Miscellaneous hardware (e.g. – bushing – carpet fastener – caster – Hinge – Having means to facilitate assembly and disassembly of hinge...
Reexamination Certificate
2001-01-08
2003-02-11
Knight, Anthony (Department: 3676)
Miscellaneous hardware (e.g., bushing, carpet fastener, caster,
Hinge
Having means to facilitate assembly and disassembly of hinge...
C016S236000, C016S238000, C016S241000, C016S245000, C016S254000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06516494
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a hinge, half of which is attached to an open frame and the other half is attached to a door, for holding the door so as to be capable of rotating. The hinge is advantageous for a use in a double hinged door because there is no need to reposition the hinge when the door is reversed.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, there exists a popular type of door hinge wherein half of the hinge is attachable to an open frame and the other half is attachable to a door, and wherein each half can be connected to and disconnected from the other half as either half of both halves is/are moved in a vertical direction against each other. This type of hinge includes a “left-type” and a “right-type” wherein the former is attached to the left side of the door and the latter is attached to the right side of the door. This type of hinge is structured so as to be attached to either the front side or the back side in the door edge, so that it can be used only as either the “left-type” or the “right-type”.
Consequently, in general, when ordering a door, it is required to designate if the door is the “left-type” or the “right-type”, and accordingly, the “left-type” or the “right-type” hinge is attached to an open frame and the door prior to shipping. And, a marking of either the “left-type” or the “right-type” is applied on a package of the open frame and the door during the packing process. However, despite an effort in the marking, unordered type of open frames and doors are sometimes shipped by a mistake. Further, it is necessary to produce both the “left-type” and the “right-type” products in each model, so that a maker of the products must run operations, calculating demands and production ratio of the “left-type” and the “right-type”.
When there is a requirement of reversing an opening direction of a door (which referrers a direction toward which a door is opened) in such occasion as a renovation of a house, it is impossible to reverse the direction if the door is provided with the above-described conventional hinge.
There have been provided hinges that can be used both as the left-type and the right-type by the applicant of the present application and others. (See, for example, Japanese Provisional Utility Model Publication Nos. 4-52177, 4-41075, 59-175573, 59-146477, 59-128876, 59-10474 and 58-195763, Japanese Provisional Patent Publication Nos. 57-68482, 55-16171 and 48-59243, Japanese Provisional Utility Model Publication No. 5-75378, Japanese Provisional Patent Publication No. 10-246055, and Japanese Provisional Utility Model Publication No. 5-75378.)
As a hinge used both as the left-type and the right-type, there has been provided so called a flag-shaped hinge. The flag-shaped hinge, as illustrated in
FIG. 8
, comprises a frame-side half
91
having a vertical axis
66
, which is attached to an open frame and a door-side half
91
having a vertical sleeve
63
for receiving the vertical axis
66
, which is attached to a door. The flag-shaped hinge is structured as such that either the frame-side half
91
or the door-side half
92
is turned over or turned upside down in order to use both as the left-type and the right-type.
Further, a hinge as illustrated in
FIG. 9
(which is disclosed in Japanese Provisional Patent Publication Nos. 48-59243 and 59-128876) is structured as such that a pair of halves
95
,
95
, each of which comprises a vertical sleeve
63
, are coupled with a single vertical axis
66
above and below intervening a flange
67
in between. And, as illustrated in
FIG. 10
, the half
95
of the hinge is reversed and turned upside down in a same plane in order to reposition the vertical sleeve.
This type of hinge is structured as such that the door-side half is shaped symmetrical about the vertical center line of the door edge which the door-side-half is attached to in such a form that it does not close neither to the front side nor the back side of the door. Therefore, this hinge can be used both as the “left-type” and the “right-type” by rotating the door upon vertical axis of the door from side to side, repositioning the vertical axis
66
and the vertical sleeve
63
of the hinge to the side which the door is directed to open.
That is, when an opening direction of the door is to be reversed, first, the door-side half of the hinge should be removed from the door by detaching the set screws, and then it should be repositioned followed by a reversing operation or by other similar operations, and finally it should be reattached to the proper position of the door. With such operation, an opening direction of the door can be reversed from the left to the right or vise versa. However, there is a drawback in this art that it requires a lot of labor in detaching the set screws, reattaching the door and the like.
Further, if the set screws are not screwed tight enough or if they are screwed into holes which were formed as the set screws were unscrewed therefrom, the set screws lose their holding power and at worst the door may drop out of the open frame.
Consequently, it is too difficult to perform a repositioning operation with such type of hinges in the field, especially in a construction of a complex housing where a numerous number of doors are supposed to be attached in a shorter period of time. Such operation is in fact impossible to complete. Because of the above-mentioned reason, this type of conventional hinge is generally attached to a door prior to it is shipped, and a marking of the “left-type” or the “right-type” is applied on a package through a conventional manner, even though the hinge is basically structured as both types.
In addition, if the set screws (which are wood screws and are 30 mm to 40 mm in length and four to six of the screws are needed to obtain enough strength) are insufficiently attached, they tend to loosen as the door intermittently swings. Then, the door may indeed drop out of the open frame over the long term of use. In order to avoid such danger, when the conventional hinge is to be attached in the field, a power tool such as an electric screwdriver was used instead of a hand operated screwdriver. There is also a concern of decrease in a strength of the set screws caused by a worker of lower skill who fails to attach the set screws properly.
Further, since the hinge is repositioned in the door, there remains a lot of holes in the door where the set screws were once screwed into. Such remaining holes deteriorates the appearance of the door and the retentive of the wood screws as well.
Besides the above-described type of hinge, there is provided another type of hinge which is so called a horizontally connecting-disconnecting type, which is such that a door-side half of the hinge is provided with a opening mouth into which a horizontal member of a frame-side half is inserted along the width direction (which is the direction from the front side to the back side of the door or vise versa) of the door. This type of hinge is used both as the left-type and the right-type (See, for example, Japanese Provisional Patent Publication No. 9-317300).
According to this type of hinge, when an opening direction of the door is to be reversed in the field, it is unnecessary to reposition the door-side half of the hinge. However, the door may drop out of the open frame if set screws for the horizontal member loosen. Further, since the frame-side half of the hinge is not repositioned, the open frame is limited to use either as the left-type or the right-type. Therefore, it is required to produce the open frames of the left-type and the right-type as well.
When concerning a packing of a door, since each conventional hinge illustrated in
FIGS. 8
to
10
has vertical sleeve
63
protruding out of the door, the hinge may be damaged during a shipping process and a package of such door becomes larger and complicated. As a door handle
61
is fixed to a door with a single screw, it is easy to detach the handle
61
from the door prior to shipments. Contrary to this, a hi
Kubo Kiminori
Nakamoto Yusho
Sako Katsunori
Bannapradist Lisa
Frishauf Holtz Goodman & Chick P.C.
Kabushiki Kaisha Juken Sangyo
Knight Anthony
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