An edge aligner/holder 10 having an edge aligner 30 with a resilient front end 32 and a tail piece 34 cooperatively interengaged with a reciprocating mechanism 36, and having a holder 20 with at least one rest 23 and one backstop 24, the holder 20 mounted above said front end 32 on said edge aligner 30. The resilient front end 32 of the edge aligner 30 holds a job stack 2 containing sheets which already have been piled in alignment when the edge aligner 30 is in its forward position, while at the same time holding the trailing edge of a next sheet 3, the leading edge of which sheet has already been deposited upon the job stack 2, so that the offset movement of this next sheet 3 may be accomplished without disturbing the alignment and piling of the job stack 2 immediately below it. The edge aligner/holder 10 is then reciprocated to a rearward position to drop the trailing edge of the sheet 3 to allow the sheet 3 to join the job stack 2 while at the same time withdrawing the edge aligner 30 from contact with the job stack 2. The operational cycle is then repeated for each additional next sheet 3 fed onto the job stack 2.
The sheet stacking-aligning apparatus or the sheet processing apparatus includes a substantially horizontal stacking tray, a rear end aligning unit for aligning a rear end of a sheet bundle on the stacking tray, and a control unit for controlling an operation of the rear end aligning unit for aligning the sheet bundle when it is in an upstream position of the stacking tray, and the stacking tray is provided substantially horizontally. It is thus made possible to increase the stacking space, thereby increasing the number of stackable sheets and to achieve the alignment of the rear end of the sheet bundle with a simple configuration, thereby improving the stacking-aligning property of the sheet bundle on the stacking tray.
The sheet stacking-aligning apparatus or the sheet processing apparatus includes a substantially horizontal stacking tray, a rear end aligning unit for aligning a rear end of a sheet bundle on the stacking tray, and a control unit for controlling an operation of the rear end aligning unit for aligning the sheet bundle when it is in an upstream position of the stacking tray, and the stacking tray is provided substantially horizontally. It is thus made possible to increase the stacking space, thereby increasing the number of stackable sheets and to achieve the alignment of the rear end of the sheet bundle with a simple configuration, thereby improving the stacking-aligning property of the sheet bundle on the stacking tray.
In a device that ejects one or more sheets of media to a moveable, remote output storage location, a method and apparatus for improving output stack quality is described. An invented stack holder holds previously-ejected sheets in place, so that the ejection of a newly-accumulated job does not cause misalignment of the stack by pushing the paper that it contacts during its movement. The preferred stack holder(s) each have an arm that extends down from a part of an accumulator and have a friction pad or area near its end. The system logic causes the stack tray to move up until the top of the output stack is sensed to be at a location that means it is abutting against the stack holder(s). In this position, the stack holder(s) place enough downward pressure on the top sheets of the output stack to hold the top sheets in place while an accumulated job is rejected onto the output stack. The stack tray logic then moves the tray down away from the stack holder at the appropriate time at the end of the ejection of the accumulated job, so that the stack tray and its stack do not touch the stack holders and, hence, do not interfere with operation of the accumulator. Simultaneously or immediately after the stack tray moves downward, the accumulators off-setters return to their home position to move the stack holders laterally away from the stacked and ejected media and to complete the end of ejection of an accumulated job.
The sheet stacking-aligning apparatus or the sheet processing apparatus includes a substantially horizontal stacking tray, a rear end aligning unit for aligning a rear end of a sheet bundle on the stacking tray, and a control unit for controlling an operation of the rear end aligning unit for aligning the sheet bundle when it is in an upstream position of the stacking tray, and the stacking tray is provided substantially horizontally. It is thus made possible to increase the stacking space, thereby increasing the number of stackable sheets and to achieve the alignment of the rear end of the sheet bundle with a simple configuration, thereby improving the stacking-aligning property of the sheet bundle on the stacking tray.
A tamping mechanism for tamping the edge of sheets in a stack including a tamping assembly having a tamping blade. The tamping blade is positioned adjacent an edge of a stack of sheets and is moved toward and away from the edge. Magnets are provided to move the tamping blade toward and away from the edge. The tamping blade has one magnet and another magnet is movable into and out of magnetic interaction of the said first magnet. The second magnet is in a wheel adjacent tamping blade. The wheel has a plurality of magnets and is rotated so that the magnets in the wheel are moved into and out of magnetic interaction with the magnet in the tamping blade.