Patent ID: 8500114

Claim:
A sheet feeding apparatus comprising a tray that can lift and lower and that holds a sheet, an air blowing portion that blows up a sheet by blowing an air to a side end of the sheet held by the tray and an adsorption conveyance system that adsorbs and conveys the blown up sheet, wherein the adsorption conveyance system comprises: an adsorption conveying portion that adsorbs and conveys the sheet blown up by blowing the air; a negative pressure generation portion that generates a negative pressure to adsorb the sheet to the adsorption conveying portion; an adsorption switching portion that is switchable between an adsorption position to adsorb a sheet by the negative pressure generated by the negative pressure generation portion and a block position to block the negative pressure; and a controller that controls the adsorption switching portion from the block position to the adsorption position such that a preceding sheet adsorbed in advance to the adsorption conveying portion is conveyed while partially overlapping a subsequent sheet, and in a case where a number of sheets conveyed in an overlapping manner reaches a predetermined sheet number and a next sheet is adsorbed, the controller changes a timing of switching the adsorption switching portion to the adsorption portion, from a first timing at which the subsequent sheet overlaps the preceding sheet to a second timing later than the first timing, and returns the timing to the first timing after the next sheet is adsorbed.