Fuji Photo Film Company, Limited

Other

Fuji Photo Film, Inc.

Takashi Koizumi

Yoshinori Kawamura

Tsukasa Ono

Tadashi Uekusa

Yoshihiro Koyanagi

Yoshio Saito

Hideo Ishizaka

Kazuoki Komiyama

Yukihide Miyata

Kazuhisa Okamoto

Nobuhiko Amano

Kazuhisa Tazaki

Takashi Kato

Osamu Fukushima

Shinichi Nakama

Osamu Seshimoto

Shinichi Matsuda

Keishiro Kido

Mitsuyoshi Nishimura

Masahide Akisada

Mamoru Murata

Koichi Yamada

Shinichi Okano

Yasuhiro Asai

A protective sheet peeling device which reliably separates, from a sheet, a protective sheet (an interleaf sheet) which is superposed with one surface of the sheet. A free roller is disposed at a downstream side of a conveying roller of a peeling section, in a state in which one portion of the free roller is disposed on an 'imaginary conveying locus' of a printing plate precursor. Further, a displacement roller is disposed at a downstream side of the free roller. After the printing plate precursor, which is superposed with the interleaf sheet, has passed by the free roller, when the displacement roller moves to a position of reaching the 'imaginary conveying locus', the printing plate precursor and the interleaf sheet are curved along the free roller. Due to reverse rotation of the displacement roller, the interleaf sheet is peeled off of the printing plate precursor.

Protective sheet peeling device and protective sheet peeling method

A conveying device has: a moving member provided so as to be movable; a rotating member rotatably supported at the moving member; and a holding member rotatably supported at the rotating member, and able to hold a sheet. In a state in which the holding member is holding the sheet, the holding member conveys the sheet by at least one of movement of the moving member, rotation of the rotating member with respect to the moving member, and rotation of the holding member with respect to the rotating member.

Conveying device

A conveying device for a printing plate precursor which takes the printing plate precursor and an interleaf sheet out from a cassette, and which, along a conveying path to an exposure section, takes-off only the interleaf sheet. When a leading end of the interleaf sheet passes by an interleaf sheet peeling roller disposed on the conveying path, the interleaf sheet peeling roller rotates in a direction opposite to a direction of conveying to the exposure section, and contacts the interleaf sheet, and slack is formed in the interleaf sheet between the interleaf sheet peeling roller and a conveying roller. A slack portion is nipped between two belts and fed to a forked-off path, and the interleaf sheet is removed from the conveying path. It is possible to feed only the printing plate precursor out to the exposure section while continuing to convey the printing plate precursor.

Image recording material conveying device and automatic image recording system

A sheet feeder for use, with a stack having plates and sheets alternating. Sheets are removed by being reliably suction adhered with a sucker. The sheet feeder includes a suction device, and the sucker and device are mounted at a supporting portion. In order to allow suction adhering of the plates and sheets alternately stacked in a magazine, the suction device is operated when the sucker is brought into contact with the sheet, and the sheet is raised separately from the plate. Thereafter, the sheet is suction adhered to the sucker by suction. This makes it possible to prevent the sucker from suction adhering to the plate together with the sheet, and only the sheet is reliably from the stack.

Sheet feeder and sheet feeding method

In a removing/conveying portion of a printing plate removing/supplying device, when one cassette among a plurality of cassettes is empty, the empty cassette is placed on a raising/lowering stand and moved to a loading space. Due to a spur gear being rotated clockwise by a motor, a sliding cover, with which the spur gear is engaging, is moved toward a removing portion such that an opening of a cassette stocker portion is opened. In this way, it is possible to refill and load printing plates from a top side of the cassette stocker portion into the empty cassette positioned at the loading space.

Printing plate removing/supplying device

A pair of optical sensors are disposed above photopolymer plates and interleaf papers, which are alternately stacked with one another. These optical sensors basically have the same structure. However, the optical sensor is disposed so as to be inclined to an optical axis of reflected light, and therefore, a detection level of the optical sensor substantially becomes low. Accordingly, although the optical sensors each react to the reflected light from the photopolymer plate, the optical sensor does not react to the reflected light from the interleaf paper. As a result, it is determined whether the uppermost layer of the stack is the photopolymer plate or the interleaf paper. In a discriminating device of the present invention, general purpose optical sensors adapted to react to light having such a fixed intensity or greater, are used.

Device for discriminating among print media

A device for removing an image recording material is provided, which takes up little space and is used with printing plates and interleaf sheets set alternately in a cassette. An interleaf sheet and a printing plate are taken out simultaneously. In the midst of being conveyed along a conveying path leading to an exposure section, only the interleaf sheet is sucked by a fan or drawn-in between a roller pair so as to be peeled off from the printing plate. The peeled-off interleaf sheet is discarded, and the printing plate is conveyed reliably to the exposure section.

Device for removing image recording material

A sheet feeder for use with a stack having plates and sheets alternating. Sheets are removed by being reliably suction adhered with a sucker. The sheet feeder includes a suction device, and the sucker and device are mounted at a supporting portion. In order to allow suction adhering of the plates and sheets alternately stacked in a magazine, the suction device is operated when the sucker is brought into contact with the sheet, and the sheet is raised separately from the plate. Thereafter, the sheet is suction adhered to the sucker by suction. This makes it possible to prevent the sucker from suction adhering to the plate together with the sheet, and only the sheet is reliably removed from the stack.

A printing plate is held at one point thereof by a holding portion provided at a surface plate. When pushed by a pushing portion, the printing plate is only rotationally displaced. Thus, an angular error is substantially eliminated and displacement of the printing plate is small. Then, the pushing portion positions the printing plate in a direction perpendicular to a direction in which the surface plate can be moved. Then, movement of the surface plate positions the printing plate in the direction in which the surface plate can be moved.

Positioning method and positioning device for positioning printing plate relative to surface plate

An apparatus for feeding printing plate precursors is provided with a detecting sensor for detecting a position of a separation plate mounted on a cassette accommodating printing plate precursors, and a plate surface detecting sensor for detecting an uppermost plate of printing plate precursors stacked in the cassette. A relative position of the separation plate with respect to suction nozzles of a suction frame of the apparatus for feeding plates is controlled constant.

Apparatus and method for feeding printing plate precursors

A sheet material stacking device and an automatic exposure device for a printing plate, capable of stacking a number of interleaf sheets stably and efficiently. A pair of skewered rollers are provided at the sheet material stacking device used for the automatic exposure device. An interleaf sheet, which is fed from an interleaf sheet transport section, is guided by guide plates and nipped by the rollers. The interleaf sheet, while maintaining a so-called stronger pulling tension, is forcibly fed to an interleaf sheet accommodating section and stacked. Even if the interleaf sheet is thin, the interleaf sheet can behave stably as it is being stacked, and a number of the interleaf sheets can be stacked regularly and effectively.

Sheet material stacking device and automatic exposure device for a printing plate

A pressure switch is set in communication with suction cups of a suction adherence conveying device applied to an automatic exposure device. Further, a suction fan which can approach and move away from a photopolymer plate or an interleaf sheet accommodated within a magazine is set integrally with the suction cups By utilizing the fact that degrees of vacuum of the suction cups differ in accordance with materials to be suction-adhered, determination of a material to be suction-adhered is performed based on output signals of the pressure switch

Conveying device using suction adherence for printing plates

A sheet feeding method for plate-shaped members is disclosed. In a sucker unit, suction nozzles are move down from respective original positions toward a bottom plate of a cassette at a fixed speed, and time t1 until the bottom plate is detected by a contact sensor, and an amount by which the suction nozzles move, &Dgr;y, until the suction nozzles suction adhere to the bottom plate after the bottom plate is detected by the contact sensor are measured. Subsequently, separation positions of the suction nozzles with respect to the original positions are set based on an interval between the bottom plate of the cassette and separation plates, and an interval required by the photopolymer plate being bent between the suction nozzles and the separation plates at an appropriate curvature. Based on the result of the setting, the photopolymer plate is reliably taken out from the cassette.

Sheet feeder and sheet feeding method for plate-shaped members

A suction transport device capable of reducing manufacturing cost due to reduction of the number of suction mechanisms by which one of photopolymer plates accommodated in a magazine is taken out is attained. Also separability when the printing plate is taken out is improved, thus improving reliability of the suction transport device. Since, among suckers and suction fans, those located at positions corresponding to the widthwise direction ends of the printing plates are movable in the widthwise direction, and separating plates are movable in the same direction. When one of the printing plates of a different size is to be taken out, the leading end corner portions of the printing plate can always be curved at a fixed curvature, and separability is improved. Further, there is no need to increase the number of suckers thus decreasing cost.

Suction transport device of a printing plate

In an automatic exposure apparatus for printing plates, a photopolymer plate is taken out of an accommodating cassette in which stacked photopolymer plates are accommodated, and an image is recorded onto the photopolymer plate. A shutter which opens and closes an opening of the accommodating cassette is configured as a thin plate, and thus, the accommodating cassette is thin and light.

Growing community of inventors

Kanagawa, Japan

Takashi Koizumi