Panasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.

Terumi Tsuda

Takefusa Ogata

Hiroshi Kusuda

Takashi Naito

Takao Araki

Kenji Fukuta

Katsuji Ichimaru

Yushi Toyomura

A retarding roller (a roller) is formed of a synthetic rubber (an industrial rubber material) such as ethylene propylene diene M-class rubber (EPDM) or polyurethane, or alternatively, silicone. The roller core of the retarding roller is cylindrical. M arc-shaped long holes (where M is an integer greater than or equal to 4) are formed in each of N layers (where N is an integer greater than or equal to 2) from a first layer (an outermost layer) to an Nth layer (an innermost layer) which are circular and concentric to a center axial line. In each layer, long holes are formed such that spokes in adjacent layers (an ith layer and an i+1th layer, where i is an integer from 1 to N&#x2212;1) do not overlap in the circumferential direction.

Roller, roller unit, paper feeder provided with roller or roller unit, and image reader

According to detection results of a plurality of original document detectors, an image reading apparatus determines whether or not correcting skew of an original document is possible, controls a pair of a plurality of transport rollers in a case where it is determined that correcting the skew of the original document is possible, and corrects the skew of the original document by making transporting speeds of the pair of the plurality of transport rollers different from each other.

Image reading apparatus provided with original document skew correction function

In order to securely prevent or detect overlap feeding of sheet materials, there is provided a sheet material feeding mechanism which deforms the sheet materials on a feeding line so as to form a gap between the overlapping sheet materials which firmly cling to each other. For preventing the overlap feeding of the sheets, the drive relationship between a feeding roller and a pair of a parting roller and a retarding roller located on the downstream side from the feeding roller is optimized to form the gap between the sheet materials. Further, for detecting the overlap feeding of the sheets, bending correction ribs are provided on guide plates formed on the upper and lower sides of the feeding line of the sheet materials so as to deform the sheet materials fed in the overlapping condition, thereby the gap is formed between the overlapping sheets.

Sheet material feeding mechanism

Growing community of inventors

Fukuoka, Japan

Terumi Tsuda