Apparatus for Dispensing a Lottery Ticket

Abstract

A lottery ticket is printed on a substrate sheet material having a front surface with lottery game indicia printed thereon and a removable covering material, typically scratch-off material, covering the lottery game indicia which is removable by a player to expose the game indicia for playing the game and other game information printed on the substrate sheet material where at least part of the substrate sheet material is formed of a translucent synthetic material to enable viewing through the part by the player. In order to allow the ticket to be dispensed in a row of the tickets from a dispensing machine with an optical sensor, a patch of an opaque or semi-opaque material is applied onto the substrate at a location to cooperate with the sensor while it is operating to detect ticket location.

1 . Apparatus for dispensing lottery tickets comprising:
 a strip of tickets joined end to end in a row with a line of weakness between each ticket and the next;   a transport mechanism for feeding the tickets along a dispensing path;   a separator located along the dispensing path by which adjacent tickets are separated from one another;   at least one rotationally driven feed roller contacting the tickets at a location along the dispensing path upstream of the separator to advance the tickets toward the separator;   at least one rotationally driven discharge roller contacting the tickets at a location along the dispensing path downstream of the separator to discharge the articles from the separator;   an optical sensor operable during at least a part of the movement of the strip for detecting a location of a ticket as it moves along the dispensing path;   wherein the strip of lottery tickets comprises a substrate sheet material where at least a portion of the substrate sheet material is translucent;   lottery game indicia printed on the front surface of each ticket;   an area of opaque material covering the lottery game indicia which material is removable to expose the game indicia;   and a patch of material which is more opaque than the substrate sheet material which patch is located on the substrate sheet material in addition to the area of the opaque material;   the patch being located on the ticket at a location for cooperation with the optical sensor as the ticket moves on the path to prevent passage of light from the optical sensor through the translucent substrate from interfering with operation of the optical sensor.   
     
     
         2 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the patch is substantially as opaque as the area of opaque material. 
     
     
         3 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the patch allows passage of some light greater than that of the area which is insufficient to interfere with the operation of the optical sensor. 
     
     
         4 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the patch is separate from the area. 
     
     
         5 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the patch is contiguous with the area. 
     
     
         6 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the patch forms a strip along a center of the ticket and extends from a leading edge of the ticket to a trailing edge of the ticket. 
     
     
         7 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein there is provided at least one additional patch at a location on the ticket spaced from the patch and from the area. 
     
     
         8 . The apparatus according to  claim 7  wherein said least one additional patch is arranged at a location on the ticket for cooperation with a second optical sensor as the ticket moves on the path to prevent passage of light from the second optical sensor through the translucent substrate from interfering with operation of the second optical sensor. 
     
     
         9 . The apparatus according to  claim 7  wherein said at least one additional patch is arranged at a location on the ticket so that the patch and the additional patch are symmetrically arranged relative to a center line of the ticket. 
     
     
         10 . The apparatus according to  claim 7  wherein said at least one additional patch and said patch are arranged at a leading or trailing edge of the ticket opposite the area so that the patches render the substrate opaque at the adjacent edge and the area renders the substrate opaque at the opposite edge for detection of the leading and trailing edges by the optical sensors. 
     
     
         11 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the patch is formed by an ink printed onto the translucent substrate material. 
     
     
         12 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the whole of the ticket is formed by said substrate so that the game indicia and the covering and the patch is applied onto the translucent substrate. 
     
     
         13 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein a part only of the substrate is formed by said translucent material. 
     
     
         14 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein observation by an intruder of the game data from a rear of the ticket is prevented by printing onto a rear surface of the substrate ink in a thickness in the range 0.5 to 2 microns which is arranged to absorb or reflect any electromagnetic energy applied thereto. 
     
     
         15 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the substrate is arranged to have the characteristic of a surface energy greater than 39 Dyne/cm by applying to the substrate an acrylic emulsion. 
     
     
         16 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the substrate is PET. 
     
     
         17 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the substrate has a fold endurance of ≥103 cycles. 
     
     
         18 . The apparatus according to  claim 1  wherein the substrate is colored. 
     
     
         19 . The method according to  claim 1  wherein the translucent material is laminated to another material and a part of the other material is omitted or removed to expose the translucent material. 
     
     
         20 . The method according to  claim 19  wherein the part removed forms a window in the ticket.