JPH0668871B2 - Optical disk carrier - Google Patents

Description

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a front-loading type optical disc transport device, and more specifically, to an optical disc transport device that transports an optical disc onto a spindle motor while automatically centering the optical disc. It is a thing.

[Technical Background of the Invention] Optical discs include 12 such as compact discs.
cm disc, 20cm disc used as an information file,
There is also a 30 cm type such as a video disc. In the optical information reading device capable of reproducing any of the optical discs having different diameters, in consideration of the convenience of handling, as shown in, for example, FIG.
Further, the disk mounting portions 2a and 2b corresponding to the respective diameters of the disks Da and Db are formed in a coaxial step shape. That is,
Each disc mounting portion 2a, 2b is formed as a circular recess having a diameter slightly larger than the diameter of the discs Da, Db, and by inserting the disc therein, some positioning (centering) can be performed. It has become.

However, this has the following drawbacks. That is, even if the centering is performed, it is not always accurate because there is a clearance between the disc and the concave portion thereof. To make this more accurate, it is sufficient to make the clearance sufficiently small, but on the other hand, another problem that it is difficult to attach and detach the disc occurs. Moreover, since the optical disk is supported on the recording surface, there is a possibility that the recording surface is scratched or soiled.

[Object of the Invention] The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned conventional drawbacks.
An object of the present invention is to provide an optical disk transporting device in which a disk can be easily attached and detached, and the disk can be automatically centered and transported to a clamping area while supporting the disk without contacting the recording surface thereof. Especially.

[Embodiment] Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to an embodiment shown in the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 shows a plan view of a carrying tray 10 applied to this optical disk carrying apparatus. In addition, in order to show the internal structure of the drawing, the lower half is a cross section, and FIG. 2 is a front view of the carrying tray 10.

According to this, the carrying tray 10 is provided with a plurality of, in this embodiment, four disc supporting pieces 11. This each support piece
Numeral 11 is preferably equal on the same circle around the central portion ◯ of the disk mounting portion 12, that is, the point ◯ which coincides with the rotation axis of the spindle motor provided in the clamping area in the reader (not shown). Arranged at angular intervals, and
It is mounted so as to slide back and forth along the radial direction. Incidentally, reference numeral 13 is a disc mounting portion.
It is a clearance groove for the spindle motor (not shown) formed on the bottom wall of twelve, and thus this carrying tray
The loading direction of 10 is the left direction in FIG.

The transport tray 10 is provided with a piece driving means that slides each of the disk supporting pieces 11 simultaneously and in the same direction as the transfer tray 10 moves. In this embodiment, the piece driving means includes a first rack 14 formed on the bottom of each disk support piece 11 and a pinion pivotally supported on the bottom surface of the transport tray 10 so as to mesh with the first rack 14. 15 and this pinion
A second rack 16 connected to the first rack 14 via 15
It has and.

In this case, two of the second racks 16 are provided on the slide lever 17 as a set. That is, the slide lever 17 is held so as to be slidable in parallel with the moving direction of the transport tray 10 by a guide means including a guide pin 18 and a slit 19, and the second racks 16 and 16 are provided at both ends thereof. It is provided so as to mesh with the corresponding pinions 15, 15. Incidentally, the remaining two second racks are not shown because they are provided in the upper half of FIG. 1, but also for this, a slide not shown provided in parallel with the moving direction of the transport tray 10 is similar to the above. It is formed on both ends of the lever.

The slide lever 17 includes a second rack 16 and a pinion.
A coil spring 20 for returning the disk support piece 11 to the initial position on the outer side in the radial direction via the first rack 14 and the first rack 14, and a pin 21 that abuts on a stopper (not shown) provided on the reader side are attached. There is.

The support piece 11 is formed with a tapered surface 22 that supports the outer peripheral edge of the support piece 11 without contacting the recording surface of the optical disk D. The tapered surface 22 is inclined downward toward the central portion ◯ of the disk mounting portion 12, and according to this embodiment, the tapered surface 22 includes two tapered surfaces 22a and 22b. That is, the second tapered surface 22a is for a disk of, for example, 20 cm, the second tapered surface 22b is for a disk of, for example, 12 cm, and a predetermined step is provided between them.

Next, referring to FIGS. 4 and 5 together, the operation of the present invention will be described.

First, in the initial state in which the transport tray 10 is pulled out to the front of the reading device, each disk support piece 11 is moved by the pulling force of the coil spring 20 to the racks 14 and 16 and the pinion 15.
To the radially outer position via (first
See FIG. 2). Although this initial position can be set arbitrarily, it is advisable to set a large clearance with respect to the outer peripheral edge of the disk D in order to facilitate the attachment / detachment of the disk D. Next, the disk D is placed on one of the tapered surfaces 22a and 22b corresponding to its diameter. In this embodiment, the disk D having a diameter of 20 cm is first
It is placed on the taper surface 22a. After that, carry tray 1
When 0 is moved to the left in FIG. 1, which is the rotating direction, the pin 21 of the slide lever 17 comes into contact with a stopper (not shown) on the reader side. As a result, the slide bar 17 relatively slides in the direction opposite to the moving direction of the transport tray 10, so that the disk support piece 11 moves inward in the radial direction via the racks 14 and 16 and the pinion 15, and finally The disk D is centered on the first tapered surface 22a as shown in FIG.

The amount of movement of the disc support piece 11 can be appropriately changed by selecting the meshing ratio of the pinion 15 and the racks 14 and 16. Further, it is not always necessary to dispose four disc support pieces 11 as in the above-described embodiment. For example, two disc support pieces 11 may be arranged opposite to each other with the central portion ◯ of the disc mounting portion 12 interposed therebetween. Good. However, in that case, it is necessary to make the taper surface 22 of each disk support piece 11 sufficiently large.

[Effect] As is apparent from the above description of the embodiments, according to the present invention, a plurality of disc supporting pieces are arranged on the same tray on the transport tray, and each of them is reciprocally moved in the radial direction. By making it slidable and forming a taper surface on each disc support piece to support the outer peripheral edge of the disc without contacting the recording surface of the disc, the optical disc is automatically centered without damaging the recording surface. There is provided an optical disk transport device that can be transported while being taken out.

[Brief description of drawings]

1 to 5 relate to an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 1 is a plan view showing a transport tray applied to this transport device with a lower half as a cross section, and FIG. 2 is the transport tray. FIG. 3 is a right side view of the carrying tray corresponding to the cross-sectional portion of FIG. 1, and FIGS. 4 and 5 are operation explanations for explaining the centering operation of the disk by the disk support piece. FIG. 6 and FIG. 6 are sectional views showing a conventional transport tray. In the figure, 10 is a transport tray, 11 is a disc support piece, 12 is a disc mounting portion, 14 and 16 are racks, 15 is a pinion, 17 is a slide lever, 20 is a coil spring, and 22 is a tapered surface.

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A transport tray for mounting an optical disc,
A front-loading type optical disc transport device for transporting the optical disc to a clamping area in an optical information reading device via the transport tray, wherein the transport tray has a center located on the spindle motor in the clamping area. A plurality of disc supporting pieces arranged on the same circumference centered on the center and capable of reciprocally sliding along the radial direction, and each of the disc supporting pieces is slid in the same direction as the transport tray moves. A piece driving means is provided, and the optical disk is centered on the disk supporting piece that is slid inward in the radial direction by the piece driving means when the optical disk is loaded. 2. An optical disk transport according to claim 1, wherein each of the disk support pieces has a plurality of support surfaces corresponding to optical disks having different diameters formed in steps. apparatus. 3. An optical disk transporting device according to claim 1, wherein the support surface of each disk support piece is a tapered surface that supports the outer peripheral edge of the optical disk. 4. The frame driving means according to claim 1, wherein the frame driving means has a first rack formed on the disk supporting frame and a shaft on the side of the transport tray so as to mesh with the first rack. A supported pinion, a second rack connected to the first rack via the pinion, and rack moving means for moving the second rack in a predetermined direction,
The optical disk transporting device is characterized in that the second rack is slidably held with respect to the transport tray in parallel with a moving direction thereof. 5. The rack moving means according to claim 4, wherein the rack moving means returns the disk support piece to an initial position radially outward through the pinion and the first rack. When the transport tray moves toward the clamping area, the spring that acts on the second rack abuts a stopper on the side of the reading device and moves the second rack against the spring in a direction opposite to the moving direction. And an engaging member for sliding the disc support piece to a centering position by mechanically moving the disc support piece.