Abstract: A document feeder which has a feed roller for feeding a document picked up from a tray toward a reading position, a first pair of rollers which is located immediately before the reading position, a second pair of rollers which is located immediately after the reading position, and a document sensor. After the leading edge of the document transported by the feed roller comes to the first pair of rollers, the feed roller keeps rotating for a specified time, whereby, registration of the document is carried out. In response to a signal which is generated when the document sensor detects the trailing edge of the document, feeding of a next document is started.

Abstract: A sheet aligning apparatus for a copying machine having a loading unit capable of loading a plurality of stacked sheets. A comparing unit determines and compares respective sizes of at least two sheets partially stacked and loaded on the loading unit. An alignment unit carries out alignment when the width of a sheet of a first job is the same or smaller than a sheet of a second job and inhibits carrying out alignment when the width of a sheet of the first job is greater than a sheet of the second job. The apparatus further includes first and second discharge units for discharging a group of sheets from respective first and second jobs onto the load unit. A determination unit determines successiveness of the first and second jobs and, based on a result of the determination, a post-processing unit executes post-processing for the group of sheets of the first job upon completion of discharging the group of sheets of the second job.

Abstract: A document feeder which has a feed roller and an intermediate transport roller for transporting a document picked up from a tray toward a reading position, a first pair of read rollers and a second pair of read rollers for transporting the document on the reading position at a constant speed. The feed roller and the intermediate transport roller transport a document at a higher speed than the pairs of read rollers.

Abstract: A document feeder which separates a single document from some picked-up documents and feeds the document toward a reading position with a feed roller and a separation roller, and which transports the document on the reading position with a first pair and a second pair of read rollers. The distance between the feed/separation rollers and the first pair of read rollers is shorter than the length of a document of a minimum regular size, the distance between the feed/separation rollers and the reading position is longer than the length of a document of the minimum regular size, and the distance between the feed/separation rollers and the second pair of rollers is shorter than the length of a document of one size larger than the minimum regular size.