Opex Corporation

General Electric Company

Glen J VanSant

Robert R DeWitt

George L Hayduchok

Michael E York

James G Robertson

Eric P Minbiole

A method and apparatus for processing mail is provided. Mail is placed into an input bin having a conveyor that conveys the mail towards a feeder. The feeder serially feeds the envelopes by engaging the lead envelope in the stack of mail and displacing the lead envelope transverse the stack of mail. The mail is fed into a shuttle that vertically displaces the envelopes to position the envelopes for entering a justifier. The justifier justifies the top edge of the envelopes and conveys the envelopes to a cutter that severs the top edge of the envelopes. A transport conveys the envelopes from the top cutter to an extractor. The extractor opens the edge-severed mail and presents the contents of the envelopes to an operator who manually extracts the contents. The transport conveys the empty envelopes from the extractor to a verifier that verifies that all of the contents have been removed from the envelope before the envelope is discarded. The transport is vertically adjustable, and a vertical drive motor is provided to vertically adjust the conveyor.

Method and apparatus for processing envelopes containing contents

A rack-mountable chassis enclosure, having measurements in at least one dimension greater than the access aperture measurement of the enclosure-supporting rack in that same dimension, and providing additional empty volume into which the enclosed apparatus may move after the chassis has been mounted to the rack, is formed from a rigid panel, which can be mounted to the rack at a position to form a front boundary of the rack-enclosed volume, and at least one pair of opposed enclosure panel members extending substantially perpendicular behind the front panel and at least partially formed of a resilient material, with the maximum dimension between the outermost opposed surfaces of the resilient panel members exceeding the access aperture width of juxtaposed rack enclosure portions through which the enclosure must pass for positioning of the enclosure within the rack, and characterized by inward flexure of the resilient wall members, responsive to pressure thereupon from associated portions of the rack, during entry of the enclosure into the rack, and expansion of the wall members to their normal position once the contact between the associated rack portion and the wall member is removed.

Rack-mountable chassis with resilient side panels

Growing community of inventors

Langhorne, PA, United States of America

Glen J VanSant