Fire escape – ladder – or scaffold – Single stile – strand or pole – Flexible
Patent
1999-06-04
2000-02-29
Chin-Shue, Alvin
Fire escape, ladder, or scaffold
Single stile, strand or pole
Flexible
182192, 182 5, 188 655, A63B 2900
Patent
active
060297778
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The present application relates to a descender for use in abseiling and belaying and in particular to an improved descender of the type which incorporates a self-acting brake.
Abseiling is a technique used to descend steep surfaces such as cliff faces and is often used by persons involved in activities such as mountain climbing, canyoning and caving. In order to abseil down a cliff face, one end of a rope is made fast at the top of the cliff and the person making descent then slides down the rope. The rope is passed either around the body of the person or, more usually, through a descender attached to a harness worn by the person such that the passage of the rope around the body or through the descender provides sufficient friction to slow the rate of descent to a safe speed.
A descender comprises rope engaging services around and between which the rope travels along a tortuous path, to provide frictional engagement between the rope and the descender. The rate of descent is normally controlled by holding the free or tail end of the rope to control the tension on the rope where it emerges from the descender and thereby to control the degree of friction engagement between the rope and descender which in turn controls the rate of descent.
Descenders used in abseiling vary greatly in performance and complexity, there being a variety of relatively simple devices which rely on frictional engagement between the rope and metal rings or racks about which the rope is wrapped, and a number of more complex descenders which incorporate a braking mechanism which allows friction between the rope and descender to be varied other than by simply controlling the free or tail end of the rope. The earliest of these more complex devices have a handle or lever which when operated tended to increase the friction between the descender and the rope. This type of descender was not a great improvement over the more simple devices as the brake was not self engaging and therefore, if the user was knocked unconscious, he or she would fall in the same way as a user of the earlier devices.
A number of devices now include automatic braking mechanisms in which a handle is operated by a person using descender to control their speed of descent and if the handle is released a brake actuates and prevents a user falling uncontrollably. Australian Patent Application No 16132/95 discloses such a descender which provides an automatic locking system for the descender operated by a lever, in which operation of the lever by a person using descender releases a braking means and allows the person to descend, and in which should the person using descender release the lever, the braking system will automatically apply and prevent the person falling uncontrollably.
A similar type of descender is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,596,314.
There are two problems associated with the descenders of the type shown in AU 16132/95. The first problem is that the descender cannot be used for belaying. Belaying is a well known technique, used in climbing. A climber (the belayee) will descend or climb a cliff face, or the like, while roped to the cliff face via pitons. A belayer will hold the rope and allow the belayee only as much rope as he or she requires in order to move a short distance up or down the cliff face. Thus, if the belayee falls their fall will be arrested by the rope and the belayer. However, descenders such as that shown in AU 16132/95 cannot be used for belaying.
A second disadvantage of the descender described in AU 16132/95 is that the rate of descent cannot be preselected by a person using the device as a descender.
It is an object of the present invention to alleviate one or more of the abovementioned disadvantages.
Thus, according to the present invention there is provided a descender for use in abseiling, or belaying, comprising:
a base having a connection means for connecting the descender to a harness or the like;
an arm pivotally mounted on the base at a pivot axis extending generally normal to the base;
the base having first and second spaced p
REFERENCES:
patent: 252829 (1882-01-01), Williams
patent: 300248 (1884-06-01), Green
patent: 682869 (1901-09-01), Hammerly
patent: 899984 (1908-09-01), Huffman
patent: 1242286 (1917-10-01), Weinandt
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