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Retard feeder with pivotal nudger ski for reduced smudge

  • US 5,004,218 A
  • Filed: 02/06/1990
  • Issued: 04/02/1991
  • Est. Priority Date: 02/06/1990
  • Status: Expired due to Fees
First Claim
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1. In a retard type sheet separating and feeding apparatus for separating and sequentially feeding individual sheets of paper or the like from the bottom of a sheet stack in a sheet feeding direction through a sheet feeding path including a retard nip defined by a retard member and an opposing frictional bottom sheet feeding member engaging the bottom of the stack, assisted by a normal force applying member for pressing on the top of the stack with a normal force, the improvement wherein:

  • said normal force applying member comprises a ski member with a relatively large and substantially planar stack engagement ski area, and a ski pivotal mounting system providing vertical movement of said ski into pressing engagement of said ski area with the top of the stack with a normal force perpendicular said sheet feeding path in response to the loading of a sheet stack into said sheet separating and feeding apparatus,said ski pivotal mounting system also providing self-adjusting tilting of said ski area about orthogonal axes of movement for self-leveling of said ski area relative to said sheet feeding path to allow said ski to adjust to different stack heights and to maintain adequate total normal force while preventing high pressure concentrations which could increase smearing by providing a large ski area of contact with evenly applied low pressure thereover,wherein said ski pivotal mounting system includes a pivoted actuating arm, and wherein said normal force applying ski member is mounted to the end of said pivoted actuating arm by a dual axis gimbaled mounting allowing said ski member to freely self-level by said pressing engagement with the top of the sheet stack for uniformly normal distributed application of said normal force thereto.

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