JPH0323465B2 - - Google Patents

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Industrial Application Field] The present invention stores banknotes inserted from a banknote input/receipt unit into an accumulation storage unit via a discrimination unit that determines authenticity, etc. The present invention relates to an automatic teller machine that deposits and withdraws money by sending banknotes from a banknote to a banknote input/reception unit via the discrimination unit.

[Conventional technology]

FIG. 2 is a schematic side view showing a conventional automatic teller machine of this type. In the figure, reference numeral 1 denotes a device housing, inside which the following components are provided.

First, reference numeral 2 denotes a bill insertion/receiving section for a customer or the like to insert or receive bills, and is located inside an opening provided at the top of the device housing 1 and having a shutter.

Reference numeral 3 denotes a separating/feeding section provided directly below the banknote input/receiving section 2, which has a suction drum 4, and transfers the banknotes transferred from the banknote input/reception section 2 to the suction drum 4.
The paper is suction-separated and fed one by one.

5 includes an optical sensor, a magnetic sensor, a discrimination circuit, etc. (not shown), and is used to determine the authenticity of the banknotes conveyed from the separating and feeding section 3, to determine whether the banknotes are damaged, and to determine the denomination of deposited and withdrawn banknotes. , 6 and 7 are impellers, 8 is a genuine bill bulk stacking section provided above one impeller 6, and 9 is a counterfeit bill bulk stacking section provided above the other impeller 7. It is provided on the upper side of the device housing 1, and the banknotes that are determined to be genuine by the discrimination unit 5 are stacked in the genuine banknote bulk stacking unit 8 by the impeller 6, and the banknotes that are determined to be counterfeit are collected by the impeller 6. The impeller 7 causes the counterfeit bills to be accumulated in a bulk stacking section 9 .

Reference numeral 10 denotes an accumulation storage unit for storing thousand yen banknotes (hereinafter referred to as a thousand note safe), numeral 11 an accumulation storage unit for storing ten thousand yen banknotes (hereinafter referred to as a ten thousand note safe), and reference numeral 12 represents a deposit that has been determined to be an unfit note by the discriminating unit 5. An accumulation storage unit (hereinafter referred to as an unfit note safe) for storing banknotes; 13 is an accumulation storage unit (hereinafter referred to as an unfit note safe) for storing banknotes determined to be defective by the discrimination unit 5 denomination determination or the detection of two sheets by a sensor (not shown) at the time of withdrawal; These are arranged side by side in the lower part of the device housing 1 in a "reject safe" (hereinafter referred to as a "reject safe").

14, 15, 16, 17 are the respective safes 10, 1
The banknotes are accumulated and stored in the safes 10 to 13 by the impellers 14 to 17 arranged on the banknotes 1, 12, and 13, respectively.

Reference numeral 18 denotes a suction drum that sucks and separates and feeds banknotes one by one from the 1,000-yen safe 10; this suction drum 18 is provided in combination with the impeller 14; This suction drum 19 is a suction drum that separates and feeds one sheet at a time, and is provided in combination with an impeller 15.

Reference numeral 20 denotes a conveyance path connecting each of the above-mentioned components, and this conveyance path 20 is constituted by a conveyance roller or a conveyance belt that conveys the banknote, and a switching blade that switches the conveyance direction of the banknote.

Next, the operation of the above configuration will be explained.
First, the deposited banknotes that have been input into the banknote input/reception section 2 by the customer are passed to the separation and feeding section 3, and then separated and fed one by one by the suction drum 4 of the separation and feeding section 3, and then passed through the conveyance path 20. The information is sent to the identification section 5, where it is determined whether it is genuine or false.

The banknotes determined to be counterfeit bills are sent to the impeller 7 through the conveyance path 20, and are sequentially stacked in the counterfeit bill bulk stacking section 9 by the impeller 7. From here, the paper passes through the conveyance path 20 and is returned to the bill insertion/reception section 2, where it is returned to the customer.

On the other hand, the banknotes determined to be genuine by the discrimination section 5 are sent to the impeller 6 through the conveyance path 20, and are stacked by the impeller 6 in the genuine banknote bulk stacking section 8. From here, it passes through the counterfeit bill bulk accumulation section 9 and then passes through the conveyance path 20.
The paper passes through the banknote input and reception section 2, the separation and feeding section 3, and is again supplied one by one to the discrimination section 5 via the conveyance path 20. The banknotes thus conveyed to the discriminating section 5 are judged to be unfit or denominations by the discriminating section 5, and are then sent to the impellers 14, 15, or 16 through the conveyance path 20. - 16 are stored in the 1,000-note safe 10, the 10,000-note safe 11, and the unfit note safe 12, respectively.

In this way, in an automatic deposit/withdrawal machine, many separation/feeding, conveyance, and stacking operations are performed just when depositing money, but especially when separating and feeding in the separation/feeding section 3, banknotes may be skewed or shifted laterally. Easy to do.

If such skew or lateral deviation of banknotes occurs, the banknotes will be moved by the impellers 6, 7 or 14-1.
6, but it is not possible to correct the lateral shift using these impellers, etc.
It becomes difficult to line up and store banknotes in each safe 10 to 13.

In this case, it is conceivable to increase the dimensions of each safe 10 to 13 by the amount that allows for the sideways deviation of banknotes, so as to make it possible to store banknotes that have deviated sideways. Furthermore, when separating and feeding banknotes from the ten thousand note safe 11, a larger lateral shift occurs, resulting in jamming of banknotes or impairing the stability of banknote conveyance, as well as dispensing uneven banknotes to customers. This results in even greater drawbacks, such as a decline in service due to

Therefore, conventionally, as a means to solve these drawbacks, a mechanism has been adopted for arranging banknotes that are accumulated and stored in each safe.

FIG. 3 shows the alignment mechanism, FIG. 3A is a plan view thereof, and FIG.

As seen in this figure, two impellers 14 are provided on the shaft 21 at regular intervals, and banknotes are accumulated and stored in the thousand note safe 10 by these two impellers 14.

The alignment mechanism includes a guide 22 provided on the inner wall of one side of the 1000-bond safe 10, a pressing member 24 located on the other side and having a pivot point 23 at one end, and a solenoid, motor, etc. that drives this pressing member 24. By using the guide 22 as the reference position for storing banknotes and swinging the pressing member 24 by the driving source, the pressing member 24 collects the banknotes by the impeller 14. The other end of the banknotes is pressed, and one end of the banknotes is pressed against the guide 22 so that the banknotes are aligned.

On the other hand, if the banknotes are skewed or laterally shifted during separation and feeding by the separation and feeding section 3 described above, the discrimination accuracy in the next step, the discrimination section 5, will be reduced.

Therefore, as a way to avoid this, a pattern memory is provided in the discrimination circuit that takes into account the skew and lateral deviation of banknotes, and during discrimination, the pattern between the data in the memory and the signal detected by the sensor provided in the discrimination section is There is a method of verification, but in this case the memory capacity increases and the discrimination circuit becomes complicated.

Therefore, in order to solve this inconvenience, for example, as shown in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 59-161792, a first sensor and a second sensor are provided in the discrimination section, and the first sensor detects the banknote. There is a method for accurately identifying the banknote by selecting the type from the obtained value and selecting a detection channel for the banknote with a second sensor in response to the type signal and the transport position signal detected by the first sensor. Proposed.

[Problem that the invention seeks to solve]

Having explained the conventional automatic deposit/withdrawal machines above,
According to this, it is necessary to provide an alignment mechanism for aligning banknotes in each safe, which poses a problem of increasing the size and complexity of the device.

Furthermore, if a method is adopted in which a first sensor and a second sensor are provided in the discrimination unit to carry out discrimination as described above, if the skew or lateral deviation of banknotes is large, a correspondingly large number of sensors will be required. , it becomes difficult to implement the sensor, and the identification circuit that selects the data in memory and the sensor channel becomes complicated.
There was a problem in that the processing time for identification became longer, making it impossible to respond to higher speeds.

The present invention was made to solve these problems, and its first purpose is to make it possible to arrange and accumulate banknotes in each safe without providing an alignment mechanism in each safe, and to make it possible to store banknotes in a small size. The aim is to realize an automatic deposit/withdrawal machine that can increase the number of users.

Furthermore, a second object of the present invention is to be able to perform accurate discrimination in a short time without increasing the number of sensors in the discrimination section and without complicating the discrimination circuit, and to cope with increased speed. The aim is to realize an automatic deposit/withdrawal machine that can do this.

[Means for solving problems]

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the present invention includes a bill insertion/receiving section for customers to insert or receive banknotes, and a separation feeder for separating and feeding the bills passed from the bill insertion/receiving section one by one. A feeding section, a discriminating section that determines the authenticity, denomination, etc. of banknotes, an accumulating storage section that accumulates and stores banknotes determined to be genuine by the discriminating section, and transporting banknotes by connecting these sections. In an automatic deposit/withdrawal machine, the automatic teller machine is provided with a conveyance path between the separating and feeding section and the discrimination section, and an alignment means for arranging the banknotes with preset standard positions closer to each other is provided in the conveyance path between the separating and feeding section and the discrimination section. an aligner drum that has a flange at one end that serves as a reference surface and rotates in a fixed direction; The aligning means comprises a biased aligner roller, and the aligner drum and the aligner roller sandwich the banknotes, and while conveying the banknotes along the aligner drum, the aligner roller aligns the banknotes widthwise toward the flange side. It is something.

[Effect]

In the present invention having the above-described configuration, the banknotes are aligned along the positioning member by the alignment means in front of the safe, and then collected and stored in each safe by the impeller.

Therefore, according to this, it becomes possible to arrange and accumulate and store banknotes in each safe using one set of banknote arranging means, and it is possible to realize downsizing.

Moreover, since the banknotes are aligned along the positioning member by the alignment means between the separation and feeding section and the discrimination section, and then enter the discrimination section, the bills are discriminated in an aligned state.

Therefore, there is no need to provide a large number of sensors in the discrimination section, the discrimination circuit can be simplified, and accurate discrimination can be performed in a short time.
It becomes possible to cope with higher speeds, and furthermore, it is possible to arrange and collect and store the banknotes after discrimination in each safe.

〔Example〕

Examples will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a schematic side view showing an embodiment of an automatic teller machine according to the first invention.

In the figure, 1 is the device housing, 2 is the banknote input/reception unit, 3 is the separation/feed unit, 4 is the suction drum, 5 is the discrimination unit, 6 and 7 are impellers, 8 is the genuine banknote bulk accumulation unit, and 9 is the counterfeit banknote 10 to 13 are accumulation and storage parts (that is, 10 is a 1000-note safe, 11 is a 10,000-note safe, 12 is an unfit note safe, and 13 is a reject safe), 14 to 17 are impellers, and 18 and 19 are suction The drum, 20, is a transport path, which corresponds to the first one and is similarly constructed, but each safe 10-13 does not include the conventional alignment mechanism shown in FIG.

Reference numeral 24 denotes an alignment means, the configuration of which will be described in detail later, has a positioning member that serves as a reference position for the banknotes to be conveyed, and is adapted to align the banknotes widthwise to this reference position. In the figure, this alignment means 25 is provided between the separation feeding section 3 and the discrimination section 5, but after the separation feeding section 3, the 1,000-note safe 1
It is sufficient if it is provided in a part of the conveyance path 20 up to zero.

Next, the operation of the above-mentioned configuration will be explained.
First, in the case of deposit, the deposited banknotes are inputted by the customer into the banknote input/receipt section 2 all at once and passed to the separation and feeding section 3, and then separated and fed one by one by the suction drum 4 of the separation and feeding section 3. . These banknotes are sorted by the alignment means 25 on the conveyance path 20 before the discrimination section 5.
The sheets are aligned one by one by a member that determines a reference position, and after being aligned, they are sent to the discrimination section 5, where they are judged to be genuine or false.

The banknotes determined to be counterfeit bills are sent to the impeller 7 through the conveyance path 20, and are sequentially stacked in the counterfeit bill bulk stacking section 9 by the impeller 7. From here, the paper passes through the conveyance path 20 and is returned to the bill insertion/reception section 2, where it is returned to the customer.

On the other hand, the banknotes that are determined to be genuine by the discrimination section 5 are sent to the impeller 6 through the conveyance path 20, and
The genuine bills are accumulated in the genuine bill bulk accumulation section 8. and,
From there, the banknotes pass through the counterfeit bill bulk accumulation unit 9, pass through the conveyance path 20, pass through the banknote input/receive unit 2, and the separation/feed unit 3. It will be done. The banknotes thus fed to the discriminating section 5 are judged to be unfit or denominations by the discriminating section 5, and then passed through the conveyance path to the impellers 14 and 1.
5 or 16, and these impellers 14~
16, they are accumulated and stored in the thousand-note safe 10, the ten-thousand-note safe 11, and the unfit note safe 12, respectively.

At the time of withdrawal, the denomination and number of banknotes specified by the customer using a pin pad (not shown) or the like are sequentially separated and fed one by one from the thousand-note safe 10 and the million-note safe 11 by the suction drums 18 and 19, and then by the alignment means 25. After being aligned and transported, they are transported to the discrimination section 5.
Then, the discrimination unit 5 performs denomination discrimination, two-bill detection, etc., and the banknotes determined to be defective are sent to the reject safe 13 by the impeller 17 via the conveyance path 20.
It is collected and stored in. In addition, banknotes that are not determined to be defective but are determined to be good pass through a conveyance path 20 and are accumulated in a genuine bill bulk accumulation section 8 by an impeller 6, and from there, they pass through a counterfeit note bulk accumulation section 9 and a conveyance path 20 to receive banknotes. Part 2
The banknotes are sent to the customer from the banknote input/receipt section 2 and paid to the customer.

FIG. 4 is a front view showing an example of the alignment means 25 used in the present invention, and FIG. 5 is a side view thereof.

In the figure, 26 and 27 are left and right side plates, and an aligner drum 28 whose outer circumferential surface is covered with a friction material such as rubber is rotatably supported on the side plates 26 and 27. The flange 29 serves as a positioning member that serves as the reference position of the banknote.
is provided.

Guides 30 and 31 each have a side surface shaped like an arc with a slightly larger curvature than the outer diameter of the aligner drum 28, and these guides 30 and 31 cover the outer circumferential surface of the aligner drum 28 with a small gap and are separated from each other. They are arranged side by side so that a cut 32 of a constant width is formed between the end faces.

Reference numeral 33 denotes a fixing member passed between the side plates 26 and 27, and the one guide 30 is supported by this fixing member 33 via a support 34.

A support plate 35 is attached to the fixing member 33 so as to be located near the flange 29, and the other guide 31 is supported on this support plate 35. Further, a plurality of support posts 36 and spring posts 37 are provided on the support plate 35 along the outer periphery of the guide 31, and at the tip of each support post 36 there is a fulcrum that can freely rotate vertically and horizontally. An aligner roller 39 having a surface made of rubber or the like having a larger friction coefficient than the friction material of the aligner drum 28 is rotatably supported by these brackets 38, and the guides 30 and 31 It comes into contact with the surface of the aligner drum 28 through the cut 32 between.

Reference numeral 40 denotes a pressure spring passed between each spring post 37 and each bracket 38, and each aligner roller 39 is pressed against the aligner drum 28 by this pressure spring 40, and 41 is a pressure spring passed between each of the above-mentioned spring posts 37 and each bracket 38. The aligner spring 4 is passed between the support post 36 and the free end of each bracket 38.
1, each aligner roller 39 is given a torsion angle θ which will be described later.

Although the number of aligner rollers 39 used in this embodiment is four as shown in FIG. 5, the number may be greater or less than this.

In addition, in FIG. 5, 42 and 43 are the conveyance path 20.
A pair of conveyance rollers each forming a part of the
is placed on the exit side. 44 is a banknote.

FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram showing the operation of the aligning means 25 having the above-described configuration developed in a plan view, and the operation will be explained below with reference to FIG. 6, FIGS. 4 and 5.

First, as shown in FIG. 5, the banknotes 44 sent through the transport path 20 are held between a pair of transport rollers 43, and the transport rollers 43 move the banknotes 44 between the guides 30 and 31 of the aligning means 25 shown in FIG. 2
8.

The banknotes 44 fed in this way are applied to the aligner roller 39 which is receiving the force of the pressure spring 40.
is pressed against the aligner drum 28, and is sent to the discrimination section 5 side by the rotation of the aligner drum 28. Further, at this time, the aligner roller 39 receives the force of the aligner spring 41 and is inclined at a torsion angle θ with respect to the feeding direction of the banknote 44 as shown in FIG. If the banknote 44 has been moved or shifted laterally, the banknote 44 is pressed against the surface of the flange 29, that is, the reference position side, by the frictional force of the aligner roller 39, which exceeds the frictional force of the aligner drum 28.

That is, as shown in FIG. 6, the banknotes 44 that have been skewed or laterally shifted in the separating and feeding section 3 or the like in FIG. A force is generated in the direction Y on the flange 29 of the drum 28, which causes the banknote 44 to move against the aligner drum 2.
8, the sheet is gradually brought closer to the flange 29 side to correct the lateral deviation, and then further pressed against the flange 29, thereby correcting the skew. After correcting the skew and lateral deviation of the banknote 44 in this way, the aligner roller 39
By eliminating movement in the direction, this banknote 4
Due to the frictional force with 4, the twist angle θ becomes 0°.

During these series of operations, the banknotes 44 are placed on the aligner drum 28 and are held at a curvature equal to the outer diameter of the aligner drum 28, so they are stiff and may be bent or wrinkled while passing through the aligning means 25. They are aligned with the flange 29 as a reference position without any adjustment, and then transported to the next process by the transport rollers 43.

Therefore, if such an alignment means 25 is provided at one location on the conveyance path 20 after the separating and feeding section 3 shown in FIG. 1, the safes 10 to 13 can be aligned to the same standard. The banknotes 44 can be fed, and the banknotes 44 can be accumulated and stored in the safes 10 to 13 while being aligned as they are by the impellers 14 to 17.

FIG. 7 is a side view showing another example of the aligning means 25, in which a wrinkle removing roller 45 is added between the aligner drum 28 and the conveying roller 42, and the rest is the same as that shown in FIG. It is configured in the same way.

Here, the diameter of the wrinkle removing roller 45 is, for example, 26 to 30 mm.
This wrinkle removing roller 45 has a small diameter of about mm.
By wrapping the banknotes 44 around and sending them, the banknotes 44
It is possible to remove wrinkles and creases, thereby further enhancing the effect of width adjustment described above.

Next, a case where the alignment means 25 having the above-mentioned configuration is installed on the conveyance path 20 between the separation and feeding section 3 and the discrimination section 5 as shown in FIG. 1 will be described.

In this case, immediately after the banknotes 44 are arranged in the same manner as described above by the alignment means 25, they are sent to the discrimination section 5, so that the banknotes 44 are arranged in the discrimination section 5 as follows.
can be differentiated.

For example, in FIG. 8, banknotes 44 are
This is an explanatory diagram showing an example of banknote discrimination using a sensor that scans the top with light and detects the density from the reflected light. It shows the scanning position.

Furthermore, Fig. 9 shows the output waveform of the sensor when scanning the normal scanning position A in Fig. 8, and Fig. 10 shows the output waveform of the sensor when skew or lateral deviation occurs. .

As seen in this figure, the output waveform of the sensor is different from the normal scanning position A at the scanning position B when the banknote 44 is skewed or laterally shifted.
Therefore, in order to identify banknotes with large skew or lateral deviation, it is necessary to use a large number of sensors and complicated circuits as in the past.

However, in this embodiment, since the banknotes 44 aligned by the alignment means 25 are sent to the discrimination section 5, scanning is always performed at the regular position A, and therefore a large number of sensors and complicated circuits are used. This makes it possible to perform highly accurate and stable identification without any problems.

Further, when the banknotes 44 after being discriminated are stored in the respective safes 10 to 13, they can be stored in a line in a similar manner to the above-described embodiment.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, the present invention provides an alignment means on the conveyance path between the separating and feeding section and the discrimination section, and uses this alignment means to align the banknotes one by one along the positioning member serving as the reference position. After arranging the
Since these aligned banknotes are transported to each safe, the banknotes can be stored in each safe in an aligned manner just by using one set of alignment means, and the banknotes are small and have a complicated structure. The effect is that it is possible to realize an automatic deposit/withdrawal machine that does not need to be deposited or withdrawn.

Further, in the present invention, the banknotes are sent to the discrimination section immediately after the banknotes are arranged by the arrangement means.
Identification can be performed without skew or lateral deviation, and as a result, highly accurate identification can be performed in a short time with a small number of sensors and a simple identification circuit, and it also has the effect of being able to handle higher speeds. .

Furthermore, since the aligning means of the present invention utilizes the outer peripheral surface of the aligner drum as an arcuate conveyance path, it is possible to secure the conveyance path length for banknote alignment within a small limited space. The torsion angle θ of the aligner rollers can be set to a small value, and multiple aligner rollers are used to align the width, so even if the length of the banknote is significantly shorter than the conveyance path length, the twist angle θ of the aligner rollers can be set small. The torsion angle θ can be made smaller, and since the flange rotates together with the aligner drum and the transported banknote moves in the transport direction together with the reference surface, one side of the banknote does not rub against the reference surface. ,
Therefore, it is possible to perform the width adjustment without applying an extra load to the banknotes, thereby achieving the effect that the banknotes can be aligned without causing folds, wrinkles, etc.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is a schematic side view showing an embodiment of an automatic teller machine according to the present invention, Fig. 2 is a schematic side view showing a conventional automatic teller machine, and Fig. 3 shows the alignment mechanism used in Fig. 2. 4 is a front view of the alignment means used in FIG. 1, FIG. 5 is a side view thereof, FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram of the operation of the alignment means, and FIG. 7 is a side view showing another alignment means. , FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of banknote discrimination in the present invention, FIG. 9 is a diagram showing the sensor output waveform at the normal scanning position in FIG. 8, and FIG. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a sensor output waveform at a scanning position when a horizontal shift occurs. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1: Device housing, 2: Banknote input/reception section, 3: Separation and feeding section, 4, 18, 19: Suction drum, 5: Discrimination section, 6, 7, 14-17: Impeller, 10-13:
Accumulation storage unit (1000-note safe, million-note safe, unfit note safe, redirect safe), 20: Conveyance path, 25: Alignment means,
28: aligner drum, 29: flange, 30,
31: Guide, 32: Cut, 35: Support plate, 3
6: Support post, 37: Spring post, 3
8: Bracket, 40: Pressure spring,
41: Aligner spring.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. A banknote input/reception unit for a customer to insert or receive banknotes; a separating/feeding unit for separating and feeding banknotes passed from the banknote input/reception unit one by one; and a banknote. A discrimination section that discriminates the authenticity, denomination, etc. of bills; a collection and storage section that accumulates and stores banknotes determined to be genuine by the discrimination section; and a conveyance path that connects these sections and transports the bills. In an automatic teller/dispensing machine, the automatic teller/dispensing machine is provided with an aligning means for aligning the banknotes widthwise to a preset reference position of the banknotes in the conveyance path between the separating and feeding section and the discrimination section. an aligner drum that has a flange at one end thereof and rotates in a fixed direction; the aligner roller, and the aligning means for sandwiching the banknotes between the aligner drum and the aligner roller, and aligning the banknotes by aligning the banknotes widthwise toward the flange side by the aligner roller while conveying the banknotes along the aligner drum. Automatic deposit/withdrawal machine.