Patent ID: 7849473
Filing Date: 2010-12-07
Classification: G11B

Abstract:
1. An optical disk apparatus into/from which an optical disk is freely loaded/unloaded for recording and/or reproducing an information signal on said optical disk, comprising: a turn table supporting rotatably said optical disk as loaded; a rotation driving source mechanism rotationally driving said turn table; a turn table raising/lowering mechanism raising/lowering said turn table between a lowered position that prevents interference with said optical disk to be loaded or unloaded and a raised position at which said optical disk as loaded can be supported; an optical pickup recording and/or reproducing an information signal on said optical disk supported by said turn table; a pickup driving mechanism reciprocating said optical pickup between an inner peripheral side and an outer peripheral side of said optical disk supported by said turn table; a shared driving source mechanism generating a driving force at least for said turn table raising/lowering mechanism and said pickup driving mechanism; a disk transport mechanism directly loading and unloading said optical disk under the driving force from said shared driving source mechanism; a main chassis serving as a base of said optical disk apparatus; a traverse chassis having a swing displacing side end and a swing axis side end attached to said main chassis in a swingable manner such that said swing displacing side end is freely movable close to or away from said main chassis, said turn table moving to said raised position by movement of said swing displacing side end close to said main chassis, while said turn table moving to said lowered position by movement of said swing displacing side end away from said main chassis; and a disk retaining plate having a slender rectangular shape in plan view and being inserted into a disk inlet/outlet in its widthwise direction, wherein said shared driving source mechanism includes: said disk transport mechanism includes: said rotation plane converting gear has a spur gear part and a bevel gear part provided coaxially with said spur gear part, said relay gear has a spur gear part, a cylindrical part provided on one side flat part of the spur gear part coaxially with said spur gear part and a bevel gear part provided on an distal end of the cylindrical part, said bevel gear part of said rotation plane converting gear meshes with said bevel gear part of said relay gear, said turn table raising/lowering mechanism includes a driven boss provided on said swing displacing side end of said traverse chassis and a slider member having a cam groove with which said driven boss is engageable, said slider member being provided on said main chassis to freely reciprocate in a predetermined direction, reciprocation of said slider member in said predetermined direction causing said driven boss to be guided along said cam groove, so that said turn table is raised/lowered, and said disk retaining plate is configured to be swingable about a swing shaft provided in parallel to its longitudinal direction, said slider member being engaged with part of said disk retaining plate, thereby swinging said disk retaining plate.