Patent ID: 6644660
Filing Date: 2003-11-11
Classification: B65H

Abstract:
A pitch correcting system for correcting spacing between serially fed documents in an inserter system, the pitch correcting system comprising:an upstream transport for transporting documents at a nominal velocity in a transport path; a downstream transport for transporting documents at the nominal velocity in the transport path; a pitch correcting transport located in between the upstream transport and the downstream transport, the pitch correcting transport receiving documents from the upstream transport and transporting them to the downstream transport; a sensor arrangement generating pitch signals identifying a measured pitch between a downstream document and a consecutive upstream document arriving at the pitch correcting transport; and a controller receiving the pitch signals from the sensor arrangement, the controller comparing the measured pitch with a nominal pitch and determining a variance of the measured pitch from the nominal pitch, the controller controlling an acceleration of the pitch correcting transport to correct the variance while the upstream document is under the control of the pitch correcting transport, and the controller controlling the pitch correcting transport to return the upstream document to the nominal velocity before transferring the upstream document to the downstream transport; wherein the pitch correcting transport further comprises a removable pitch correcting module positioned between the upstream transport and the downstream transport.