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:
May. 26, 1998
Filed:
May. 09, 1997
Applicant:
Inventors:
Todd Alan Dutton, Lexington, KY (US);
Armando Villarreal Flores, Lexington, KY (US);
Assignee:
Lexmark International, Inc., Lexington, KY (US);
Attorney:
Primary Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
G03G / ;
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
399391 ; 399393 ;
Abstract
Two stacked paper trays (43, 45) are connected electrically by cable (53) and are physically combined, as by bolts. The combined unit has a single microprocessor (49). The paper trays communicate status, such as paper size and paper amount to the microprocessor. The microprocessor reports upon interrogation from a control processor (61) of a printer (7) that it is a multiple tray unit and reports the status for each unit. This avoids the use of a microprocessor with each tray.