The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 13, 1994
Filed:
Sep. 24, 1993
Akinobu Nakahata, Sakai, JP;
Hiroshi Kubota, Osaka, JP;
Kouji Migita, Sakai, JP;
Masami Fuchi, Neyagawa, JP;
Kenji Oda, Toyonaka, JP;
Yoshinori Makiura, Kawachinagano, JP;
Katsuhide Yamaguchi, Takatsuki, JP;
Mita Industrial Co., Ltd., Osaka, JP;
Abstract
A sheet feeder includes a feeder for feeding a sheet, a cassette for containing a plurality of stacks of small sized sheets side by side therein, the cassette including a plurality of biasing members for biasing the respective stacks of small sized sheets upwards so as to bring uppermost sheets of the respective stacks into contact with the feeder, a plurality of sheet detectors arranged in positions corresponding to the respective stacks of sheets for detecting the height of the respective stacks of sheets contained in the cassette, and a controller responsive to the plurality of sheet detectors for determining the absence of sheet in the cassette when at least one of the plurality of sheet detectors detects that the height of the stack has become lower than a predetermined height, and stopping a sheet feeding operation. This sheet feeder prevents the transfer device of an image forming apparatus from being smeared due to the fact that the small sized sheet is fed from only one stack.