Sheet Feeders

摘要

A sheet feeder comprises a feed deck for supporting a stack of sheets (65) to be fed. The feed deck may be formed by a bed of freely spinning rollers. A feed block (62) comprises a friction pad (66) that projects from the bottom of the feed block (62) towards a drive belt (42) to define a gate therebetween. The drive belt (42) frictionally engages the underside of a bottom sheet of the stack (65) and urges the sheet towards the gate. The feed block (62) comprises a front face (72) immediately upstream from the gate, which is inclined at a sharp angle to the feed direction. The friction pad (66) comprises a lower face that is substantially parallel to the feed direction and does not intersect the plane of the feed block front face (72).

主权项

1. A sheet feeder comprising:
a feed deck for supporting a stack of sheets to be fed; a feed block; a drive belt for frictionally engaging the underside of a bottom sheet of the stack and urging the sheet below the feed block along a feed direction; wherein the feed block comprises:
a friction pad that projects from the bottom of the feed block towards the drive belt to define a gate therebetween; anda first front face immediately upstream from the gate, the first front face defining a plane inclined at a first angle to the feed direction;wherein the friction pad does not intersect the plane of the first front face.