The conveyor roller cooperates with a skewed roller which produces a skewing urging force to bring the reference side edge of the sheet into pressure contact with the reference position regulating member.

Abstract: A tablet dispenser comprises a tubular protective housing, from which a stack of tablets can be pushed. Lateral guides for the top tablet of said stack are provided in the working range of an ejector. Said lateral guides are constituted by side walls, which have side wall extensions, which are provided with outwardly directed pivot pins, which have been snap-fitted into bearing bores of the ejector when said side wall extensions have resiliently been deflected. The tablet dispenser comprises a U-shaped spring, the upper leg of which has a free end portion, which bears under pressure on a stop ledge of the ejector and is adapted to resiliently oppose a movement of said ejector out of a stand-by position.

Abstract: A paper sheet transfer apparatus has lower and upper paper-sheet discharge rollers which contact each other and discharge a sheet of paper in accordance with the rotation thereof, and a corrugation roller located in the vicinity of the lower discharge roller. The corrugation roller has a holding portion mounted on the shaft of the lower discharge roller, and a roller main body elastically held by the holding portion and being able to be brought into contact with the sheet of paper. The holding portion and the roller main body are resin-molded integral as one body. By virtue of this structure, the paper sheet transfer apparatus can be assembled at low cost.

Abstract: For discharging paper stacks from a conveying path via an outlet a truck is provided with which is opened the outlet immediately adjacent to a packing station and can be closed in a substantially gap-free manner. For this purpose the truck has a closing plate for closing the outlet, which simultaneously serves as a support member for substantially dimensionally rigidly supporting the paper stack in the vicinity of the extended truck. Thus, the associated conveyor can have a relatively small number of conveyor belts.

Abstract: Device for preventing removal of more sheets than a single sheet from the surface of a sheet pile includes fingers distributed on a front stop in vicinity of the surface of the sheet pile along a front side of the sheet pile for separating the sheets in a separating or singling process, at least one bearing member for carrying the fingers, and resilient supports for supporting the bearing member, the resilient supports being adjustable independently of one another with respect to the sheet pile.

Abstract: In a sheet output system with a stacking tray for a reproduction apparatus, in which sheets sequentially moving in an output path are fed out from a sheet ejection nip for stacking in the stacking tray, a sheet separating assistance unit is mounted adjacent the ejection nip with three evenly circumferentially spaced radially extending sheet separating arms, with one separating arm automatically normally extending into the output path for engagement and partial rotation and translation solely by a moving sheet lead edge in the output path, while maintaining at least one separating arm in contact with the moving sheet as the moving sheet is fed out from the sheet ejection nip to provide sheet separating assistance, even if the nip reverses for duplexing. The automatic realignment of the device to a lead edge catching position after each sheet is provided by gravity with an eccentric over-center mounting system with a large triangular shaped mounting aperture.

Abstract: A can vending mechanism comprising a module containing three vertically-extending channels arranged front-to-back and dimensioned to vend cylindrical products, such as cans, with their longitudinal axes parallel to the front face of a vending machine to achieve greater product capacity. A sold-out switch is provided in each channel. Each sold out switch is activated when two products remain in escrow at the bottom of its respective channel. The channels are refilled without the use of diverters by dropping new products into the channels. The two products remaining in escrow at the bottom of each channel absorb the shock of the falling products.

Abstract: Apparatus and method for separating low density solids from an airflow where a first airflow containing low density solids moves through a first conduit at a predetermined velocity and pressure and flows into a separating chamber wherein it is changed into a second airflow at a substantially reduced velocity and pressure to separate a substantial portion of the low density solids and moves out of the separating chamber through one of a second or third conduits as a third airflow at a velocity and pressure substantially the same as that of the first airflow and also passes through filtering apparatus in the second or third conduits to separate additional low density solids out of the third airflow.

Abstract: The front limit stop of the stack receiving magazine of a sheet separator is provided, in the region contacted by the lowermost sheets of the stack, with a retractable wall portion. The movements of this retractable wall portion are synchronized with the operation of a device which causes downward deflection of the edge region of a sheet located adjacent the magazine front limit stop. Accordingly, simultaneously with the application of the deflecting force, the frictional retaining force is removed from the edge region of the sheet to be separated.

Abstract: An apparatus is provided which can assign drugs to respective buckets running on a conveyor with accuracy and high efficiency and transport them. A case accommodates a plurality of storage/delivery conveyors. Near the drug inlets for the respective conveyors, displays are provided which indicate the prescription number. Buckets running on a conveyor each carry an IC card. A detector reads the data on the IC card of each bucket so that the drug indicated by the data will be discharged into a right bucket from the storage/delivery conveyor.

Abstract: In a part feeding apparatus including a feeder bowl for discharging and feeding parts to an assembly apparatus and a hopper for discharging and feeding parts to the feeder bowl, a counter for counting parts discharged from the hopper and a counter for counting parts discharged from the feeder bowl are provided. The hopper is driven, so that a difference between values of the two counters is brought close to a definite value.

Abstract: A sheet-jogging device in a delivery of a printing press with a press frame formed of side parts and having drives and a switching element therefor, a sheet-jogging device having at least one sheet-jogger reciprocatingly mounted in one of the side parts of the press frame so as to be adjustable to different sheet formats, and being tiltably supported, together with a bushing, in a lifting direction of a sheet pile so as to act on the switching element, includes a device for supporting the bushing in the one side part so that the supporting device is movable on all sides with respect to the direction of motion of the sheet-jogger, and a device for resiliently pretensioning the bushing into a given position of operation in which it counteracts deviating movements for moving the bushing out of the given position of operation, the switching element being provided for different drives and being actuatable by the deviating movements in different directions.