A contact-and-separation system includes a first roller, a second roller, and a contact-and-separation device. The first roller contacts a belt. The second roller is opposed to the first roller. The contact-and-separation device contacts or separates the belt to or from the second roller via a sheet conveyed. The contact-and-separation device includes an eccentric cam, a motor, and a circuitry. The eccentric cam is mounted on an end of a rotation shaft of the first roller. The motor rotates the eccentric cam. The circuitry controls the motor to rotate the eccentric cam to contact or separate the belt to or from the second roller via the sheet conveyed. The circuitry controls the motor to decelerate a rotation speed of the motor on contact or separation of the belt to or from the second roller between the first roller and the second roller.

A drive unit includes a drive source and a driving force transmitter that includes a plurality of rotators, an endless belt stretched by the plurality of rotators, a pressing member to press the endless belt, a first support shaft, a first link member to hold the pressing member, a second support shaft, a second link member to press the first link member, a biasing member to bias the second link member. A relation of L1 to L2 satisfies L1>L2, where L1 denotes a distance between the second support shaft and a biasing position and L2 denotes a distance between the second support shaft and a first pressing position. A relation of L3 to L4 satisfies L3>L4, where L3 denotes a distance between the first support shaft and the pressing position and L4 denotes a distance between the first support shaft and a second pressing position.

The belt conveyor device includes an endless belt, a pair of biasing members, a pair of tension arms, and a correction mechanism. The pair of biasing members bias a tension roller in such a direction as to heighten tension of the belt. The pair of tension arms retain the tension roller and the pair of biasing members, and are swingably supported by a pair of arm support portions of the casing. The pair of biasing members bias a shaft portion of the tension roller in such a direction as to make the shaft portion farther from the pair of arm support portions. The arm support portions are placed above the shaft portion of the tension roller.

A sheet stacking system for transporting sheets and depositing them in a stack includes a layboy, a transport conveyor downstream of the layboy, and a main conveyor downstream of the transport conveyor, the main conveyor having a frame and being supported by a conveyor support, a discharge end of the main conveyor being movable between a lowered position and a raised position relative to the conveyor support. The main conveyor intake end is configured to move from a first position when the main conveyor discharge end is in the lowered position to a second position when the main conveyor discharge end is in the raised position, and also a variable length conveyor between the transport conveyor and the main conveyor, the variable length conveyor having a discharge end connected to and movable with the main conveyor intake end and movable relative to the transport conveyor discharge end.

A belt device for an image forming apparatus, includes an endless belt; a first and second support rollers, each including a rotary shaft, that support the belt with tension; a contacted member that contacts the belt; a shaft displacement device to displace any of the rotary shafts of the support rollers; and a main rotary shaft disposed at a side of the rotary shaft of the first support roller moved by the shaft displacement device along a stretching direction of the stretched surface of the endless belt that the contacted member contacts, relative to a contact portion between the endless belt and the contacted member, and at an opposite side of the contacted member in a direction perpendicular to the stretching direction of the endless belt. As the first support roller and the second roller rotate about the main rotary shaft, the endless belt is separated from the contacted member.

A sheet feeding apparatus includes a first and second electrode elements arranged on an attracting member, including a plurality of attracting force generation electrodes and power feeding electrodes corresponding to the respective attracting force generation electrodes. The attracting force generation electrodes of the first and second electrode elements are alternately arranged. Further, the sheet feeding apparatus includes a power feeding brush arranged at a position different from an attracting position and capable of supplying voltages to the electrode elements, respectively, and a neutralization roller pair arranged at a position different from the attracting position and the power feeding brush and configured to be brought into contact with the electrode elements to remove a residual charge on the attracting member. With this, decrease in productivity is prevented by enabling both of the generation of the electrostatic attracting force and the neutralization without control of switching between power feeding and neutralization.

An apparatus and a corresponding method for singling value documents, in particular banknotes, includes a support means and a conveyor belt for picking a single value document from a stack of value documents lying on the support means. The singling device has a positioning device by which at least a portion of the conveyor belt can be moved back and forth relative to the support means between a first position and a second position. In the first position the conveyor belt cannot touch the stack lying on the support means. In the second position the conveyor belt can touch the lowermost value document of a stack lying on the support means and pick the former from the stack at least partially.

A sheet storage that stores a sheet includes: a reel around which a tape is wound; a first drive unit that rotates the reel around a rotation axis; a drum that is connected to the reel via the tape and winds the tape wound around the reel together with the sheet; a second drive unit that rotates the drum around a rotation axis; and a control circuitry that controls at least one of the first drive unit and/or the second drive unit to change tension acting on the tape according to a state of the sheet storage.

A sheet stacking system for transporting sheets and depositing them in a stack includes a layboy, a transport conveyor downstream of the layboy, and a main conveyor downstream of the transport conveyor, the main conveyor having a frame and being supported by a conveyor support, a discharge end of the main conveyor being movable between a lowered position and a raised position relative to the conveyor support. The main conveyor intake end is configured to move from a first position when the main conveyor discharge end is in the lowered position to a second position when the main conveyor discharge end is in the raised position, and also a variable length conveyor between the transport conveyor and the main conveyor, the variable length conveyor having a discharge end connected to and movable with the main conveyor intake end and movable relative to the transport conveyor discharge end.

A conveyor includes a plurality of belt support assemblies each having a drive wheel assembly at one end and an idler wheel assembly at the other end. Each of the drive and idler wheel assemblies includes a motion converter for converting the rotational movement of a shaft into linear motion along the shaft and an actuator for selectively engaging the motion converter and the shaft. A controller controls the operation of the shafts and the actuators to selectively and individually control the location of each end of each belt assembly relative to one another and to a centerline of the conveyor.