Can yall identify this part?

[Faradave]

Hi, I found this oart in a printer and it had an arm that lower down between those two rectangular pieces. It seems like maybe it's keying off of a magnetic field and that arm blocks it or something like that. It's just a circuit element I've never seen before and I need it identified before I can go to sleep hahaha thanks a bunch guys

 

[Pommie]

Look like opto interruptors - led one side, photo diode/transistor other side.

Mike.

 

[DrG]

Yup, looks like that to me also.

Lots of info on them...here is a nice site on repurposing them that you might find interesting.

 

[Faradave]

Well saw my legs off and call me shorty..... Well I'll be monkey's son of a *****... etc
if that aint the coolest thing I've harvested in a year then I'll.... you'll.... I'll be your dear aunt Sally! Thanks guys! 1st time poster, long time electron lover

 

[DrG]

Well saw my legs off and call me shorty..... Well I'll be monkey's son of a *****... etc
if that aint the coolest thing I've harvested in a year then I'll.... you'll.... I'll be your dear aunt Sally! Thanks guys! 1st time poster, long time electron lover

lol

BTW: If you go to that site that I posted, make sure you read the comments - he initially screwed up the open collector buisness.

 

[Faradave]

I shall do just that, good scientist. Yea until now I've only ever seen IR transistors with three legs. And I seen a lot of ir transistors. Thanks a bunch guys!

 

[JimB]

I use a slotted opto-isolator like that as part of a turns counter when I use my lathe for coil winding.

I use a metal "Flag" which is magnetically attached to the back of the chuck,
the flag passes through the opto and interupts the IR beam,
The transistor of the opto drives an electro-mechanical counter to count the turns.

A useful thing made from stuff in the junk box.

JimB

 

[The March Muppet]

As it is the middle of the night, I'm enjoying a cup or two of Tennessee's finest, and not above boosting my post count by one although the question has been answered...

Yes, a photo interrupter - an IR LED and photo-transistor pair. in printers used from everything to detect the presence of paper in the tray, to registration (where to begin printing the image on the paper leading edge)

They work splendidly on machines feeding under ~35-45 pages per minute, but above that can be a nightmare. Not the actual electronics that work into (at least) the tens of MHz, but the "arm" - called a flag.

They physically wear - either flattening the contact surface, or the paper actually smashing a groove into them. respectively either throwing off the printer timing which will declare a misfeed, or rolling up the leading edge of the paper and causing a jam.

Due to (IMO) skulduggery - they range in manufacture part number price from a buck fifty to over $300! Because they can. Electronically, pretty much identical - but there are 3 wires that can be in one of three positions each for any given outline and modern techs are trained to replace parts by number, not work out solutions that require a meter, soldering iron, and a bit of heat shrink to make replacements as needed.

Yes, I spent over 20 years in that industry and watched it go from skilled labour to screwdriver (read the flow chart) jockey.

I once designed a circuit for my techs. 6 rectifiers in 3P configuration powering a 555, 3 bi-coloured LEDs, and a handful of passives. You'd plug the thing into the sensor harness and it would identify the Vcc, GND, and signal pin positions indicating red, green, and yellowish respectively.