Konica Minolta, Inc.

Masanobu Tomiyasu

Naoki Matsui

Yasuaki Tomoda

Kenji Sawada

Takahiro Iwasaki

Shigeru Sawano

Yuki Doshida

Kouki Muramoto

In a paper cassette, a guide slides on a tray to place a sheet at a proper position. A lift mechanism uses a restoring force of an elastic member to push up the tray and make the sheet on the tray approach a pickup roller. When the paper cassette is pushed by a user from an opened position, which is out of the housing of a printer, to a closed position, which is in the housing, an adjuster mechanism mechanically converts a force of the user pushing the paper cassette to the restoring force of the elastic member from a time the guide reaches a specific point on a trajectory along which the guide travels together with the paper cassette, thus adjusting the strength of the restoring force continuously to a distance by which the guide overruns the specific point.

Sheet feeder, sheet conveyer having the same, and image forming device having the same

A sheet material feeding device includes: a housing; a cassette configured to internally house a sheet material, and capable of being pulled out of the housing and housed into the housing; a rear-end regulating member provided inside the cassette and configured to regulate a position of an upstream end of the sheet material in a sheet material feeding direction; a rear-end displacing member supported by the rear-end regulating member and configured to swing along the sheet material feeding direction; a sliding member provided for the cassette, having an engagement part to be engaged with the rear-end displacing member, and configured to slide toward a downstream side in the sheet material feeding direction to displace the rear-end displacing member toward the downstream side in the sheet material feeding direction; and a first energizing member configured to energize the sliding member toward an upstream side in the sheet material feeding direction.

Sheet material feeding device and image forming apparatus

A sheet feed cassette having: a main body to be set in a body of an image forming apparatus; a first press-up member configured to support print media stacked thereon; a first elastic member configured to apply an elastic force to make the first press-up member press up the print media; a second press-up member; a second elastic member configured to apply an elastic force to make the second press-up member press up the first press-up member or the print media; an adjusting mechanism configured to adjust the force of the second press-up member to press up the first press-up member or the print media in accordance with a size of the print media; and a regulatory mechanism configured to prevent the second press-up member from pressing up the first press-up member or the print media when the main body is detached from the body of the image forming apparatus.

Sheet feed cassette

Growing community of inventors

Toyokawa, Japan

Masanobu Tomiyasu