CA1064065A

CA1064065A - System and apparatus for the orientation and bidirectional feed of indicia bearing mail

Info

Publication number: CA1064065A
Application number: CA281,110A
Authority: CA
Inventors: Gerald C. Freeman; James F. Mahoney
Original assignee: Pitney Bowes Inc
Current assignee: Pitney Bowes Inc
Priority date: 1976-07-19
Filing date: 1977-06-21
Publication date: 1979-10-09
Also published as: US4119194A

Abstract

Abstract of the Disclosure A mail handling system and apparatus accepts randomly arranged mail, determines the location of postage indicia on individual pieces and feeds the pieces to separate conveyors in response to the determination of indicia location to orient the same and enables combining the conveyed mail pieces so that the indicia thereon appears entirely on one edge. Feed rollers singulate and feed randomly stacked mail past indicia detectors to a positionable chute-like receptacle which is positioned in response to the detection to eject and direct mail pieces to separate conveyors depending upon whether indicia is present adjacent the right or left edge of the piece as it is presented.
The conveyors unite to provide a mail output stream with all indicia either adjacent the leading or trailing edge of the moving piece. In the event that it is desired to have the indicia all adjacent either the upper or lower edge of each piece in the stream, it is possible to provide suitable detectors and a 180°
reversal station so that pieces having the indicia thereon in the "wrong" position may be inverted to bring all indicia into essential alignment.

Description

Background of the Invention This invention relates to mail handling systems and more particularly to systems and apparatus for ori~nt:ing and feeding postage indicia bearing mail for further processing such as facing and cancelling o~ postage.
Automated postal operations have utilized meehanized mail handling systems of varying complexities to convey, orient, and face individual pieces of mail for the cancellat.ion of postage indicia thereon. Pieces of mail, sueh as envelopes, having their longer edges aligned may nevertheless be randomly oriented with respeet to postage indicia so that the indicia may be earried on the front face or reverse ~ace, at the top or at the bottom, or adjacent the right or left edge of the.envelope. ~or convenient :.
eancelling of postage, the mail is desirably oxiented and "faced";
that is, all envelopes should be arranged with the postage indicia side facing the same direction when viewed to place the indicia . generally in the upper right corner of the envelope.
.S. Patent No. 2,929,490 (Stewart) issued March 22, 1960 discloses facing and stacking apparatus utilizing complex 20 meehanical and eleetrical signal operated pneumatic devices for postage indicia orientation. In U.S. Patent No. 3,140,780 (Richert et al) issued July 14, 1964 there is disclosed an article '!
eonveyi-ng system utilizing two branching conveying ehannels which receive articles from an input channel according to a distri~ut;.on -l determined by suction means eontained in drums rotating in the !i~ ' eonveying ehannels. U.S. Patent No. 3,698,538 tGroeber) issued Oetober 17, 1972 discloses a pneum~ic roll device for faeing a B singulated letter in response to a stamp detector.. Conveying

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means with tra~lsfer switch mechanisms as in U.S. Patent No.

3,612,2~9 (Schnelder) issued October 12, 1971 and sheet and card inverters as in U.S. Patent No. 3,523,6~7 (Petersen et al) issued August 11, 1970 are also known.
Thus, prior art attempts at providing systems for orienting and conveying mail bearing postage indicia have been many and varied. However, the desire to i.ncrease system reliability by minimizing the complexity of operating par-ts, such as are present in the electromechanical-pneumatic devices of the prior art, nevertheless exists.
Summar of the Invention Y __ .
.~ The present invention provides a system and apparatus for accepting randomly arranged mail, determining -the presence and location of postage indicia on the individual mail pieces and feeding the individual mail pieces bidirectionally in response to .. the determination of location of indicia to orient the same so that : all indicia appears either entirely on the leading edge or entirely : on the trailing edge of the conveyed mail pieces~
; The mail orienting and feeding apparatus of this invention ~ 20 singulakes randomly stacked indicia bearing mail pieces, the edges .~ of which have been registered against the side rail of a feed deck .
so that the location of the indicia is a predictable position, by ... .
~. receiving them vertically downward between feed and separation ~ xollers. Indicia detectors scan one edge of the single mail pieces .~ during their downward translation to detect whether or not there is .~ ~
: ~ postaye indicia, such as a stamp o~ postaye meter imprint, on that edge~.
: The mail yiece moves down further into a movable chute-like receptacle which is positionable to direct the mail piece to onveyors for further feeding in response to a signal ,~'.` .
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depending upon whether or not indicia is detected to be present on the edge.
The mail receptacle may advantageously be an open ended drop chute pivotable ~o ~ r of three positions:
neutral, in which the mail piece is ~ed into the chute from the feed roller and remains in the chute, and two opposed, ~ ~.9., front and rear, positions, in which ejection means -- contact the mail piece in the chute to propel the piece ; to either the left or to the right where further feed is continued by transport belts forming part of separate conveyors ~; aligned with that chute position. The conveyors unite intoa single conveyor so that the streams of mail pieces which have been ejected bidirectionally come together in an alignment such that the postage indicia are all present on the lead edge of the mail pieces, at either the top or bottom.
~ The ou~put of the orienting and bidirectional mail I feeding system and apparatus provides a stream of mail pieces having the indicia on either the top or bottom lead edge and therefore the output can be utilized in further mail handling and processing. Thus, the output ~ay be gated to either a bypass or to a 180 degree twist belt, upon signal rom-an indicia detector, to function as a letter facing achine~and may provide feed to an optical character recognition sy tem. Also tbe output of the orienting and bidirectional mail~feeding system and apparatus can be conveniently fed direc~ly into the facer machine of a facer-canceller apparatus containing an indicia detector and, since there is a bypass -.. , ;
and 180 degree twist belt betweea the facer and canceller ~achines, the output of the canceller machine con~titutes "
. ~ , both faced and cancelled mail.
Another advantage of the mail orienting and feeding system and apparatus of this invention is the provision of a minimum number of signal-operated parts which reduces the need for on-and-off operation of various drive components and provides also for a greater mechanical simplicity in the reduction of articulated and movable elements so that increased reliability is obtained.
While the orienting and feeding system and apparatus of this invention find advantageous utility in postal system mail handling, they are also useful for the processing of other flat, sheet-like articles having other types of indicia thereon and the latter are intended to be encompassed by the term "mail" as used herein.
Accordingly, a feature of this invention is the provision of a mail orienting and feeding system and apparatus for orienting randomly arranged mail and feeding it to provide a single mail stream with the postage indicia on individual pieces thereof all appearing at one edge.
In summary of the above, therefore, the present invention may be broadly defined as a mail handling apparatus comprising feeding means for individually feeding mail pieces to an indicia detection means for detecting the location of postage indicia on the mail pieces, receptacle means for receiving the mail pieces, the receptacle means being positionable to at least two positions aligned with two separate conveying means, and e~ection means operatively located at the receptacle means positions aligned with the conveying means for ejecting mail pieces from the receptacle means to direct them to the conveying means ak that position.

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Brief Description of _ e Draw.in~s FIGURE 1 is a top perspective schematic view of a mail orienting and feeding system and apparatus according to an embodiment of this invention;
FIGURE 2 is an enlarged perspective view of the mail orienting and feeding apparatus for directing the ~ail pieces ,' ' ' ' .
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shown as par~ of the system of FIGURE l;
FIGURE 3, appearing on the same sheet as Figure 1, is a side view, partly in section, of the mail piece chute receptacle of the apparatus shown in FIGU~ 2, showing its pivotable positions; and FIGURE 4 is a top perspective schematic view of a continuation of the output conveyor shown in FIGURE 1 further showing an envelope inverting means which provides an output of completely faced envelope.
; 10 Description of *he Preferred Embodiment FIGURE 1 schematically illustrates a mail orienting and feeding system 10 in which randomly stacked individual mail pieces, such as envelopes 2 and 6, are fed, in a mail feeding station 12, downward past an indicia detecting station 14 to a mail orienting station 16 from which they are either ejected to the right to a conveyor 18 or to the le~t to a conveyor 20 ~rom whence they are recombined into a slngle stream in an output conveyor 22.
Referring to FIGURES 1 and 2, there is shown a feed deck -30 on which is placed randomly stacked pieces o~ mail such as the envelopes 2 and 6. The feed deck 30 includes edge registration belts 32 which move in the direction of the arrows 34 in the plane of the feed deck 30 to urge the individual mail pieces against the side and fron-t registration walls, 36 and 38 respectively.
A mail orienting and ~eeding apparatus 40 is positioned beneath the ~eed deck 30. Individual mail pieces are fed downward from the eed deck 30 and into the auxiliary feed roller 42 .. ' ' ' .
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rotating in the direction of the arrow 44. I'he mail pieces are singulated by means of the feed roller 46 . .
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rotating in the ~irection of the arrow 48 and the reverse feed roller 50 rotaking in the direction shown by the arrow 52, in order to function as a separation roller to assure that the mail pieces are destacked singly, vertically downward.
A letter guide chute 54 guides the individual mail pieces past the indicia detectors 55 and 57 which determine whether or not there is postage indicia on the right edge of the mail pieces.
For purposes of clarity of illustration, means to support the feed deck, feed rollers and guide chute are not shown. ~Iowevert it will be understood that they may be suitably supported and driven as is knownl either as part of feed deck or by attachment to the frame 56 of the orienting and feeding apparatus 40.
After passing the indicia de.tectors 55 and 57, the mail ..
pieces move downward to the chute-like recep-tacle 58 which is pivotable about the shaft 60 mounted in pivot supports 62 secured to the frame 56.
The chute-like rece ~ cle 5B has longitudinaI side walls 59 and 61 extending between the open ends 63 and 65. A stepper motor 64 is mounted on the frame 56 and drives the arm 66 secured to the receptacle 58 for pivoting it -to any one of three positions.
The three positions which the chute-like receptacle 58 may assume are best seen in FIGURE 3. Thus, the a.rm 6~, when in the position shown.in F~GURE 2, permits the receptacle to remain in a central or neutral position in which the individual mail . pieces drop into it without further movement. When the stepper .. motor 64 receives a signal from ~ ' . ,.

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: : , : . , ~ , : i;, , , . . : . , .` ''' '' '. ~ ' ' ,. ~ ~ " , the indicia detectors 55 and 57 in response to the detection of the presence or absence of postage indicia on the right edge of the piece of mail, i~ operates to ac~ivate the arm 66 to swing the chute 58 to the forward position referred to as 58' in FIGURE 3. In this poc;ition the ejection drive belt 68 rotating on the rollers 70 in the direction shown by the arrow 72 projects through the slot 74 in the front side 59 of the receptacle 5~, as best seen in FIGURE 3, and frictionally contacts the mail piece therein to eject it to the right out through the open end 61 to tbe conveyor 18. When no indicia is detected on the right edge-of the mail piece thus indicating the indicia is located on the left edge, the stepper motor 64 swings the receptacle to the rear position shown as 58 " in FIGURE 3 where the ejection drive belt 76 rotating on the rollers 78 in a direction opposite to that of the arrow 72 projects through a slot 80 in the rear side 61 of the recep~acle 58 ~o contac~ mail pieces therein and eject them to the l~ft out through the open end 65 to the conveyor 20.
~ ~ The drive motor 82 for the ejection syste~ is secured , .. . .
to the frame 56 and through its drive pulley ~4 and the I drive belt 85, moving in ~he direction shown by the arrow .. 1 88, drives the ejection drive belt pulleys 70 and 78 continuously without the need for gear boxes or on and off operation in response to electrical signals.
Similar efficiency of operation can be provided for th~ co~eyors }8 and 2n since the conveyor belt pulleys 90 and 92 can obtain their drive directly from pick ofE
rollers, not shown, making contact with the ejaction system ,i ~ - ' :

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drive iE desired.
An illustration of the bidirectional feeding operation of the mail o~ienting and feeding system and app~ratus of this invention is shown in FIGURE 1. An individual piece of mail, the envelope 2, is shown ~ith postage indicia 4 on its front face in the upper right corner. ~hen the envelope 2 drops past the indicia detectors 55 and 57 into the receptacle 58, the ejection belt ~ ejects it to the right into the conveyor 18 ~here transport belts 17 convey it, now shown as envelope 2', to the output conveyor 22. However, an envelope 6, the rear of which faces forward so that the postage indicia ~ is adjacent the left edge on the reverse side as viewed in FIGURE 1, will be ejected to the left into the conveyor 20 where transport belts 1~ will convey it, now shown as envelope 6', to the output conveyor 22.
In the output conveyor 22 the output conveyor belts 21 convey a siDgle stream of envelopes, shown as 2" and 6'', which : now have their indicia all located on the leading edge.
In the event that an envelope was present in the stack 12 in an inverted condition with the postage indicia ~ , on the right edge reverse side it would be ejected to the right and conveyed to have its pos~age indicia on a leading edge although such indicia would be on the bottom, reverse ¦ of the envelopes 2'' and 6 " shown in FIGURE 1. In this I eve~t, the output conveyor 22 can be provided with further : -i indici? detectors which determine if the indicia is on tha top or bottom edge and thus generate signals operating gating mechanisms to provide a bypass for such an envelope or to pro-, vide means to invert the envelope 1~0 degrees to face it for _ 9 _ :; ~ ' ~,, , , :

:. : ~ 1 alignment with the others. For example, as shown in F~GURE

4, an indici.a detector 100 in the pa-th of the lower l~adi.ng edge of envelope 10~ will determine the presence of -the indicia in this loca-tion. Detector 100 will control gate 104 to direct the envelope to either a bypass conveyor 106 when in its solid line position or a 180 degree inverting means such as twist belt 108 when in its dotted line positionD Such a twist belt is shown in U~S. Patent 2,947,406 (Hazelton~ issued August 2, 1960. The bypass conveyor 106 and twist belt 108 then merge into a common feed path 110, providing a flow of envelopes all having their indicia located at a common position which could then serve as input for further processing, such as feed to an optical character recognition system for additional operations ~hat the user may desire.
Alternatively, the bypass conveyor 106 and twist belt 108 may be omitted and the outpt may go directly to a facer-canceller machine having facing and cancelling devices with a bypass and 180 degree twist belt between them and an ind.icia detector in each so that the final output constitutes a stream of faced and cancelled mail..

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Claims

We Claim:

1. A system for orienting randomly arranged pieces of mail bearing postage indicia at either the right or left edges thereof and feeding the oriented mail to provide a stream of mail in which all individual mall pieces have the postage indicia located at one edge comprising a mail feeding station having mail feeding means for feeding singulated pieces of mail to an indicia detection station, the indicia detection station having indicia detection means for detecting the location of postage indicia on the mail pieces, an orienting station having mail receptacle means for receiving indicia detected mail pieces, the receptacle means including positionable mail directing means positionable in response to a signal generated by the indicia detection means for directing the mail pieces to a predetermined one of a plurality of separate mail conveying means of a mail conveying station depending upon which edge bears the detected postage indicia, the separate mail conveying means including means for joining to provide a single stream of conveyed mail pieces in which all the postage indicia appears either entirely on the leading edge or entirely on the trailing edge of the mail pieces.

2. A system as claimed in claim 1 in which the mail directing means comprises a pivotably mounted chute-like receptacle, positioning means connected to the receptacle for pivotably positioning it to at least two positions, one of the positions causing the receptacle to be aligned with a first conveying means for directing mail pieces thereto, the other position causing the receptacle to be aligned with a second conveying means for directing mail pieces thereto and the position-ing means operatively positioning the receptacle in response to a signal from the indicia detection means so that mail pieces are directed to either one or the other of the conveying means depending upon whether the postage indicia is located on the right or left edge thereof.

3. A system as claimed in claim 2 in which the chute-like receptacle comprises a bottom support means for support-ing the mail pieces, side support means for supporting the mail pieces on their sides between the right and left edges, the side support means extending between open ends through which the mail pieces are directed and has operatively associated therewith ejection means for ejecting the mail pieces through either end depending upon the position of the receptacle.

4. A system as claimed in claim 1 further including a second indicia detection station having indicia detection means for detecting the location of postage indicia on the joined single stream of mail pieces, a gating station having mail directing gating means to gate the mail pieces to either a bypass or to a 180 degree twist means in response to a signal generated by the second indicia station detection means to provide a stream of faced mail pieces.

5. A mail handling apparatus comprising feeding means for individually feeding mail pieces to an indicia detection means for detecting the location of postage indicia on the mail pieces, receptacle means for receiving the mail pieces, the receptacle means being positionable to at least two positions aligned with two separate conveying means, and ejection means operatively located at the receptacle means positions aligned with the conveying means for ejecting mail pieces from the receptacle means to direct them to the conveying means at that position.

6. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 5 in which the receptacle means comprises an open top chute having a bottom support means for supporting the mail pieces, side support means for supporting the mail pieces on their sides between their right and left edges, the side support means extending between open ends through which the mail pieces are directed, the ejection means comprises at least a pair of mail piece engaging rotating means which project through openings in the side support means to engage mail pieces in the receptacle and frictionally direct them to the conveying means, one of the pair of rotating means being located on the side of the receptacle at one of the receptacle positions aligned with the one conveying means and the other being located at the other conveying means aligned position in a manner such that effective engagement with a mail piece occurs for that rotating means only when the receptacle is in a position proximate to the rotating means.

7. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 6 wherein the rotating means rotate in directions opposite to one another so that mail pieces are directed out of the receptacle means in opposite directions.

8. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 7 wherein the rotating means comprises endless belts.

9. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 8 wherein the rotating ejection means and the conveying means are all directly driven by a single power drive source.

10. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 6 wherein the receptacle means is pivotably supported and further comprising actuation means joined to the receptacle means for pivotably positioning it for directing the mail pieces, the actuating means acting in response to a signal from the indicia detection means to position the receptacle means in different positions aligned with the conveying means depending upon whether the postage indicia is detected as being located on the right edge or the left edge of the mail piece.

11. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 10 wherein the feeding means comprises a pair of feed rollers between which the mail pieces pass, the feed rollers including means for rotating them in directions opposite to one another so that one roller rotates in a direction opposite to the direction of the other to separate the mail pieces received therebetween and singulate them.

12. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 5 wherein the indicia detection means comprises a pair of indicia detectors positioned opposed to one another for mail pieces to pass between them and located to detect the presence or absence of postage indicia along one edge of the mail piece only.

13. A mail handling apparatus for feeding mail pieces in opposite directions according to the location of postal indicia thereupon comprising:
A. an indicia detection station including means for detecting the location of postage indicia on each mail piece;
B. feeding means to feed individual mail pieces to said indicia detection station;
C. two separate conveyor means each located adjacent opposite sides of said indicia detection station;
and D. ejection means operatively located at said indicia detection station for ejecting individual mail pieces to a selected one of said adjacent conveyor means, said selected conveyor means being determined by said indicia detection means;
whereby individual mail pieces are presented to an indicia detection means and the location of the indicia on the piece is determined and ejection means controlled by said indicia detector ejects the mail piece to either a right or left conveyor depending upon the location of the indicia.

14. The apparatus of claim 13 wherein the two separate conveyor means includes means for joining to provide a single stream of conveyed mail pieces in which all the postage indicia appears either entirely on the leading edge or entirely on the trailing edge of the mail pieces.

15. A mail handling apparatus for feeding mail pieces according to the location of postal indicia thereupon comprising:
A. feeding means for individually feeding mail pieces;

B. a chute-like receptacle means located below said feeding means for receiving mail pieces from said feeding means, said receptacle means being positionable to at least two positions aligned with two separate conveying means each located adjacent opposite sides of said receptacle means;
C. an indicia detection means located between said feeding means and said receptacle for detecting the location of postage indicia on the mail pieces and for controlling the positioning of said receptacle means; and D. ejection means operatively located at each position of said receptacle means for ejecting mail pieces from the receptacle means to one of the aligned conveyor means.

16. A mail handling apparatus for feeding envelope mail pieces according to the location of postal indicia thereupon comprising:
A. feeding means for individually feeding mail pieces in a downward direction;
B. a chute-like receptacle means located directly below said feeding means for receiving mail pieces fed down-wardly from said feeding means, said receptacle means being positionable to at least two positions;
C. a first conveyor means commencing adjacent one end of said receptacle and aligned with one of said receptacle positions;
D. a second conveyor means commencing adjacent the other end of said receptacle and aligned with said other receptacle position.
E. an indicia detection means located between said feeding means and said receptacle for detecting the location of postable indicia on each mail piece fed thereby and for controlling the positioning of said receptacle means; and F. ejection means operatively located at each position of said receptacle means for ejecting each mail piece from the receptacle means to one of the aligned conveyor means.

17. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 16 in which the receptacle means comprises an open top chute having a bottom support means for supporting the mail pieces, side support means for supporting the mail pieces on their sides between their right and left edges, the side support means extending between open ends through which the mail pieces are directed, the ejection means comprises at least a pair of mail piece engaging rotating means which project through openings in the side support means to engage mail pieces in the receptacle and frictionally direct them to the conveying means, one of the pair of rotating means being located on the side of the receptacle at one of the receptacle positions aligned with the one conveying means and the other being located at the other conveying means aligned position in a manner such that effective engagement with a mail piece occurs for that rotating means only wheel the receptacle is in a position proximate to the rotating means.

18. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 17 wherein the rotating means both rotate in the same direction so that mail pieces are directed out of the receptacle means in opposite directions.

19. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 19 wherein the rotating means comprises endless belts.

20. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 19 wherein the rotating ejection means and the conveying means are all directly driven by a single power drive source.

21. A mail handling apparatus as claimed in claim 17 wherein the receptacle means is pivotably supported and further comprising actuation means joined to the receptacle means for pivotably positioning it for directing the mail pieces, the actuating means acting in response to a signal from the indicia detection means to position the receptacle means in different positions aligned with the conveying means depending upon whether the postage indicia is detected as being located on the right edge or the left edge of the mail piece.