Ricoh Company, Ltd.

Aki Ikeda

Manabu Nonaka

Yoshikuni Ishikawa

Shun Kobayashi

Yu Wakabayashi

A sheet feeder includes an attraction separation unit including an attraction belt facing the upper surface of a stacked sheet bundle to attract an uppermost sheet thereof, and rotatably supported by a support member at a position upstream of the attraction belt in a sheet feeding direction; and a swing device for swinging the attraction separation unit around the support member as a fulcrum to move the attraction belt between an attraction position and a feed position more distant from the sheet bundle than the attraction position is. The swing device includes a first drive transmitting portion attached to a downstream end portion of the attraction separation unit and a second drive transmitting portion attached to the body of the sheet feeder and connected with the first drive transmitting portion. The first drive transmitting portion and the rack connect to swing the attraction separation unit.

Sheet feeder and image forming apparatus

A sheet feeder includes a loading member, an attraction separation unit, and a control device. The loading member carries sheet materials. The attraction separation unit includes an endless dielectric belt, holding rollers, and an adjustment device. The endless belt attracts and holds the uppermost one of the sheet materials. The holding rollers holding the endless belt include upstream and downstream holding rollers. The upstream holding roller is rotated around a shaft of the downstream holding roller as the rotation axis in accordance with rotation of the downstream holding roller. The adjustment device provided to the upstream holding roller adjusts the movement range of the upstream holding roller in the height direction. The control device controls, in accordance with the type of sheet materials, an operation of lifting and lowering the loading member, to thereby allow the adjustment device to adjust the movement range of the upstream holding roller.

Sheet feeder and image forming apparatus using the same

A sheet conveying device includes an attractive separation unit and a contacting and separating device. The attractive separation unit includes an attraction belt arranged to face the upper surface of a sheet stack, two rollers that stretch the attraction belt taut, with the upstream-side roller in the sheet conveying direction supported to be movable in substantially upward and downward directions within a predetermined range with respect to the upper surface of the sheet stack, and a charging device which charges a surface of the attraction belt. The contacting and separating device swings the attractive separation unit to make the attraction belt come into contact with and separate from the sheet stack, with a fulcrum of the swing of the attractive separation unit set to a position upstream in the sheet conveying direction of the upstream-side roller in the sheet conveying direction.

Growing community of inventors

Kanagawa, Japan

Aki Ikeda