Minolta Company, Ltd.

Tohru Murakami

Koji Yamamoto

Shoichi Minato

Akira Fukuda

Toru Ishii

Yoshiharu Tanaka

Noritoshi Maruchi

Akiyoshi Johdai

Kuniaki Ishiguro

Masao Kondo

Hiroshi Nishikawa

Tatsuya Shinno

Norikazu Okabe

Koji Higashikawa

Hirofumi Tanahashi

Motoki Takata

Riichi Hama

Toru Ishi

Kunihiko Katsuta

An apparatus for transporting sheets into a fixed image reading position has a drive roller and a pad. The pad has a lower layer made of a flexible material and an upper layer provided on the lower layer and made of rigid material in the form of film with a kinetic friction coefficient of 0.2 or less. The is biased to the drive roller so that the upper layer contacts a peripheral surface of the drive roller to form a nipping region between the drive roller and the pad by a compressive deformation of the flexible lower layer of the pad.

Apparatus for transporting a sheet into a reading position

A digital-type camera having a printing mechanism which assures a high quality of prints in an environment with a low temperature. The digital-type camera has an arrangement in which an ink cartridge, for storing ink fed to a printer head of a printing part, is installed on a rear surface of a substrate on a front surface of which a CCD of a heat-generating component is installed. Heat generated from the CCD is conducted to the ink cartridge via the substrate, so that the ink stored inside the ink cartridge is prevented from dropping down in temperature, and so that the temperature of the ink is kept within a thermal region within which its printing operation is guaranteed.

Digital camera unified with printer

There is provided a digital camera having a printing function, the camera having a moving member for moving from an out-of-use position to an in-use position to perform a shooting operation, a selector for selecting a printing operation to be performed, and a controller for bringing the moving member into the out-of-use position in response to the selection of the printing operation by the selector.

Digital camera having a printing function in which a movable camera part is moved from an in-use position to an out-of-use position during printing

A digital camera having a printing function which is driven by a battery comprises a printer unit operable when the voltage of the battery is equal to or higher than a first voltage, a camera unit operable when the voltage of the battery is equal to or higher than a second voltage, and a voltage detecting unit for detecting the voltage of the battery. The digital camera further comprises controller which compares the voltage of the battery detected by the voltage detecting unit with the first and second voltages and performs, based on the result of comparison, a control operation whereby the respective operations of the printer unit and the camera unit are enabled or disabled.

Digital camera having a battery level check

There is provided a digital camera having a printing function, the camera comprising a detector for detecting the amount of camera shake during shooting, a recording medium for recording each of shot images and camera shake data on the amount of camera shake detected by the detector, a selector for selecting a shot image to be printed from the shot images recorded on the recording medium, and a controller for judging, for the shot image selected by the selector, whether or not proper printing of the shot image can be performed. The digital camera further comprises an indicator for giving a warning when it is judged that proper printing cannot be performed.

Digital camera having blur detection

A sheet accommodating device comprising a sheet-laid tray including a processing tray and a carrying tray; a discharge tray; a sheet accommodating unit; first, second and third sheet transporting paths for leading the discharged sheet to the sheet-laid tray, the sheet accommodating unit and the discharge tray, respectively; a transporting and aligning device for moving the sheet discharged onto the sheet-laid tray toward an alignment reference position; a detector for detecting a vertical position of an upper surface of the sheet on the carrying tray; a tray position adjusting device for adjusting the vertical position of the carrying tray based on a result of detection by the detector ; controller for raising or lowering the carrying tray; and others, the second sheet transporting path extending through the escape position of the processing tray, as well as a sheet processing system including a combination of the sheet accommodating device and an image forming apparatus.

Reciprocating tray for sheet finisher

A document feeder which picks up documents from a tray, separates/feeds a document with a feed roller and a separation roller and transports the document on a reading position with read rollers. The speed of feeding a document by the feed roller is higher than the speed of transporting a document by the read rollers. The reading position is at a distance from the nip portion between the feed roller and the separation roller, the distance being longer than the length in the document feeding direction of the document.

Document feeder and method of document reading

According to a document transport device of a preferred embodiment, when reading images of a plurality of one-sided documents, these one-sided documents are accommodated in a first accommodating portion with the document surface facing upward. The held documents are fed sequentially from the uppermost document to the first document transport path, inverted front-to-back, and transported with the document surface facing downward to the predetermined position, i.e., the document reading position. When the reading of the document is completed at the document reading position, the read document is transported to a second document transport path, inverted front-to-back, and accommodated in a second accommodating portion with the document surface facing upward. Thereafter, the document is transported to a third document transport path, inverted front-to-back, and accommodated in a third document accommodating portion with the document surface facing downward. The second and subsequent documents are similarly transported, and stacked in the third accommodating portion with the document surfaces facing downward.

Sheet transport device and sheet transport method

The present invention relates to a sheet conveying apparatus for conveying a sheet in recirculation. The apparatus comprises a feed tray on which a plurality of sheets are set, a discharge tray on which the plurality of sheets are discharged, a feed mechanism for feeding the plurality of sheets set on the feed tray one by one, a recirculation conveying mechanism for conveying the sheet fed by the feed mechanism to discharge it on the discharge tray and return it to the feed tray, and a plurality of stoppers. The stoppers are disposed at different positions along the sheet conveying direction correspondingly to the sheet size. Each of the plurality of stoppers is moveable between an operation position and a withdrawal position and restricts the front end of the sheet discharged on the discharge tray to align the sheet in the operation position.

Sheet conveying apparatus

The present invention relates to a sheet conveying apparatus comprising a separating mechanism and a conveying mechanism. The separating mechanism separates a plurality of sheets to convey it one by one. The separating mechanism applies a friction force to the sheet to be conveyed in a direction opposite to the sheet conveying direction. The separating mechanism has a plurality of separating members disposed in a direction perpendicular to the sheet conveying direction. The conveying mechanism receives and conveys the sheet separated by the separating mechanism. The conveying mechanism has a plurality of conveying rollers disposed in a direction perpendicular to the sheet conveying direction. An outermost profile width of the conveying rollers in a direction perpendicular to the sheet conveying direction is smaller than that of the separating rollers.

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Okazaki, Japan

Tohru Murakami