JP6345942B2 - Paper alignment device - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a sheet aligning apparatus that aligns sheets carried in from the previous stage in accordance with alignment standards.

  In the following Patent Document 1, a placement unit for placing a medium, a feed roller for feeding the placed medium, and a width direction X with respect to the feeding direction Y of the placed medium are moved and placed. An edge guide that aligns both sides of the placed medium, and a bend imparting section that imparts a bend to the placed medium in a direction Z that intersects the moving direction (X) of the edge guide. A sheet feeding device that presses and aligns both ends of a medium with the same magnitude of force as in a case where the stiffness of the medium is relatively strong is disclosed even if the medium is relatively weak.

JP 2009-173390 A

  By the way, in the encapsulating and sealing apparatus that the applicant of the present application is newly developing, a sealed letter is produced by enclosing and sealing the contents so as to wrap the contents in an envelope form, so that the position in the paper width direction perpendicular to the conveying direction of the contents is predetermined. It is necessary to align with the reference position. If the papers are not aligned, jamming may occur during the subsequent transport process or sealing process, and a fine misalignment may occur during the folding process or paste application process, resulting in a defective sealed letter. It is because it may become a good product.

The cause of such misalignment (position misalignment) is that the paper bends under the influence of the static pressure on the alignment fence and the wind pressure during transport, and the force acting during alignment in the paper width direction cannot be transmitted sufficiently. Is mentioned. In particular, when thin paper (for example, a basis weight of about 50 g / m ² or less) is used as the contents, misalignment tends to occur because the rigidity of the paper is low. Therefore, in order to carry out a favorable sealing process, it is necessary to accurately perform paper alignment (paper positioning) regardless of the rigidity (thickness) of the paper sealed in the sealed letter before the sealing process.

Temporarily, in addition to the alignment processing of thick paper and plain paper, the apparatus disclosed in Patent Document 1 that can perform alignment processing on thin paper with low rigidity (for example, basis weight of about 50 g / m ² or less) is the same as that of the enclosing sealing device. Assume that it is adopted as a paper alignment unit.

  However, in the apparatus of Patent Document 1, for example, a curved portion is applied to the sheet bundle by pressing the sheet bundle placed when aligning the sheet bundle from above. There is a possibility that the pressing load hinders alignment in the paper width direction and affects alignment accuracy.

  Further, in the enclosing and sealing device, since the sheet is sequentially conveyed to the sheet aligning unit until the prescribed number of sheets to be encapsulated is reached, the apparatus of Patent Document 1 once releases the pressing of the sheet in accordance with the timing of loading the sheet. There is a problem in that the paper that has already been carried in needs to be accepted and is misaligned.

  Therefore, the present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and can form a curved portion without imposing an extra load on the paper, and can accurately perform alignment processing without being influenced by the rigidity of the paper. An object of the present invention is to provide a sheet aligning device.

In order to achieve the above object, a sheet aligning device according to claim 1 includes a tray on which sheets are placed,
An alignment unit that includes a pair of alignment fences and reciprocates along a sheet width direction orthogonal to the sheet conveyance direction to perform alignment processing on the sheet placed on the tray;
Before performing the alignment process by the alignment unit, comprising a curve forming means for lifting the sheet from below the placement surface of the tray to form a curved portion in the sheet width direction on the sheet,
The curve forming means is a second transport roller disposed below the tray mounting surface and movable relative to the first transport roller disposed above the tray mounting surface. It is characterized by.

  The sheet aligning device according to claim 2, wherein the bending forming unit lifts the sheet from below after the at least one sheet is placed on the tray, and the curve is formed. A part is formed.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided the sheet aligning apparatus according to the first aspect, wherein when the sheet on the tray is a thin sheet, the curved portion is formed by the curved forming unit .

Sheet aligning device according to claim 4, in the sheet aligning apparatus of claim 1, wherein, prior Symbol second conveying roller, the sheet waits below said tray of the mounting surface until carried into the sheet receiving position A first position;
A second position where the curved portion is formed on the paper by raising a predetermined height from the placement surface during the start of the aligning process by the aligning unit after the paper is carried to the paper receiving position; ,
A third position for nipping and conveying the aligned paper with the first conveying roller to the subsequent stage;
It is characterized by moving to.

According to the paper aligning device of claim 1, the pressing force of the aligning means during the aligning process is formed by forming a curved portion along the paper width direction with respect to the paper placed on the tray, thereby increasing the rigidity of the paper. Therefore, alignment processing in the paper width direction can be performed with high accuracy, and alignment failure can be prevented in advance. In addition, since the second transport roller used when transporting the paper from the tray to the downstream side functions as a curve forming means for the paper, there is no need to provide another configuration as the curve forming means, and the rigidity of the paper is increased. In this state, the alignment process can be performed with high accuracy.

  According to the paper aligning device of the second aspect, the curved portion is formed by lifting the paper from below between the time when at least one paper is carried into the paper receiving position and the paper is aligned. Thus, the first sheet can be smoothly carried in without being caught by the curve forming means.

According to the sheet aligning apparatus of claim 3, wherein, when the sheet is placed on the tray is of low rigidity thin paper, by forming a curved portion in the paper by bending means, a thin rigid during alignment For example, the curve forming process can be omitted for a sheet that does not need to be curved, such as thick paper.
According to the paper aligning device of the fourth aspect , the second transport roller is the first to third in the series of aligning processes after the paper is carried into the paper receiving position and transported to the subsequent stage after the alignment. By appropriately moving to this position, the sheet alignment process can be performed with high accuracy without interfering with the alignment process.

It is a schematic block diagram which shows the structural example of the sealed letter preparation apparatus by which the paper aligning apparatus which concerns on this invention is mounted. It is an apparatus block diagram which shows the structural example of this apparatus. It is a functional block diagram of this apparatus. (A) is a figure which shows the state which the 2nd conveyance roller which is a curve formation means waits in a standby position, (b) is a figure which shows a state when the roller moves to a curve formation position, (c ) Is a diagram showing a state when the roller has moved to the nipping and conveying position. (A), (b) is the figure explaining the other structural example of the paper conveyance part.

  Hereinafter, embodiments for carrying out the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. In addition, the present invention is not limited by this embodiment, and all other forms, examples, operation techniques, and the like that can be considered by those skilled in the art based on this form are included in the scope of the present invention. Shall.

[About sealed letter production equipment]
First, the sealed letter preparation apparatus 100 on which the sheet aligning apparatus 1 according to the present invention is mounted will be described.
As shown in FIG. 1, the sealed letter preparation apparatus 100 includes a printing unit (printing apparatus) 110 that performs a predetermined printing process on the contents P and the envelope form PE enclosed in a sealed letter as a finished product, and the printing unit 110. Enclosed sealing unit 120 (encapsulated) is prepared by enclosing and sealing the content P in the envelope form PE after the necessary folding is applied to the content P and the envelope form PE that have been subjected to the predetermined printing process in Sealing device).

<About the printing unit>
The printing unit 110 is a device that performs a predetermined printing process on the envelope form PE and the contents P and discharges the envelope form PE and the contents P to the subsequent sealing unit 120.
More specifically, a plurality of types of sheets (sheet-like sheets P1 to P3 and envelope form PE that become the contents P) are fed at a predetermined timing to the inside or the side of the housing that stores each part. The paper section 111 and a loop-shaped transport path 113 that transports the paper from the introduction path 112, and four inks that discharge cyan (C), black (K), magenta (M), and yellow (Y) inks, respectively. Printing means 114 composed of inkjet heads C, K, M, and Y, a first discharge path 115 for discharging the sheet to the enclosing and sealing unit 120, a second discharge path 116 for discharging the sheet out of the loop, and a conveyance path 113 is provided with a switchback path 117 which reverses the sheet 113 after receiving the sheet conveyed and returns it to the conveyance path 113 to invert the sheet upside down.

<About enclosed sealing unit>
The encapsulating / sealing unit 120 is an apparatus for producing a sealed letter by performing necessary encapsulating processing so that the envelope foam PE and the contents P are folded and the contents P are wrapped with the envelope foam PE. In this embodiment, the envelope foam PE is folded in three and accommodated so as to wrap the contents P, but the number of times and how to fold the envelope foam PE depends on the shape and use of the finished product to be produced. Since there are various forms, there is no particular limitation.

  More specifically, a content folding unit 121 that performs a predetermined fold as necessary while conveying the content P, and an envelope foam folding unit that performs a predetermined fold as necessary while conveying an envelope form PE serving as an envelope. 122, a storage portion 123 that stores the content P while wrapping a part of the envelope foam PE as it is conveyed, and a second fold of the envelope form PE in which the content P is stored in the storage portion 123 A flap folding part 124 that folds in position to form a flap to form an envelope form PE, and a rewetting paste that functions as a standby path for positioning the folding position of the flap and is transferred in advance to the envelope foam PE A water application processing unit 125 that applies water to the part, a sealing unit 126 that seals the envelope after water application as it is transported, and the sealed sealed letter is transported up to the outside of the device casing After, and a discharge unit 127 for discharging transported horizontally to the discharge tray 127a.

  Further, the sealed letter preparation device 100 includes, for example, a general storage unit 128 that stores information necessary for driving each part of the sealed letter preparation device 100 such as a sealed letter preparation job in which conditions necessary for preparing the sealed letter are set, and a sealed letter And an overall control unit 129 that performs drive control of each unit included in the manufacturing apparatus 100.

  The sealed letter production job includes, for example, the number of letters to be printed, information on the envelope form PE to be used (number of printed sheets, form size, printing conditions (single-sided printing / double-sided printing), print image data to be printed, folding information, etc. ) And information about the contents P (number of copies, number of copies printed, output size, paper thickness information (thin paper, plain paper, thick paper), printing conditions (single-sided printing / double-sided printing), print image data to be printed, Envelope form information and contents information necessary for producing a sealed letter, such as information on how to fold, etc., are included.

  In addition, as a method for the sealed letter preparation device 100 to obtain a sealed letter preparation job, a method of inputting from an external terminal device such as a PC used by a user, or an auxiliary storage device such as a USB memory storing a preset sealed letter preparation job is used. Via a communication network from an external server that stores a pre-set sealed letter preparation job. There is a method to input.

  The sheet aligning apparatus 1 according to the present invention is arranged in front of the “content folding unit 121” in the above-described sealed letter preparation apparatus 100, and forms a curved portion along the sheet width direction in the sheet bundle that becomes the contents P. Thus, by increasing the rigidity of the paper, misalignment due to the bending of the paper is prevented.

[About paper alignment device]
<About device configuration>
Next, the sheet aligning apparatus 1 according to the present invention will be described.
The sheet aligning apparatus 1 of this example is disposed in a descending conveyance path that conveys a sheet horizontally conveyed from the vicinity of the upper portion of the enclosure sealing unit 120 described above to the content folding unit 121 disposed below the casing. 2 or 3, the tray 11, the sheet thickness acquisition unit 12, the sheet transport unit 13, the sheet alignment unit 14, the storage unit 15, and the control unit 16 are configured. .

  In the following embodiment, a process for aligning a bundle of sheets formed by stacking a plurality of sheets as the contents P will be described, but the number of contents P is not limited to a plurality and may be one. In other words, the “alignment processing” of the paper carried out by this apparatus is not only the processing of aligning the edges in the paper width direction in the paper bundle, but also a sheet of paper or a sheet so that the contents P are correctly enclosed in the envelope form PE. A process of aligning the position of the sheet bundle in the sheet width direction with a predetermined reference position is also included.

  The tray 11 has a placement surface 11a provided with a guide groove that serves as a guide when the paper alignment unit 14 slides during paper alignment, and the paper that becomes the contents P sequentially transported from the printing unit 110 is placed thereon. It is mounted on the mounting surface 11a. In addition, on the loading surface 11a, a second conveying roller 13b, which will be described later, waits below the tray 11 when the sheet bundle is conveyed and when a curved portion is formed along the sheet width direction in the sheet bundle. An opening hole 11b is provided for protruding or retreating upward.

  The paper thickness acquisition unit 12 emits light from the projector to the paper and detects the transmittance of the light with a light receiver. The sensor includes various sensors capable of detecting the thickness of the paper, such as an ultrasonic sensor that detects the transmittance with a receiver, detects the thickness of the paper before being conveyed to the tray 11, and uses the detection result as paper thickness information. It is output to the control unit 16.

  In this embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, the sheet printed by the printing unit 110 is disposed until the sheet is conveyed to the sheet aligning apparatus 1 (that is, before the sheet is carried into the sheet aligning apparatus 1), and the tray The paper thickness is detected before being transported to 11, and the paper thickness information indicating the detection result is output to the control unit 16.

  When the paper thickness information is included in the sealed letter preparation job, the control unit 16 can acquire the paper thickness information from the sealed letter preparation job, so that the configuration of the paper thickness acquisition unit 12 is not necessary.

  The paper transport unit 13 is fixedly disposed above the placement surface 11a of the tray 11, and has a fixed first transport roller 13a that supports the surface side of the aligned sheet bundle placed on the placement surface 11a. The second transport is provided below the tray mounting surface 11a so as to be able to advance and retract in the vertical direction from the opening hole 11b of the mounting surface 11a, and supports the back side of the sheet bundle placed on the mounting surface 11a. It is comprised by the conveyance roller pair comprised with the roller 13b.

  Moreover, the 2nd conveyance roller 13b becomes a structure which can move to the following three positions. The second conveying roller 13b is a “standby position” that is a position when the first sheet is held below the placement surface 11a of the tray 11 until the first sheet is carried to the sheet receiving position as the first position. And the opening hole 11b of the placement surface 11a between the time when the first sheet constituting the sheet bundle as the second position is carried to the sheet receiving position and the alignment process by the sheet aligning unit 14 is started. “Curve forming position”, which is a position where the curved portion passes through and rises to a predetermined height and forms a curved portion along the paper width direction in the paper bundle, and when the aligned paper bundle is conveyed to the subsequent stage as the third position. The first conveyance roller 13a moves to three positions, namely, a “nip conveyance position” that is a position for nipping and conveying the sheet bundle.

  Further, the second conveying roller 13b functions as a curve forming unit that forms a curved portion along the sheet width direction with respect to the sheet bundle that has been raised to the curve forming position and conveyed to the sheet receiving position.

Here, the movement position of the second conveying roller 13b functioning as the curve forming means will be described with reference to FIG.
In the following description, “copy” is a unit indicating the number of copies to be printed on the sheet as the contents P. Therefore, for example, when printing 5 copies of a set of 3 sheets as a print job, a set of 3 sheets corresponds to “copy”.

  As shown in FIG. 4A, the standby position is the second transport period after the alignment process for the previous part of the sealed letter preparation job is completed and before the first sheet is carried in the next part. It is a position where the roller 13b waits, and is located below the tray 11 (on the back side).

  As shown in FIG. 4B, the curve forming position is the first between the time when the first sheet of the part to be aligned is carried in and the time when the number of the parts is aligned and the alignment process is started. At a position where the second conveyance roller 13b, which is a curve forming means, moves to rise to a predetermined height from the standby position so as not to contact the conveyance roller 13a and to form a curved portion along the sheet width direction with respect to the sheet. is there. As described above, the second conveying roller 13b moves from the standby position to the curve forming position and imparts a predetermined curve shape to the sheet bundle placed on the placement surface 11a, thereby serving as a curve forming means. . Further, when the second conveying roller 13b is raised to the curve forming position, the position is maintained until the alignment process by the sheet aligning unit 14 is completed.

  As the height of the curve forming position, it is sufficient that at least a curved portion along the sheet width direction is formed in the sheet bundle. Therefore, the curve forming position is at least the placement surface 11a of the tray 11 and the first transport roller 13a. It should be positioned between the two, but it will be the optimum height according to the paper information (paper basis weight, paper flow (vertical eye, horizontal eye), paper size) and the number of papers in the paper bundle. The curve forming position may be variably controlled.

  The timing at which the second conveying roller 13b is raised from the standby position to the curve forming position aligns the sheet bundle by the sheet aligning unit 14 after at least the first sheet forming the sheet bundle is carried into the sheet receiving position. It may be between.

  Further, the curve forming position is a position where the second transport roller 13b, which is a curve forming unit, moves to form a curved portion along the sheet width direction with respect to the sheet when the sheet to be used is thin. Therefore, when the later-described curve formation determining means 16a determines that the sheet to be used is not a thin sheet, the second conveying roller 13b does not move to the curve forming position but reciprocates between the standby position and the nipping and conveying position at a predetermined timing. It will be.

  As shown in FIG. 4C, the nipping and conveying position is a position for nipping the sheet bundle aligned by the sheet aligning unit 14 with the first conveying roller 13a and conveying it to the subsequent content folding unit 121. It is. In the example shown in the drawing, since the sheet bundle is clamped by moving close to the fixed first conveying roller 13a, the position is higher than the curve forming position. When the second transport roller 13b moves to the nipping and transporting position and finishes the sheet bundle transport process, it moves to the standby position before the first sheet is carried in to perform the alignment process for the next section. .

  The sheet aligning section 14 is composed of a pair of plate-like members standing upright along the guide grooves provided in the tray 11 so that the distance between them can be increased or decreased. First alignment means 14a that abuts on both side edges and aligns at a mounting position that conforms to the alignment reference, and a plate-like member that is erected on the mounting surface 11a of the tray 11 so as to be movable along the paper transport direction. And a second aligning unit 14b that moves to a position corresponding to the sheet size and abuts with the front end in the sheet transport direction to perform alignment in order to regulate the sheet receiving position.

  When the second aligning unit 14b moves in the sheet conveying direction according to the size of the sheet to be used under the control of the control unit 16, the sheet aligning unit 14 is placed on the tray 11 by the number corresponding to the content P. The first alignment means 14a is reciprocated along the sheet width direction to align the position of the sheet bundle in the sheet width direction. When the content P is a single sheet, a curved portion along the sheet width direction is formed by the second conveying roller 13b, which is a curve forming unit. The direction position is aligned.

  The storage unit 15 includes, for example, various types of semiconductor memory including nonvolatile memory such as EEPROM and flash memory, and volatile memory such as DRAM and SDRAM, and various storage devices such as HDD, and determines whether or not the sheet is thin paper. In addition to the thin paper discrimination threshold value, which is a determination criterion, the drive control information of each unit constituting the paper alignment apparatus 1 is stored.

  The control unit 16 includes, for example, a CPU (Central Processing Unit), a ROM (Read Only Memory), a RAM (Random Access Memory), or a processor such as an MPU (Micro-Processing Unit) having these functions. The drive control of each part which comprises 1 is performed.

  Further, the control unit 16 determines the standby position, the curve forming position, and the nipping and conveying position so that the second conveying roller 13b functions as the curve forming unit according to the determination result of whether or not the sheets constituting the sheet bundle are thin sheets. Is provided with a curve formation determining means 16a for performing control to be moved appropriately.

  The curve formation determination unit 16a compares the sheet thickness information output from the sheet thickness acquisition unit 12 with the thin paper determination threshold value stored in the storage unit 15 to determine whether or not to form a curved portion in the sheet bundle. When it is determined that the sheet to be used is thin, control is performed to appropriately move the second transport roller 13b to the standby position, the curve forming position, and the nipping and transporting position so that the second transport roller 13b functions as a curve forming unit.

  When the curve formation determining unit 16a determines that the sheet to be used is not a thin sheet based on the sheet thickness information, the sheet is not moved to the curve formation position, and after the sheet bundle is aligned, the holding conveyance position is moved from the standby position. The second conveying roller 13b is driven and controlled so that the normal sheet conveying process is performed by raising the position to the upper limit.

<About processing operation>
Next, a series of operations related to the bending imparting process performed by the sheet aligning device 1 will be described with reference to FIG.
Here, when the paper used in the sealed sealing unit 120 of the sealed letter preparation apparatus 100 described above is a thin paper, a curved portion is formed in the paper bundle that becomes the contents P printed by the printing unit 110. It is an operation example at the time of carrying out to the content folding part 121 of a back | latter stage after aligning. Further, the timing for moving the second transport roller 13b to the curve forming position in this operation example is the timing before the first sheet of the content P is carried to the sheet receiving position and the second sheet is loaded. .

  First, the printed sheet is conveyed from the printing unit 110 and acquired by the sheet thickness acquisition unit 12 before being carried into the sheet aligning apparatus 1. Then, the acquired sheet thickness information (here, sheet thickness information indicating that the sheet is thin) is output to the control unit 16. At this time, the second transport roller 13b is waiting at the standby position as shown in FIG.

  Next, when it is confirmed from the sheet thickness information acquired by the control unit 16 that the sheet is thin, the first sheet is loaded and then the second sheet is loaded into the sheet aligning apparatus 1. Before, the 2nd conveyance roller 13b is moved to a curve formation position. As a result, as shown in FIG. 4B, a curved portion along the paper width direction is formed in the paper bundle carried to the paper receiving position. Further, since the second and subsequent sheets are carried along the surface of the previous sheet, the second conveyance roller 13b does not interfere with the sheet conveyance.

  Next, when the number of sheets set as the contents P is carried in, the sheet aligning unit 14 performs alignment processing with the curved portion formed. After that, as shown in FIG. 4C, the second transport roller 13b is moved close to the first transport roller 13a so as to sandwich the sheet bundle and transport to the content folding section 121 at the subsequent stage.

  Thereafter, the alignment process is performed in a state in which a curved portion is formed on the sheet bundle as the contents P one by one according to the number of sealed letters to be produced.

  Further, when the content P is one sheet, when it is confirmed that the sheet is a thin sheet, the second conveying roller 13b, which is a curve forming unit, is moved to the curve forming position and is moved along the sheet width direction. By forming the curved portion, the sheet aligning unit 14 aligns the position in the sheet width direction.

  As described above, in the above-described sheet aligning apparatus 1, when it is determined that the sheet constituting the sheet bundle to be aligned is a thin sheet, the first sheet serving as the sheet bundle is placed on the tray 11. The second conveying roller 13b, which is a curve forming means, is waited at the standby position until the sheet receiving position on the surface 11a, and after the first sheet is conveyed to the sheet receiving position until the sheet bundle is aligned. The second transport roller 13b is moved from the standby position to the curve forming position to lift the sheet, thereby forming a curved portion along the sheet width direction. Then, when the sheet alignment unit 14 performs alignment processing in the width direction of the sheet bundle in which the curved portion is formed and aligns the sheet bundle, the second conveying roller 13b is moved to the nipping and conveying position, and the aligned sheet bundle is moved to the first position. It is nipped and conveyed toward the subsequent content folding portion 121 by one conveyance roller 13a.

  As a result, a curved portion along the paper width direction is formed on the thin paper that is weak, thereby increasing the rigidity of the paper so that the pressing force by the first alignment means 14a is transmitted during the alignment process. The matching process can be performed with high accuracy. Accordingly, it is possible to prevent misalignment due to suction due to static electricity or bending of the paper due to wind pressure during conveyance.

  Further, since the second conveying roller 13b of the sheet conveying unit 13 is configured to be movable to three positions of a standby position, a curve forming position, and a nipping and conveying position, and functions as a curve forming unit for the sheet bundle, the curve forming unit Therefore, it is not necessary to provide another configuration separately, and the alignment process can be performed with high accuracy while increasing the rigidity of the sheet.

  Further, by providing the paper thickness acquisition unit 12 that detects the thickness of the paper before the paper is carried into the tray 11, it is determined that the paper is thin without performing the curved portion forming operation for all the paper. Only the curve forming process can be carried out.

[Other embodiments]
In addition, this invention is not limited to said each embodiment, For example, as shown below, it can also change suitably according to a use environment etc. and can also be implemented. Also, the following modifications can be implemented in any combination within the scope not departing from the gist of the present invention.

  In the embodiment described above, the example in which the sheet aligning device 1 is mounted in the front stage of the content folding unit 121 in the enclosing sealing unit 120 has been described. However, the present invention is not limited to this. In addition, it may be mounted as a sheet aligning unit of a post-processing apparatus that performs stapling or bookbinding after printing. In this case, information relating to paper printing (for example, information such as output size, single-sided / double-sided printing, the number of copies, the number of copies printed for each number of copies, etc.) ).

  Further, in the above-described embodiment, when the paper to be used is a thin paper, the curved forming means forms the curved portion on the paper or the paper bundle that becomes the contents P, but for example, in addition to the thickness (basis weight) of the paper Thus, a configuration may be adopted in which the height of the curve forming position is appropriately changed in accordance with information such as the sheet flow (longitudinal and horizontal), the sheet size, and the number of sheet bundles.

  Further, the sheet conveying unit 13 is configured to move the movable second conveying roller 13b close to the fixed first conveying roller 13a in order to form a predetermined curved portion on the sheet or the sheet bundle as the contents P. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and any configuration may be used as long as a predetermined curved portion can be formed on at least a sheet or a sheet bundle. Accordingly, as another embodiment of the paper transport unit 13, for example, the first transport roller 13a and the second transport roller 13b are both movable so that they can move relatively, and the second transport roller 13b is used from below the tray. A configuration is conceivable in which after the curved portion is formed in the sheet bundle, the first conveying roller 13a is moved close to the second conveying roller 13b to be nipped and conveyed.

  Further, in the above-described form, each roller of the paper transport unit 13 has been described as being fixed with respect to the transport direction position. However, considering the case where the paper size of the contents P (transport direction size) is different, It may be configured to move along the transport direction as appropriate according to the alignment range of the first alignment means.

  For example, as shown in FIG. 5A, when A4 paper and A5 paper are used as the contents size, if a curved portion is formed near the center of the A4 paper, the curved portion is formed on the A4 paper. However, with A5 paper, only the trailing edge of the paper is lifted, and no curved portion is formed. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 5B, the curve forming means (that is, the second conveying roller 13b) is moved to the vicinity of the approximate center of the smaller paper size so that the curved portion is formed on the smaller paper size. By moving the sheet a predetermined distance along the sheet conveyance direction and then lifting the sheet, a curved portion can be formed on the entire sheet bundle regardless of the size of the sheet. Of course, even in the case of a single sheet, a curved portion along the sheet width direction can be formed by appropriately moving the curve forming means in a predetermined direction according to the size of the sheet in the conveyance direction.

  Moreover, although the example which used the inkjet recording device as a structure of the printing apparatus used as the printing unit 110 in the sealed letter preparation apparatus 100 demonstrated, desired image on the content P, envelope form PE, etc. according to the preparation contents of the sealed letter to produce. As long as the image can be formed, various image forming apparatuses such as a stencil printing apparatus, a copying machine, and a laser printer may be employed in addition to the ink jet recording apparatus.

  Further, in the above-described embodiment, the configuration in which the sheet aligning apparatus 1 includes the storage unit 15 and the control unit 16 has been described. However, the overall storage unit 128 and the overall control unit 129 of the sealed letter preparation apparatus 100 on which the present apparatus is mounted include , You may cover its function.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Paper alignment apparatus 11 ... Tray (11a ... Loading surface)
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 12 ... Paper thickness acquisition part 13 ... Paper conveyance part (13a 1st conveyance roller, 13b ... 2nd conveyance roller (curve formation means))
14... Paper alignment unit (14a... First alignment means, 14b. Second alignment means)
15 ... Storage unit 16 ... Control unit (16a ... Curve formation determination means)
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 100 ... Seal letter preparation apparatus 110 ... Printing unit (printing apparatus)
120 ... Encapsulated sealing unit (encapsulated sealing device)
P ... Contents

Claims (4)

A tray for loading paper,
An alignment unit that includes a pair of alignment fences and reciprocates along a sheet width direction orthogonal to the sheet conveyance direction to perform alignment processing on the sheet placed on the tray;
Before performing the alignment process by the alignment unit, comprising a curve forming means for lifting the sheet from below the placement surface of the tray to form a curved portion in the sheet width direction on the sheet,
The curve forming means is a second transport roller disposed below the tray mounting surface and movable relative to the first transport roller disposed above the tray mounting surface. A sheet aligning device characterized by the above.   2. The sheet aligning apparatus according to claim 1, wherein after the at least one sheet is placed on the tray, the curve forming unit lifts the sheet from below to form the curved portion. 2. The sheet aligning apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein when the sheet on the tray is a thin sheet, the curved portion is formed by the curved forming unit . A second position where the second transport roller waits below the placement surface of the tray until the paper is carried into a paper receiving position;
A second position where the curved portion is formed on the paper by raising a predetermined height from the placement surface during the start of the aligning process by the aligning unit after the paper is carried to the paper receiving position; ,
A third position for nipping and conveying the aligned paper with the first conveying roller to the subsequent stage;
Sheet aligning apparatus of claim 1, wherein the move to.

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