An envelope bin assembly for a printer comprising a bin member in which envelopes can be stacked in readiness for feed by an envelope feed roller of the printer, the bin member being engageable in a support of the printer such that the feed roller of the printer can engage the frontmost envelope in the stack to feed the same to a printing station of the printer. A pressure applying member is guidably supported for displacement in the bin member for applying pressure, under the action of gravity, to the stack of envelopes at the rear thereof thereby to press the frontmost envelope in the stack against the feed roller and bend the envelopes at the front of the stack around the feed roller to produce a fan effect at the lower edges of the envelopes by which the lower edges are spread apart to facilitate single feed of the frontmost envelope.

Apparatus for feeding and separating seriatim a sheet of paper from a stack of sheets. The apparatus includes: a deck having a receiving end and a feeding end for supporting the stack of sheets on edge, the deck oriented at an angle between about 10 and 20 degrees to a horizontal plane and wherein the feeding end is lower than the receiving end; a main urge roller situated above the feeding end of the deck at about midway between the top and bottom edges of the stack of sheets, whereby the stack is bent at a point in the sheets about midway between the top and bottom edges of the sheets; a secondary feed roller parallel to and situated above the main urge roller near the top edge of the stack of sheets, wherein a line of tangency joining the peripheries of the main urge roller and the feed roller adjacent the stack of sheets is disposed at an angle between about 40 and 50 degrees to a horizontal plane; a device for urging the stack against the main urge roller as the stack is reduced in the course of the feeding of the sheets seriatim; and a device downstream of the secondary feed roller for separating the bottom sheet from the stack of sheets at the top edge of the stack.

In an optical detection system for detecting a feature located at a predetermined lateral position on a banknote, for example, the banknote is moved along a flow path and a series of light receivers are arranged transversely across that portion of the flow path which the feature is expected to occupy, so that different ones of the light receivers will respond to the feature in the banknote depending on the lateral offset of the banknote at that portion of the flow path. The margins of the note are utilized in the detection system to gate the said light receivers so that for any position of lateral offset of the banknote only that light receiver which responds to the said feature of the banknote will produce an effective output signal. In the embodiment of FIG. 1, two sets of fibre optics are used to effect this gating, one set having its first ends (S1 to S5) opposite a light source at one margin of the sheet and its other ends (F1 to F5) adjacent the above mentioned light receivers (F1' to F5'). The said light receivers are constituted by first ends of the second set of fibre optics, the other ends (D1 to D5) of which provide light output for a detector at the other margins of the notes. An electronic gating system is also disclosed (FIG. 2).

A dispenser for playing cards includes a shoe adapted to contain stacked playing cards and dispense a single card at a time. The shoe includes a front wall adapted to conceal the leading card of the stack. A slot sized to permit a playing card to pass through is positioned adjacent the floor and front wall. The dispenser also includes a card pusher adapted to urge the stack cards down an inclined floor and a contact roller for dispensing cards. An endless belt located in an opening in the front wall engages the contact roller. The belt also securely engages a pair of inner rollers spaced by a predetermined distance such that displacement of the belt by the operator through the predetermined distance causes rotation of the contact roller to advance the leading card into and substantially out of the slot. The predetermined distance is preferably selected to approximate the distance which operators are accustomed to move the leading card when dealing the leading card from a manual shoe. In another embodiment, which permits a larger stack of cards to be loaded into the dispenser, the floor of the shoe contains an elongated aperture. The card pusher, which extends through the aperture, includes a pusher plate located above the floor for contacting the trailing card, and a weight located below the floor.