JPH0749343B2 - Paper handling equipment - Google Patents

Description

Description: TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a paper sheet handling apparatus that conveys and processes paper sheets such as banknotes inside an automatic depositing / dispensing apparatus or the like.

(Prior Art) For example, in a financial institution, an automatic deposit / withdrawal device is widely used for withdrawing, depositing, or transferring deposits and savings. This device accepts a plurality of banknotes inserted by the customer, separates them one by one, conveys them, and recognizes their authenticity and denomination, while counting the amount of money and accumulating it at a predetermined place. Perform an action.

In such an apparatus, there may be an abnormal conveyance state in which bills are bent during conveyance, are conveyed obliquely (skewed), or two or more bills run while overlapping each other.

In order to detect such an abnormality, a sensor is provided on the transport path of the apparatus to detect the transport status of banknotes. Then, for example, when an abnormal conveyance state in which banknotes cannot be recognized or counted is detected, the processing is stopped. The operator removes the banknotes remaining in the device, checks the device, and then restores the device.

(Problems to be solved by the invention) By the way, when a similar abnormal transportation state often occurs, a maintenance person performs a failure investigation and analysis during a time period when the apparatus is not in operation. In this case, the maintenance staff knows the situation when the abnormal conveyance state occurs and the state of the bill at that time,
Ask the operator for these points and then ask for an explanation of how to get the machine back up. Further, a test run is actually carried out using bills or the like to search for an abnormal place and analyze the cause of failure.

However, when inspecting maintenance personnel, such troubles and abnormal transportation conditions are not always reproduced, and even if the cause analysis is performed by relying on the memory of the operator, the memory of the operator may be ambiguous. In the case of inaccuracy, there is a problem that accurate diagnosis cannot always be performed, and it takes a lot of time and effort to search for a location where a failure has occurred.

In addition to this, even if an abnormal conveyance state occurs, there is a problem that it is not possible to determine whether the cause is the device side or the bill itself is defective. This is particularly problematic in that it is not known which banknote was transported to cause an abnormal transport state.

The same problem occurs in a copying machine, a stamp handling device, and other devices that continuously convey and process various paper sheets.

The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and an object of the present invention is to provide a paper sheet handling apparatus that facilitates searching for a location where a failure has occurred in the apparatus and analyzing the cause of the failure.

(Means for Solving Problems) A paper sheet handling apparatus of the present invention is a paper sheet handling apparatus that creates transport state data for each transported paper sheet and stores the data in a storage unit. , A start pointer, a next start pointer, and a transport state data storage block. Each start pointer stores the pointer of the first block in which the data of the processing is stored, and the next start pointer stores the next The pointer of the first block in which the processing data is stored is stored, and the transport state data storage block stores the sensor number, the step, and the transport information of the sheet for each sheet, and the transport information of the sheet is stored. Is characterized by including information immediately before the occurrence of the abnormal conveyance state.

(Operation) When the paper sheet is conveyed in the conveyance path, the above-described device stores the detection outputs of the plurality of sensors that detect the conveyance state of the paper sheet in the storage unit as the conveyance state data. This transportation status data is, for example, always stored in the latest version, that is, for the last several transactions. Moreover, since the transport state data is stored separately for each sheet to be transported, when the abnormal transport state occurs, it is possible to easily recognize which sheet has such a state. Further, when the abnormal conveyance state of the paper sheet occurs, the conveyance state data immediately before the occurrence of the state is stored. As a result, the analysis of the cause of the abnormal traveling can be performed in detail and quickly.

(Embodiment) <Schematic configuration of apparatus> The sheet handling apparatus of the present invention will be described below by taking an automatic depositing / dispensing apparatus as an example.

FIG. 1 is a schematic view showing an embodiment of an automatic depositing / dispensing device according to the present invention.

This device separates, recognizes and accumulates a plurality of banknotes 3 inserted into the customer service section 2 from the customer service opening 1 one by one, while stocking them in a deposit safe 12, a banknote safe 13 and a ticket safe 14. This is a device for performing processing of taking out bills from the 10,000-denomination bank safe 13 and the 1,000-ticket safe 14, accumulating them in the first accumulating section 16 and presenting them together with the statement slip 18 to the customer.

In the figure, the deposit pool 4 is a device for receiving the bills 3 taken into the customer service section 2 and holding them until the separating section 5 takes out the bills one by one. Recognition unit 6
Is a device that recognizes the authenticity of the bills sent into it. The pump 38 is a pump for obtaining a negative pressure for sucking bills in each part of the device.

The main motor 39 is a motor for applying a carrying force to the bills carried in the carrying path 20 via a transmission device (not shown). Also, this device has an I / O interface 4
The control unit 41 and the storage unit 43 are connected via 2 and the bus line 40. The control unit 41 controls the operation of each unit of the apparatus, and the storage unit 43 is a memory for storing the transport state data for each transported sheet, which is a feature of the present invention.

The banknotes are transported through various transport paths 20 as shown in the figure according to the type of operation, and the deposit first sensor
21, 1,000-ticket first sensor 32, 10,000-ticket first sensor 31, A sensor 2
2, B sensor 23, C sensor 24, D sensor 25, E sensor 2
6, F sensor 27, G sensor 28, K sensor 29, H sensor 3
0, L sensor 33, M sensor 34, N sensor 35, and the like are arranged to detect the conveyance state of bills. Each sensor is composed of, for example, a pair of light-transmissive sensors arranged so as to sandwich the conveyance path of the banknote, for example, the posture and inclination of the banknote are turned on and off.
It can be detected by the timing of turning off.

<General operation of device> This device operates as follows when depositing money.

A plurality of banknotes 3 received by the customer service section 2 from the customer service opening 1
Are first stocked in the deposit pool 4. Then, these bills 3 are separated one by one by the separating unit 5, and are conveyed to the recognizing unit 6 through the deposit first sensor 21 and the A sensor 22. The recognition unit 6 is a device for recognizing the authenticity and denomination of the bill.

The banknote 3 that has undergone the recognition processing in the recognition unit 6 is a B sensor.
It goes to the accumulating unit 16 or 17 via the C sensor 24 in 23 ways. In front of the C sensor 24, a switching gate 7 for switching the conveyance direction of the bill 3 is installed. At the time of depositing, the switching game 7 is oriented so that all banknotes are conveyed in the direction of the C sensor 24. When the banknotes pass through the C sensor to the stacking units 16 and 17, the genuine bills pass through the D sensor 25 via the switching gate 8 and are stacked in the first stacking unit 16 by the stacking vehicle 10. The banknotes rejected by the recognition unit 6 after being judged as counterfeit are guided by the switching gate 8, pass through the E sensor 26, and are stacked in the second stacking unit 17 by the stacking vehicle 10.

After that, the genuine bills are transferred to the deposit deposit box 12, the multi-ticket deposit deposit box 13, and the 1000-price deposit deposit box 14, and the rejected bills are connected to the customer service section 2 and the customer service opening 1.
Will be returned through.

Now, the withdrawal operation will be described.

First, for example, 1 specified number of banknotes from the banknote safe 13
The sheets are separated one by one and delivered to the transport path 20. The fed-out bills are sent to the recognition unit 6 through the tenth bill first sensor 31, the N sensor 35, and the A sensor 22.

The recognition unit 6 discriminates the double feeding, the tearing, the mixing of different types of bills, etc. of the bill, and the bill which has been discriminated as abnormal is guided to the switching gates 7 and 9 through the B sensor 23 and is transferred to the withdrawal defective bill safe 15. It is stored. In this case, the bill is F sensor 27 and G sensor 28.
Pass through. The banknotes identified as normal by the recognition unit 6 are guided by the switching gates 7 and 8 toward the first stacking unit 16.
In this case, the sheet is conveyed through the C sensor 24 and the D sensor 25. The banknotes of the number designated by the customer are collected in the first stacking unit 16
Then, it is accumulated in the customer service section 2 through the medium detection sensors 36, 37, the customer service opening 1 is opened, and the customer is refunded.

<Conveyance State Data> FIG. 2 shows an explanatory diagram of the conveyance state data stored in the storage unit 43 shown in FIG.

The transport state data is composed of a storage area including a start pointer 46, a next start pointer 47, a transaction number 48, and a block 49 for storing detailed transport state data for each banknote.

The block 49 includes blocks 1 to 127, and one block is composed of 16 bytes, for example. This one block is selected to have a size in which all specific transport state data regarding one banknote is stored. Therefore, in block 49 in the figure, 127 sheets of banknote transport state data are stored in total.

Now, in the start pointer 46, the latest transaction is
A pointer is stored which indicates in which block the data stored starts. The next start pointer 47 stores the pointer of the first block in which the data of the next transaction is stored. The transaction number 48 stores data indicating the total number of banknotes conveyed in each recent transaction. The number of transactions for each transaction is stored here.

With such a configuration, when the maximum number of transactions per transaction is 100, the banknote transport state data for the one transaction can be stored. If the number of transactions per transaction is small, the transportation state data for several transactions is stored.

Here, one of the blocks 49, for example, block 1 has a data structure as shown on the right side thereof.

First, the sensor number (No) 51 stores a sensor name for identifying which sensor is currently in the ON or OFF waiting state while the bill is being conveyed.

In step 52, data for identifying whether the sensor is waiting for turning on, waiting for turning off, detection of turning off, or any state is stored.

Further, the bill information 53 is, as shown in the upper right part of FIG.
It is composed of transport status data consisting of 8-bit information of 1 or 0, respectively. This includes a mechanical double error 53a, a skew error 53b, an abnormal approach error 53c, and a jam error 53d.

The mechanical double error 53a is set to 1 when the A sensor 22 detects that the bill has a certain thickness or more. That is, this is data for detecting whether or not two or more banknotes have run in an overlapping manner. In addition, 1 is set in the skew error 53b portion when the bill is bent while it is being conveyed and is traveling a certain amount or more. The abnormal approach error 53c is 1 when the interval between two banknotes that arrive at the sensor is very short.
Is set. This is detected, for example, by the deposit first sen 21 and the A sensor 22.

The time when the bill should reach the sensor is recognized in the jam error 53d portion, and 1 is set when the bill has not arrived by that time. This is detected by all the sensors, for example, after passing through the depositing first sensor 21, the case where the bill does not reach the A sensor 22 even after a predetermined time has passed is detected. When the abnormal conveyance state does not occur, all banknote information is 0.

The number of idling motions 54 stores the number of idling motions when separating the bills one by one in the separating unit 5 shown in FIG.

In the deposit first sensor approaching raw data 55, the previous banknote is the deposit first
After passing the sensor 21, the next bill is deposited into the first sensor 21.
It stores the time to reach.

In the deposit first sensor skew raw data 56, when a pair of sensors provided across the transport path forming the sensor detect passage of the banknote with a certain time difference,
Data corresponding to the time difference is stored.

In the A sensor approach raw data 57, the time from the passage of the preceding bill to the A sensor 22 until the bill reaches the A sensor 22 is stored.

In the A sensor skew raw data 58, the same data as the previously described depositing first sensor skew raw data 56 in the A sensor 22 is stored.

Further, in the A sensor mechanism duplex data 59, when the device for detecting the thickness of the banknote provided in the A sensor 22 portion detects that the banknotes are conveyed in a double overlap, the overlapping width is determined. Store the corresponding data. That is, when two banknotes are completely overlapped, the entire width of the banknote is the overlapping width, and when two banknotes are partially overlapped, the width corresponding to the overlapping part is this A It is stored as sensor mechanism duplex data 59.

The recognition response data 60 stores the recognition data obtained when recognizing the authenticity of bills and the denomination. This is also the data output from the recognition unit 6.

The recognition response data 60 has a 4-byte structure, for example. The sensor number 51 and the step 52 are combined into 1 byte, and the banknote information 53 to the A sensor mechanism duplex data 59 are each composed of 1 byte.

The last sensor passage information 61 is a 3-byte data. This sensor passage information 61 indicates which one of the right and left sensors from A sensor 21 to N sensor 35 is turned on first, or a so-called half-folded bill has passed without turning on one of the sensors. It is data such as.

<Operational Flowchart of Device> The above device operates as follows.

First, FIG. 3 is a flow chart showing the main routine of the apparatus of the present invention.

First, the customer waits for the insertion of bills (step S1).
Here, when the insertion of the bill is confirmed, the bill is conveyed to the deposit pool 4 shown in FIG. At this time, the next start pointer 47 shown in FIG. 2 is set to the start pointer 46 (step S2). Then, the banknotes are separated one by one in the separating unit 5 shown in FIG. 1 (step S3). When the bills are separated, the traveling monitoring operation is activated (step S4). Also, the next start pointer 47 is updated here. The subroutine of the part of step S4 when the traveling monitoring is activated will be described again with reference to FIG. In this main routine, it is then determined whether or not all banknotes have been separated (step S5), and steps S3 to S
Repeat the process up to S5. Then, all the bills are separated, and it is confirmed whether or not the bills are accumulated in the accumulating unit 16 or 17 shown in FIG. 1 (step S6). When the confirmation is completed, another process such as sending the bill to the customer service department or the safe will be performed.

Next, referring to FIG. 4, a traveling monitoring subroutine of the device of the present invention (step S4 in FIG. 3) will be described. Note that this subroutine starts from step S401.

First, when the traveling of the bill is started, it is monitored that the bill passes through the deposit first sensor 21 shown in FIG. 1 (step
S401). Here, even if you wait for a certain time, the banknotes will not pass,
When a so-called timeout occurs (step S40
2), the bit of the jam error 53d shown in FIG. 2 is set to 1 (step S403). Then, when this time-out occurs, the apparatus is stopped as it is. On the other hand, if no timeout occurs, this subroutine is further continued.

When the banknote passes through the deposit first sensor 21, the idling frequency 54, the deposit first sensor approach raw data 55, the deposit first sensor skew raw data 56, and the sensor passage information 61 shown in FIG. It is stored in the storage unit 43 shown in FIG. 1 (step S4
04).

Next, it is determined whether or not the abnormal approach error described above has occurred (step S405). If an abnormal approach error has occurred in the deposit first sensor 21, the bit of the abnormal approach error 53c shown in FIG. 2 is set to 1 (step S406). Then, this time, it is determined whether or not the skew is large (step S407). And, as explained earlier, if the skew is very large, the skew error
The bit of 53b is set to 1 (step S408). Then, the sensor number 51 and step 52 shown in FIG. 2 are updated (step S409). That is, the storage of the transportation state data including the banknote information regarding the deposit first sensor 21 has been performed until now, but this time, the storage of the transport state data similar to that of the deposit first sensor 21 for the A sensor 22 is started.

That is, the passage of the A sensor is monitored (step S410), the time-out is judged (step S411), and in the case of time-out, the jam error bit is set (step S412),
A sensor approach raw data 57 and A sensor skew raw data 58
Then, the A sensor mechanism duplex data 59 and the sensor passage information 61 are stored in the storage unit 43 (step S413). Then, the abnormal approach is further determined (step S414), and in the case of the abnormal approach, the abnormal approach error bit is set (step S415), and the skew is determined (step S416) and the skew error bit is set when the skew is large (step S415). S41
7) is performed to finally determine the occurrence of the mechanical double error 53a (FIG. 2). If this occurs, the mechanical double error bit is set (step S419). It should be noted that this A sensor 22 is better than the deposit first sensor 21
More information will be obtained in terms of checking the mechanical double error 53a.

When the data storage for the A sensor 22 is completed, the sensor number 51 and the step number 52 are updated (step S420).

Then, this time, the process proceeds to the storage of the transport state data for the B sensor 23. That is, the passage of the B sensor is judged (step
S421), time-out judgment (step S422), and if time-out, set jam error bit (step
S423) is performed to store the sensor passage information 61 (step S424). With regard to the B sensor 23, the processing just described is performed, and the transfer state data of the next sensor, that is, the C sensor 24 is stored.

The sensor number 51 and the step number 52 are updated (step 425), the passage of the C sensor is judged (step S426), and the timeout is judged (step S42).
If 7) and the time-out occurs, the jam error bit is set (step S428), and the recognition response data 60 (FIG. 2) and the sensor passage information 61 are stored (step S429).

By the way, if any abnormal conveyance state is recognized during the above-described processing from step S401 to step S429, subsequent conveyance state data is not stored for the banknote, it is determined to be rejected, and the second sheet is determined as it is. Accumulator 17
It will be conveyed to the withdrawal defective ticket safe 15. Therefore,
In step S430, the processing is divided depending on whether or not the bill is rejected.

First, for banknotes that are not rejected, the sensor number 51 and the step number 52 are updated (step S4
31), the passage of the D sensor is determined (step S432),
Judgment of time-out (step S433) and if time-out, jam error bit is set (step S434), and sensor passage information 61 is logged (step S43).
Five).

On the other hand, regarding the rejected banknote, the sensor number 51 and the step number 52 are updated (step S43
6), the storage of the transportation state data for the E sensor is advanced. That is, it is determined that the E sensor has passed (step S43
7) If it does not pass, a time-out is determined (step S437), and if it is time-out, the jam error bit is set (step S439) and the sensor passage information is set.
61 is stored (step S440).

Through the above processing, the subroutine of the traveling monitoring activation (step S4) shown in FIG. 3 is completed. If any trouble occurs during the execution of the above subroutine, the subsequent data storage operation is stopped, and the transport state data stored immediately before is read and analyzed for each banknote in which the trouble has occurred.

<Field of Application> The present invention is not limited to the above embodiments.

For example, even in a copying machine, a plurality of copy sheets are simultaneously conveyed on the conveying path at high speed. When a part of the copy paper has a conveyance abnormality due to so-called jamming, the above-mentioned configuration makes it easy to perform maintenance and inspection.

That is, the present invention can be applied to various types of devices that convey paper sheets in a relatively complicated conveyance path.

(Effect of the Invention) According to the paper sheet handling apparatus of the present invention described above, even if an abnormality in the conveyance state occurs due to a jam or the like, the cause of the failure can be read by reading the contents of the storage unit during inspection and repair. The occurrence location and its analysis can be easily performed in a short time.

In this case, since the transport state is stored in the storage unit for each sheet, it is possible to easily find the sheet in which the abnormal transport state has occurred.

Further, since the transport state data immediately before the occurrence of the failure is stored, the analysis of the cause of the failure becomes easier.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic view of the paper sheet handling apparatus of the present invention, FIG. 2 is an explanatory view of the transport state data stored in its storage unit, and FIGS. 3 and 4 show the operation of the apparatus of the present invention. It is a flowchart. 1 ... service opening, 2 ... service department, 3 ... banknotes, 4 ... deposit pool,
5 ... Separation unit, 6 ... Recognition unit, 7, 8, 9 ... Switching gate, 10 ... Stacked vehicle, 12 ... Deposit safe, 13 ... Manten bank safe, 14 ... Thousand bank safe, 15
… Disposal of defective bank safe, 16… First stacking unit, 17… Second stacking unit,
18 ... Details slip, 20 ... transport path, 21-35 ... sensor, 41 ... control unit, 42 ... I / O interface, 43 ... storage unit.

Front page continued (72) Inventor Etsuhiro Uchiyama 4-11 Sakaemachi, Takasaki-shi, Gunma Hara Building 7F Oki Firmware Systems Co., Ltd. (56) Reference JP-A-60-242166 (JP, A) JP-A-62 -81656 (JP, A) JP-A-54-40458 (JP, A) JP-A-59-149252 (JP, A)

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A plurality of paper sheets are separated and conveyed one by one, a plurality of sensors arranged in a conveyance path detect the conveyance state of the paper sheets, and the detection output of each sensor is received to convey the paper sheets. In a paper sheet handling apparatus that creates transport state data for each sheet to be stored in a storage unit, this storage unit includes a storage area for a start pointer, a next start pointer, and a transport state data storage block. Stores the pointer of the first block in which the data of the process is stored, and the next start pointer contains
The pointer of the first block that stores the data of the next process is stored, and the transport state data storage block stores the sensor number, step, and transport information of the sheet for each sheet, and transports the sheet. A paper handling device characterized in that the information includes information immediately before the occurrence of an abnormal conveyance state.