A PICTURE RECORDING APPARATUS

Abstract: In a laser beam printer, a cassette (2) is loaded or unloaded on a front side of a device body (1). A paper (21) accommodated in the cassette (2) is reversed back so as to send to a transfer means (5) by a paper separation reversal guide section. The paper (21) further is reversed back so as to be discharged on a tray (8) in manner that a forwarding end of the paper (21) is located on a front surface side and a transferred surface of the paper (21) is faced downwardly. A manually paper feeding section (44) is provided on the front side of the device body (1). The most part of the cassette (2) can be accommodated inside the device body (1) and the installation area can be reduced. The operativity of the feeding for a paper (13) through the manually paper feeding section (44) can be increased.

Description: The present invention relates to an image recording apparatus for producing image formation by transferring a toner image onto paper. The Prior Art An image recording apparatus is already known in which a cassette means for accommodating sheets of paper is insertable into a bottom portion of a housing of the apparatus. Such apparatus further includes a photosensitive drum means; a developing means for forming the toner image on said photosensitive drum means; and a transfer means for transferring the toner image formed on said photosensitive drum means to said paper. In this known art there is a pickup roller means for removing the paper from the cassette in a direction opposite to the insertion direction of the cassette and a first paper reversing guide means for reversing the conveying direction of the paper removed from the cassette. The known apparatus includes resist roller means for causing the paper to be conveyed in synchromism with a circumferential speed of said photosensitive drum so as to come into contact with said photosensitive drum means at said transfer means; and fixing means for fixing the toner image on the paper. The apparatus also comprises a second paper reversing guide means for reversing the conveying direction of the paper delivered from said fixing means. Discharge roller means then discharge the paper with the image surface facing downwardly onto tray means provided on an upper surface of said housing means for receiving the paper discharged from said discharge roller means. All of the above features are already known from US-A-4 147 426. A construction problem in this known prior art is that because the paper is removed from the cassette in a direction opposite to that in which the cassette has been inserted into the apparatus and that the paper on being withdrawn from the inserted cassette must immediately make its first reverse change of direction, difficulty arises in the provision of means for handling the paper in this manner since such means must not hinder the insertion and withdrawal of the cassette into and out of the apparatus. The Present Invention It is an object of the present invention to provide an image recording apparatus of the kind already acknowledged above but in which the aforesaid construction problem is solved in an improved manner. The present invention is as defined in the accompanying Claim 1 that has been divided into a two part form with the known features referred to above being defined in the pre-characterizing part of the claim. According to the characterizing part of Claim 1 a supporting body is provided in said housing so as to be rotatable between a non-operating position and an operating position; and which supports: (a) said first paper reversing guide means; (b) a separation belt for contacting said pick-up roller in its operating position; and (c) a roller means which is arranged to rotate said supporting body to its operative position by contact with an operating plate of the cassette means during insertion thereof. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS: Fig.1 is a schematic side view showing a laser beam printer of one emobodiment of the present invention; Figs.2 and 3 are detailed sectional views showing the laser beam printer shown in Fig.1; and Figs.4 and 5 are partial enlarged views of the laser beam printer shown in Fig.1. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS: One embodiment of the present invention is described with reference to the drawings. Fig.1 shows one embodiment of the picture recording device in the case of using a laser beam printer employing an electrophotographic system. For picture formation in the laser beam printer, a photosensitive drum 4 is rotated in the arrow direction. And around the photosensitive drum 4, there are disposed a corona discharger 14 for charging, a laser beam 15 to be radiated for exposuring, a developing apparatus 16, a corona discharger 14 for transferring and a cleaner 17. A cassette 2 accommodating sheets of cut paper 21 (see Figs.2-5) is inserted into a bottom portion of a device body 1 from the arrow X direction (front side) and the entire portion of the cassette 2 is allowed to be accommodated inside the device body 1. A pick-up roller 3 allows the cut paper 21 to be removed from of the cassette 2 on the rear end side in the direction of inserting the cassette 2 and a paper reversing guide 43 serves to reverse the cut paper 21 back so as to convey it to resist rollers 9a and 9b. Next, the cut paper 21 comes into contact with the photosensitive drum 4 so that the picture information (toner image) formed on the photosensitive drum 4 may be transferred to the cut paper 21 by means of a transfer means 5. After that, the cut paper 21 passes through a path shown by a one-dot chain line and fixing means 6a and 6b serve to fix the picture information on the cut paper. Further, the cut paper 21 is reversed back by means of another paper reversing guide 45 provided on rear end portion of the device body 1 and then is discharged by discharge roller 7a, 7b to a tray 8 provided on the upper surface side of the device body 1 with the transferred surface facing downwardly by means of the discharge rollers 7a and 7b. In the case of manually feeding or manually inserting a paper 13, the paper 13 is inserted into a paper feeding section 44 for manually feeding the paper 13 provided on the same side (front side) as that of the insertion of the cassette 2 as shown by a one-dot chain line and is then conveyed to the resist rollers 9a and 9b by means of conveyance rollers 10a and 10b. After that, the same process as in the case of feeding the cut paper 21 by means of the cassette 2 is followed. Fig.2 is a sectional view showing the picture recording apparatus in further details. The photosensitive drum 4 disposed in the device body 1 is driven to rotate in the arrow direction. The corona discharger 14 serves to uniformly charge the photosensitive drum 4 and the laser beam 15 is radiated to the photosensitive drum 4 by means of a laser optical unit consisting of a laser diode (not shown in the drawing, a polygon mirror 25, a lens 26, a mirror 27 and the like. A fan 35 for cooling is disposed in the device body 1. Next, a developing apparatus 16 serves to form the toner image on the photosensitive drum 4. The cut paper 21 is set in the cassette 2. A pick-up roller 3 for taking out the cut paper 21 in the cassette 2 is driven to rotate in the arrow direction. A separation belt 36 made of a polyurethane foam sheet is supported by a supporting body 42 and is integrated with the first paper reversing guide 43. This section is referred to as a paper separation reversal guide section. The paper separation reversal guide section is rotatably supported on a through shaft 18. When the cassette 2 is not loaded in the device body 1, the paper separation reversal guide section is retained at the position shown in Fig.2 by means of a spring 39. When the cassette 2 is set in the device body 1 as a result of the sliding movement in the arrow direction, an operation plate 34 provided in the cassette 2 contacts a roller 33 of the paper separation reversal guide section. The inserting force of the cassette 2 from the front side permits a rotative movement of the paper separation reversal guide section around the through shaft 18. Fig.3 shows a state in which the cassette 2 is set in the device body 1. The roller 33 of the paper separation reversal guide section is pushed by means of the operation plate 34 provided in the cassette 2 and thus is in the position shown in Fig.3. The cut paper 21 in the cassette 2 is removed from the rear end side by virtue of the rotation of the pick-up roller 3 and then contacts the separation belt 36. At this time, in the case where two sheets or more of cut paper 21 are removed by the pick-up roller 3, by suitably selecting coefficients of friction between the pick-up roller 3 and the cut paper 21, between each sheet of the cut paper 21, and between the cut paper 21 and the separation belt 36, the cut paper 21 can be separated in the paper separation reversal guide section and thus only one sheet of cut paper 21 is conveyed to pass through the first paper reversing guide 43 by means of the pick-up roller 3. The cut paper 21 reaches the resist rollers 9a and 9b while it is reversed and guided. The rotation drive of the resist rollers 9a and 9b causes the cut paper 21 to be conveyed in synchronism with the circumferential speed of the photosensitive drum 4 so as to come into contact with the photosensitive drum 4, where the cut paper 21 is given the transfer of a toner image by means of the transfer means 5 and has charges removed by a charge-remover 22. Then, the cut paper 21 is separated from the photosensitive drum 4 and is conveyed by means of a conveyance belt 23 and then is heated and fixed by means of the fixing rollers 6a and 6b. Lastly, the cut paper 21 is discharged onto the tray 8 provided on the upper surface side of the device body 1 as the picture-transferred surface faces downwardly by way of the discharge rollers 24a and 24b and the discharge rollers 7a and 7b and the second paper reversing guide 45. Figs.4 and 5 are detailed sectional views showing the cassette 2 and the paper separation reversal guide section. Fig.4 shows a state in which the cassette 2 is not inserted into the paper loading position of the device body 1, and in this state, the paper separation reversal guide section is rotatably supported by the shaft 18. The paper separation reversal guide section comprises the separation belt 36, the supporting body 42 for supporting the separation belt 36, an arm 40, the first paper reversing guide 43 and the roller 33 rotatably supported at the tip of the supporting body 42. The paper separation reversal guide section is pulled upwardly by means of the spring 39 and is in the stopped state by virtue of a stopper 41. Further, at this time, the cut paper 21 in the cassette 2 stays in the low position because a plate 20 is held in the position shown in Fig.4 by means of a locking mechanism (not shown in the drawing). Further insertion of the cassette 2 from the front side allows the operation plate 34 provided in the cassette 2 to come into contact with the roller 33 and to move downwardly against the spring force of the spring 39. Consequently, the state shown in Fig.5 is brought about. At this time, the locking mechanism for the plate 20 provided in the cassette 2 serves to release its locking by means of a projection (not shown in the drawing) provided in the device body 1. The plate 20 is pushed upwardly by virtue of the spring force of the cassette spring 19 and the cut paper 21 on the plate 20 comes into contact with the pick-up roller 3. As a result, the cut paper 21 can be removed. In the case of unloading the cassette 2 from the device body 1, a guide member 37 provided in the device body 1 serves to push down the rollers 38 provided on both sides of the plate 20. And thus the rollers 38 are held in the lowest position by means of the locking mechanism so as to prevent the cut paper 21 from getting in the way upon a pulling or extracting of the cassette 2 out of the device body 1.

Claims: An image recording apparatus for producing image information by transferring a toner image on paper (21), the apparatus comprising housing means (1); a cassette means (2) for accommodating sheets of paper (21), said cassette means (2) being insertable into a bottom portion of said housing means (1); a photosensitive drum means (4); a developing means (16) for forming the toner image on said photosensitive drum means (4); a transfer means (5) for transferring the toner image formed on said photosensitive drum means (4) to the paper (21); pickup roller means (3) for removing the paper (21) from said cassette means (2) in a direction opposite to the insertion direction of said cassette means (2); a first paper reversing guide means (43) reversing the conveying direction of the paper removed from said cassette means (2); resist roller means (9a, 9b) for causing the paper (21) to be conveyed in synchronism with a circumferential speed of said photosensitive drum means (4) so as to come into contact with said photosensitive drum means (4) at said transfer means (5); fixing means (6a, 6b) for fixing the toner image on the paper (21); a second paper reversing guide means (45) for reversing the conveying direction of the paper (21) delivered from said fixing means (6a, 6b); discharge roller means (7a, 7b) for discharging the paper (21) with the image surface facing downwardly; tray means (8) provided on an upper surface of said housing means (1) for receiving the paper (21) discharged from said discharge roller means (7a, 7b); characterized in that in said housing means (1) a supporting body (42) is provided, which is rotatable between a non-operating position and an operating position, and which supports: (a) said first paper reversing guide means (43); (b) a separation belt (36) for contacting the pick-up roller (3) in the operating position; and (c) a roller means (33) which is arranged to rotate the supporting body (42) to its operating position by contact with an operating plate (34) of the cassette means (2) during insertion thereof. An image recording apparatus according to Claim 1, characterized in that the apparatus further comprises a manual paper feed means (44) provided on a front side of the housing means (1) for enabling a feeding of the paper (13) including conveyance roller means (10a, 10b) for conveying the manually inserted paper (13) to said resist roller means (9a, 9b). An image recording apparatus according to Claim 1, characterized in that said first paper reversing guide means (43) further comprises a shaft means (18) for rotatably supporting said supporting body (42); and spring means (39) for pulling said supporting body (42) upwardly when said cassette means (2) is not inserted into a paper feeding position of said housing means (1). An image recording apparatus according to Claim 3, characterized in that said operating plate (34) of said cassette means (2) is arranged to contact, on insertion of the cassette means (2) into the apparatus, said roller means (33) of said supporting body (42) and to move it downwardly against the spring force of said spring means (39).

Inventors: FURUICHI, MASAYOSHI, SUZUKI, MITSUO, YONEKURA, SEIJI
Applicants: HITACHI, LTD.
Application year: 1986
Main classification: G03G15
IPC codes: B65H3, G03G15, B65H11, B65H1