The disclosure relates to a device for producing cut objects. A dye-sublimation thermal printer prints a printing pattern onto a printing substrate and outputs the latter. A cutting apparatus cuts the printing substrate along a cutting pattern, wherein the cutting apparatus comprises a cutting unit and a moving unit for moving the printing substrate during cutting. The dye-sublimation thermal printer is adapted to print the printing substrate in such a way that the outputted printing substrate has a printed area in which printing has occurred and a non-printed area in which printing has not occurred, wherein the printed area and the non-printed area are successively arranged and the dimension of the non-printed area in the arrangement direction is at least equal to a distance between the cutting unit and the first moving unit.

A conveying device includes a sheet conveyor configured to convey a medium in a conveyance direction of the medium, a sheet winder including a winding roller and a winding motor, and circuitry to control the sheet conveyor and the sheet winder. The circuitry is configured to convey the medium intermittently while repeating: causing the sheet conveyor and the sheet winder to convey the loosened medium by a predetermined conveyance amount; rotating the winding motor in a normal direction by a predetermined torque according to an outer winding diameter of the medium to apply a predetermined tension force to the medium; and rotating the winding motor in a reverse direction to loosen the medium by a predetermined slack amount. The circuitry is configured to determine the predetermined tension force according to the width of the medium intersecting with the conveyance direction of the medium.

A medium conveying apparatus includes a first conveying path, a second conveying path that is connected to the first conveying path, a third conveying path that is connected to the first conveying path and the second conveying path, and a skew corrector that blocks a first space between the first conveying path and the second conveying path when a medium conveyed along the first conveying path is skewed, and retreats from the first space when the medium is not skewed, wherein the skew corrector retreats from a second space between the second conveying path and the third conveying path when blocking the first space, and blocks the third space between the first conveying path and the third conveying path when retreating from the first space.

In order to enable a sheet end portion to be properly guided to a nip portion in performing folding processing a plurality of times, provided are a transport path including a guide face to guide a transported sheet, a rotating body pair which nips the sheet transported to the transport path by a nip portion to rotate, a folding blade that pushes the sheet to the nip portion of the rotating body pair, and a blade guide member including a guide portion for pushing one end of the sheet to the nip portion when the folding blade pushes the sheet to the nip portion, and a shift section that shifts the folding blade and the blade guide member in a push direction for pushing to the nip portion and in a return direction opposite to the push direction.

A magnetic ink reading device includes a housing having a slot through which a medium is inserted, a roller driven by a motor by which the medium is conveyed along a conveyance path, one or more sensors arranged along the conveyance path and configured to detect the medium at one or more respective positions, a magnetic head configured to read a magnetic pattern formed on the medium with magnetic ink, and a controller. The controller is configured to control the motor to convey the medium inserted through the slot, measure a length in a conveyance direction of the medium using outputs from the sensors, and control the magnetic head to read the magnetic pattern from the medium while controlling the motor to continuously convey the medium for a period corresponding to the measured length.

A sheet discharge apparatus includes a first tray for stacking sheets, and a sheet bundle forming unit that forms a sheet bundle on the first tray. The sheet bundle forming unit forms a first sheet bundle on the first tray, and forms a second sheet bundle on the first sheet bundle to be offset from the first sheet bundle. When forming each of the first sheet bundle and the second sheet bundle on the first tray, the sheet bundle forming unit divides sheets constituting each of the sheet bundles into a plurality of sets and discharges the sheets in a plurality of times for each sheet bundle. A number of sheets included in a first sheet set of the first sheet bundle is set smaller than a number of sheets included in a first sheet set of the second sheet bundle.

A sheet feeding device includes a support, a rotation driver, a guide, a support shaft, a biasing member, a leading end sensor, a roller, an outer diameter sensor, and circuitry. The circuitry causes the rotation driver to rotate a spool in a winding direction to determine a timing at which a signal change rate exceeds a change rate threshold as a passing time at which a leading end of a continuous sheet passes through the leading end sensor, causes the rotation driver to rotate the spool by a rotation angle in the winding direction, from the passing time, to position the leading end of the continuous sheet at a feeding start position, and rotates the spool in a feeding direction to feed the continuous sheet from the feeding start position along a guide portion. Further, the circuitry changes the change rate threshold based on an outer diameter of a roll.

A medium conveyance route switching device includes: a support unit located at a branching point where conveyance directions of a medium converge in three directions; a gate assembly including a plurality of gates to guide at the branching point the medium to different conveyance paths; and a rotation mechanism configured to selectively rotate the plurality of gates. The support unit includes: a first support piece having a first through-hole portion; a second support piece having a second through-hole portion; a third support piece having a third through-hole portion; a first bending connection portion rotatably connecting one end of the first support piece and the second support piece; a second bending connection portion rotatably connecting the other end of the first support piece and the third support piece; and a fixing shaft inserted into the first through-hole portion, the second through-hole portion, and the third through-hole portion.

A sheet post-processing apparatus that performs post-processing on a sheet on which an image is formed includes: a punch hole forming portion; and a sheet bundle forming portion that has a conveyance portion, stops a first sheet on a conveyance path, and conveys a second sheet after the first sheet to a position overlapping the first sheet to form a sheet bundle. The sheet post-processing apparatus includes a shift portion to make a shift so that a relative position between the first sheet and the second sheet in a direction orthogonal to a conveyance direction becomes a relative position at which the second sheet does not overlap a punch hole of the first sheet to make the second sheet overlap the first sheet, and forms a sheet bundle in which sheets overlapped with each other are deviated in a width direction.

A sheet folding apparatus includes a folding roller pair that forms a first fold line owing to that the folding roller pair nips a first position of the sheet, which has a loop to be formed on an upstream side of the folding roller pair due to continuous conveyance of the sheet by a conveyance roller pair in a stopped state in which a front end of the sheet being conveyed from the conveyance roller pair is nipped by the folding roller pair, as starting conveyance of the sheet while a pushing plate is pushing the sheet and moving toward the folding roller pair, and thereafter, forms a second fold line owing to that the folding roller pair nips a second position of the sheet with the loop formed as aligning with a rear end of the sheet.