JPH0516672Y2 - - Google Patents

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] [Industrial field of application] The present invention is a cassette mounting device that is most suitable for application to, for example, a front-loading type cassette-type VCR.
This invention relates to a device that allows different types of cassettes to be selectively installed.

[Summary of the idea]

The present invention allows two types of cassettes, large and small, to be selectively inserted into a cassette holder through a cassette insertion slot provided on a front panel, and the inserted cassettes are guided to the cassette by a guide rail provided on the cassette holder. In a cassette loading device configured to be positioned within a holder, a small cassette guide is provided between the front panel and the cassette holder, and the small cassette guide is moved to a non-operating position when a large cassette is inserted;
To improve the ease of inserting a small cassette without causing any adverse effects when inserting a large cassette by configuring the small cassette to be in an operating position and guided to the guide rail when the small cassette is inserted. It was made so that it could be done.

[Conventional technology]

Regarding a cassette mounting device that allows selective use of two types of cassettes, large and small, for example, the patent application filed in 1983 by the present applicant
Devices such as those described in US Pat. No. 2,328,62 exist.

The device has a cassette insertion slot on the front panel into which large and small cassettes can be selectively inserted, and holds the cassette inserted through the cassette insertion slot and moves it back and forth between the cassette insertion position and the cassette mounting position. The cassette holder has a movable cassette holder, and a pair of left and right guide rails are provided on the bottom plate of the cassette holder to guide the small cassette to a predetermined position on the cassette holder.

Two types of cassettes, large and small, are selectively inserted into the cassette holder from the cassette insertion slot.
At this time, the large cassette is inserted into the cassette holder while its position in the left and right direction is restricted on both sides of the cassette insertion opening. A pair of guide rails within the cassette holder are inserted relatively into a pair of guide grooves provided at the bottom of the large cassette to guide the large cassette to a predetermined position within the cassette holder.

On the other hand, the small cassette is inserted between the pair of guide rails, and guided while being regulated by the inner side of the pair of guide rails on both left and right sides of the small cassette,
is positioned in a predetermined position within the cassette holder.

[Problem that the invention attempts to solve]

According to the above device, the large cassette is inserted into the cassette holder while its position is restricted in the left and right direction on both sides of the cassette insertion opening, so it is difficult to insert the guide rail in the cassette holder into the guide groove of the large cassette. No special positioning required. In other words, simply by inserting the large cassette into the cassette holder through the cassette insertion slot, the guide rail inside the cassette holder will naturally be relatively inserted into the guide groove at the bottom of the large cassette, allowing the guide rail to guide the large cassette. Can receive.

On the other hand, a small cassette is inserted and guided between a pair of guide rails as described above, but since the width of the small cassette is narrower than the width of the cassette insertion slot, it cannot be inserted into the cassette insertion slot like a large cassette. Positioning in the left and right directions is not regulated. Therefore, in the case of a small cassette, it is necessary for the user to position the small cassette at a position corresponding to the pair of guide rails and then insert the small cassette into the cassette holder. However, since the guide rails are provided on the bottom plate of the cassette holder, they are difficult to see from the outside, and in order to insert a small cassette between a pair of guide rails, it is necessary to locate the guide rails inside the cassette holder from the cassette insertion opening. It is necessary to check the cassette while inserting the cassette, and if the device has an opening/closing door attached to the cassette insertion slot, it is necessary to insert the cassette while relying on the feeling of the hand holding the cassette. Therefore, the small cassette cannot be easily adapted to the guide rail. Further, since there is a distance from the front panel to the guide rail, the small cassette to be inserted is likely to become misaligned with respect to the guide rail before it reaches the guide rail.

If a small cassette is incorrectly inserted out of position from the guide rail, the small cassette may ride on the guide rail, making it impossible to remove the small cassette from the cassette holder, or damaging the small cassette or the cassette loading device. or

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to provide a cassette mounting device equipped with a small cassette guide that can improve the ease of inserting a small cassette without causing any adverse effects when inserting a large cassette.

[Means for solving problems]

The present invention provides the above-mentioned cassette loading device with a small cassette guide provided between the front panel and the cassette holder, and a position where the small cassette guide is inserted into the insertion passage for the large and small cassettes and an operating position outside the insertion passage. The small cassette guide is configured to be movable between a non-operating position and a non-operating position, and is provided with an urging means for urging the small cassette guide to move to the operating position, so that when a large cassette is inserted from the cassette insertion opening, , the small cassette guide is pressed against the urging means by the large cassette so as to escape to the non-operating position, and when the small cassette is inserted from the cassette insertion opening, the urging means The small cassette guide is held in the operating position by the small cassette guide, and the small cassette is guided to the guide rail of the cassette holder by a small cassette guide surface provided on the small cassette guide. .

[Effect]

According to the present invention, when inserting a large cassette, the small cassette guide is moved to the non-operating position.
The small cassette guide does not have any adverse effect on the insertion of the large cassette. However, when inserting a small cassette, the small cassette guide can reliably guide the inserted small cassette to the guide rail of the cassette holder between the front panel and the cassette holder, preventing the small cassette from slipping from the guide rail. The small cassette can always be correctly and easily inserted into the cassette holder without being incorrectly inserted into the correct position.

〔Example〕

The following is a cassette type device that can use two types of cassettes of different sizes according to the present invention.
An embodiment applied to a VTR cassette mounting device will be described with reference to the drawings.

As shown in FIG. 1, a substantially rectangular cassette insertion opening 2 is provided in a front panel 1 of the cassette loading device. The width of the cassette insertion slot 2 is shown by a dashed line and a solid line, and is formed to be approximately the same as the width of the large cassette 3 of the large and small cassettes 3 and 4 that are selectively inserted. A cassette holder 6 having a width corresponding to the width of the large cassette 3 and into which large and small cassettes 3 and 4 are selectively inserted is provided inside the front panel 1.

As shown in FIGS. 1 and 7, the cassette holder 6 has three guide rollers 7 attached to its left and right side plates 6a, and a pair of left and right holder support plates fixed vertically on the chassis. It is supported by being loosely fitted into three approximately L-shaped guide grooves 9 provided at 8. The cassette holder 6 is driven by its drive mechanism (not shown) to a cassette insertion position opposite to the cassette insertion opening 2 of the front panel 1, and a cassette installation position located below and behind the twist. It is configured to be able to freely reciprocate along the guide groove 9 in the directions of arrows a and b in FIG. After the large and small cassettes 3 and 4 are selectively inserted from the direction of arrow c in FIG. 6
from the cassette insertion position to the cassette mounting position.
The large and small cassettes 3 and 3 are moved forward in the direction of arrow a in the figure.
4 is configured to be selectively mounted on a reel stand or the like provided at the cassette mounting position.

Next, as shown in FIGS. 1 and 7, a pair of left and right guide rails 11 are arranged on the upper part of the bottom plate 6b of the cassette holder 6, with the guide rails 11 being distributed left and right with respect to the lateral center of the cassette holder 6. are arranged in parallel. Note that both guide rails 11 are molded from synthetic resin, and are each screwed onto the bottom plate 6b with a plurality of screws 12. A pair of inner surfaces of both guide rails 11 constitute positioning reference surfaces 13 for the large and small cassettes 3 and 4. Note that there is a guide surface 1 at the end of both positioning reference surfaces 13 on the front panel 1 side.
4 is formed.

As shown by the solid line in FIG. 1, when the small cassette 4 is inserted parallel to the cassette holder 6 from the cassette insertion opening 2 in the direction of the arrow c into the cassette holder 6 which has been returned to the cassette insertion position, the small cassette 4 is The small cassette 4 is inserted between the guide rails 11 while being guided by the guide surface 14, and the left and right side surfaces 4a of the small cassette 4 are regulated by the positioning reference surfaces 13 and positioned in the left-right direction.

On the other hand, when the large cassette 3 is similarly inserted into the cassette holder 6 from the direction of arrow c, as shown by the dashed line in FIG. Both guide rails 11 are relatively inserted into the guide grooves (not shown), and the inner surfaces of both guide grooves (not shown) are regulated by both positioning reference surfaces 13 to position the guide grooves (not shown) in the left-right direction. Note that the large and small cassettes 3 and 4 selectively inserted into the cassette holder 6 are attached to the front surface 3a,
4b is brought into contact with an insertion stopper 15 provided on the bottom plate 6b to be positioned in the front-rear direction.

Next, the small cassette guide will be explained with reference to FIGS. 1 to 6.

First, as shown in Figure 2, the small cassette guide 1
6, a base portion 16a and a tip portion 16b having a substantially L-shaped planar shape are integrally molded from synthetic resin. The tip portion 16b has a small cassette guide surface 17, a large cassette guide surface 18, a small cassette receiving surface 19 provided between these, and a large cassette receiving surface 19 provided on the opposite side of the small cassette receiving surface 19. A cassette abutment surface 20 is provided.

Next, as shown in FIG. 3, a pair of left and right small cassette guides 16 formed in a symmetrical shape are arranged between the lower edge 1a of the cassette insertion opening 2 of the front panel 1 and the bottom plate 6b of the cassette holder 6. The bases 16a of both small cassette guides 16 are rotated as shown in FIGS. 3 to 6 on a fulcrum shaft 22 horizontally installed between a pair of left and right guide support plates 21 fixed vertically on the chassis. It is mounted so that it can move freely. Therefore, these two small cassette guides 16 are connected to the tip portions 1 of these small cassette guides 16 as shown by solid lines in FIGS.
6b is inserted from below into the insertion passage 23 for large and small cassettes 3 and 4 between the cassette insertion opening 2 and the cassette holder 6, and from below the insertion passage 23 as shown by the dashed line in FIG. It is configured to be freely rotatable in the directions of arrows d and e between the non-operating position and the non-operating position. As shown in FIG. 4, these small cassette guides 16 are supported by a pair of left and right torsion coil springs 24 which are biasing means fitted to a fulcrum shaft 22.
The protrusions 25 provided on both the small cassette guides 16 are urged to rotate in the direction of the arrow d to the operating position by the guide support plates 21 as shown by solid lines in FIG.
arrow d on the pair of left and right stoppers 26 provided in the
It is configured to abut from the direction.

Then, the substantially L-shaped tip portions 16b of both small cassette guides 16 that have been rotated to the operating position are
As shown in the figure, the cassette insertion slot 2 of the front panel 1
The lower edge 1a of FIG. 3 and the bottom plate 6b of the cassette holder 6
Notches 27, 28 formed in an approximately L shape between
Both small cassette guides 1 are inserted from below into the
A pair of left and right small cassette guide surfaces 17 of No. 6 are disposed at a front position (a position in the direction of arrow f) of a pair of left and right guide rails 11 and are symmetrically inclined at a predetermined angle θ with respect to both positioning reference surfaces 13. be done.

Next, the operation of guiding the small cassette 4 by the small cassette guide 16 will be explained.

First, as shown by the two-dot chain line in FIG.
When the small cassette 4 is inserted from the direction of arrow c, one side 4a of the small cassette 4 comes into contact with the small cassette guide surface 17 of one of the small cassette guides 16, and the small cassette guide surface 17 The cassette 4 is guided in the direction of arrow c', and the small cassette 4 is correctly, easily and smoothly inserted between both guide rails 11.

However, at this time, as shown in FIG. 3, when the small cassette guide surface 17 of the small cassette guide 16 guides the small cassette 4 in the direction of arrow c', the frictional force F ₁ acting on the small cassette guide surface 17 is , fulcrum shaft 2
Since it is shifted upward by l ₁ in the figure from the center of 2,
A rotational moment acts on the small cassette guide 16 in the direction of arrow d. As a result, the small cassette guide 16
is held in the operating position without escaping (sinking) to the non-operating position, and reliably guides the small cassette 4 in the direction of arrow c'.

Note that, as shown by the dotted line in FIG. 1, if the small cassette 4 is incorrectly inserted into the cassette holder 6 in the direction of arrow c at a position that is largely shifted to one side from the center position of the cassette insertion slot 2 in the left-right direction, As shown in FIG. 4, the front surface 4b of the small cassette 4 is brought into contact with the small cassette receiving surface 20 of one of the small cassette guides 16. As shown in FIG. Since the external force _F2 acting on the small cassette guide 16 at this time is shifted upward by _l2 in the figure from the center of the fulcrum shaft 22, a rotational moment in the direction of arrow d also acts on the small cassette guide 16. Therefore, the small cassette guide 16 is held in the operating position to prevent the small cassette 4 from being erroneously inserted.

Next, as shown by the one-dot chain line in FIG.
When the large cassette 3 is inserted in the direction of the arrow c, the bottom surface 3b of the large cassette 3 comes into contact with the large cassette guide surfaces 18 of both small cassette guides 16, as shown in FIG. At this time, the large cassette guide surface 18 is connected to the fulcrum shaft 22.
Since it is composed of an arcuate surface with a radius r centered on a lower point 0, the external force _F3 acting on the small cassette guide 16 passes through the center 0. Therefore, if the distance between this external force F ₃ and the fulcrum shaft 22 is l ₃ , then a rotational moment acts on both small cassette guides 16 in the direction of arrow e. As a result, by inserting the large cassette 3 in the direction of arrow c, both the small cassette guides 16 move from the operating position shown by the solid line in FIG. As a result, the small cassette guides 16 automatically escape (sink) in the direction of arrow e, and the two small cassette guides 16 do not have any adverse effect (do not become an obstacle) when inserting the large cassette 3.

As shown in FIG. 6, when the large cassette 3 is pushed toward the cassette holder 6 in the direction of the arrow a after the insertion, the small cassette guide 16 separates from the bottom surface 3b of the large cassette 3, and at the moment Figure 1
It is returned to the operating position shown by the dotted chain line by the action of both torsion coil springs 24. During this time, the large cassette 3 is guided by the side plates 6a of the cassette holder 6 toward the guide rails 11 provided on the cassette holder 6. Thus, large cassette 3
Accurate left-right positioning is performed by this guide rail 11.

On the other hand, when the large cassette 3 is moved back by the cassette holder 6 from the aforementioned cassette mounting position to the cassette insertion position in the direction of arrow b and is ejected from the cassette mounting device, the bottom surface 3b of the large cassette 3
is the large cassette contact surface 2 of both small cassette guides 16
Touched by 0. At this time, the pressing force F ₄ applied from the large cassette 3 to both cassette guides 17 is shifted upward by l ₄ from the center of the fulcrum shaft 22 in the figure, and the rotation moment in the direction of arrow e is applied to both small cassette guides 16. works, so both small cassette guides 1
6 automatically escapes in the direction of arrow e from the operating position indicated by the dashed line to the non-operating position indicated by the solid line against both torsion coil springs 24. Then, when the large cassette 3 is pulled out from the cassette holder 6 to the outside of the cassette insertion opening 2 in the direction of arrow f, both small cassette guides 16 return to the operating position shown by the dashed line.

Although the embodiments of the present invention have been described above, the present invention is not limited to the embodiments, and various effective changes can be made based on the technical idea of the present invention.

For example, in the embodiment, the small cassette guide is configured to rotate in the vertical direction (in the direction of arrows d and e), but it may also be configured to move linearly in the vertical direction.

Further, the present invention is not limited to a cassette mounting device for a cassette type VTR, but can be applied to various cassette mounting devices for various other cassette type recording/reproducing devices, information processing devices, etc.

[Effect of idea]

According to the present invention, the inserted small cassette is guided by the small cassette guide provided between the front panel and the cassette holder, and is accurately guided toward the guide rail of the cassette holder.

In other words, if a small cassette is incorrectly inserted in a position that is misaligned with the guide rail and the small cassette rides on the guide rail, the small cassette may not be able to be removed from the cassette holder, or the small cassette or the cassette mounting device may be damaged. It is possible to prevent accidents that would otherwise occur.

When inserting a large cassette, the small cassette guide is pushed to the non-operating position so that it does not adversely affect the insertion of the large cassette.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

The drawings show an embodiment of the present invention, in which Fig. 1 is a plan view of the main part, Fig. 2 is a perspective view of the main part, and Fig. 3 is a cross-section taken in the direction of - arrow in Fig. 1. 4 and 6 are sectional views taken along the - arrow direction in FIG. 1, FIG. 5 is a sectional view taken in the - arrow direction of FIG. 1, and FIG. 7 is a perspective view of the cassette holder. In addition, in the symbols used in the drawings, 1
...Front panel, 2...Cassette insertion slot, 3...
Large cassette, 4...Small cassette, 6...Cassette holder, 11...Guide rail, 16...Small cassette guide, 17...Small cassette guide surface, 18...
...Large cassette guide surface, 24...Torsion coil spring,
It is.

Claims (1)

[Claims for Utility Model Registration] A cassette insertion port provided on a front panel, a cassette holder that reciprocates between a cassette insertion position and a cassette mounting position, and a guide rail provided on the cassette holder. , at a cassette mounting position configured such that two types of cassettes, large and small, are selectively inserted into the cassette holder from the cassette insertion opening, and the inserted cassettes can be positioned within the cassette holder by the guide rails; A small cassette guide is provided between the front panel and the cassette holder, and the small cassette guide has two positions: an operating position in which the small cassette guide is inserted into the insertion passage for the large and small cassettes, and a non-operating position in which the small cassette guide is moved out of the insertion passage. The small cassette guide is configured to be movable between the small cassette guide and a biasing means for biasing the small cassette guide to move to the operating position, and when the large cassette is inserted from the cassette insertion opening, the small cassette guide is moved between the small cassette guide and the large cassette. When the small cassette is inserted from the cassette insertion opening, the small cassette guide is forced into the non-operating position by the urging means. A cassette mounting device characterized in that the small cassette is held in position and guided to the guide rail of the cassette holder by means of a small cassette guide surface provided on the small cassette guide.