Land vehicles: bodies and tops – Bodies – Seats with body modifications
Reexamination Certificate
2000-03-06
2001-10-09
Pape, Joseph D. (Department: 3612)
Land vehicles: bodies and tops
Bodies
Seats with body modifications
Reexamination Certificate
active
06299230
ABSTRACT:
DESCRIPTION
The invention relates to an appliance for the rapidly releasable, displaceable and rapid-retention fixing of a piece of vehicle equipment, such as a seat, a bench seat, a table or the like, in a vehicle, in particular a motor vehicle. In particular, but not exclusively, the invention relates to a rapid-retention seat rail which is provided for arrangement between the vehicle floor and the seat and allows simple and convenient adjustment and also removal of the seat.
Customary appliances for rapid adjustment of seats, in particular seats with integral safety belts in vehicles, customarily comprise two rails, between which balls are provided for the purpose of support. One of the rails is firmly connected to the seat and the other is firmly connected to the body. However, these known appliances provide only a limited adjustment range and also do not allow the seat to be released rapidly and in a simple manner from the body when required.
DE-A-195 20 959 has disclosed a quick-change fitting, in particular for multi-hole rails in aircraft. The known fitting comprises a housing in which mushroom-shaped feet are mounted, these being actuable by means of an eccentrically mounted pivoting lever to fix or release the fitting by means of clamping. A peg is furthermore provided on the housing of the known appliance and is intended to engage in the slot of the multi-hole rail to provide guidance, an eccentric shaft mounted in the housing and having the feet fixed to it being longitudinally displaceable in the released state, with the result that the peg arranged between the feet is spaced apart from the feet to a variable extent. This known quick-change fitting is thus suitable for achieving rapidly releasable fixing of, for example, seats in an aircraft, but there is no possibility of adjustment or displacement, in particular adjustability with the possibility of retention. Due to the variable spacing between the pegs and the feet, the arrangement of the quick-change fitting can furthermore be inconvenient and time-consuming, and there is the additional risk that the fitting will not be arranged completely outside the holes in the multi-hole rail, with the result that unintended disengagement can occur. Finally, there is also inadequate reliability with the known appliance since fixing is exclusively by frictional engagement.
GB-A-2 219 493 discloses a seat anchoring system, a seat fixed to a support being fixed to a floor rail, a member with clamping elements being fixed to the support. The clamping elements can engage in apertures in the floor rail to fix the support. This document also discloses a clamping device which is fixed to the support and can be rotated by means of a lever to move the block upward and the support downward, thereby fixing the clamping elements to the floor rail. However, the known anchoring system has the disadvantage that it has a complex structure, with the result, in particular, that it has a high unit price and does not allow rapid-retention fixing of the seat.
It is therefore the object of the present invention to provide a simple and rapid-retention fixing appliance for a piece of vehicle equipment.
According to the invention, this object is achieved by an appliance in accordance with claim
1
. Preferred embodiments are the subject matter of the dependent claims.
Accordingly, it is advantageously made possible to fix any piece of vehicle equipment in a vehicle in a rapidly releasable manner, this fixing making possible displacement or adjustment and rapid and convenient retention and satisfying high standards of reliability. In particular, the appliance should additionally ensure, on the one hand, that fixing is reliable at all times and, on the other hand, that unintended release of fixing is excluded, even if acted upon by high forces.
In particular, the invention provides a very reliable appliance for the rapidly releasable, displaceable and rapid-retention fixing of a piece of vehicle equipment, such as a seat, in particular a seat with a safety belt, in a vehicle, such as a motor vehicle or even an aircraft or the like. The appliance according to the invention comprises a housing and clamping elements protruding from the housing, preferably at least three clamping elements, each of which has at least one projection in order to engage behind a protrusion on the vehicle or a fixing part fixed on the latter, in particular a multi-hole slotted rail. The appliance comprises at least one displaceable first tightening element, on which the clamping elements can be fixed individually or in groups and which can be displaced in a direction in which the desired clamping effect is achieved. In particular, the first tightening element is displaceable in a vertical direction. The movement of the first tightening element can be guided by a guide of the clamping elements or by a device to be provided separately, e.g. sliding rails or a special configuration of the housing. At least one second tightening element is furthermore provided, this being movable essentially perpendicular to the first tightening element and bringing about a displacement of the first tightening element and thus likewise of the clamping elements. In particular, the second tightening element is displaceable in a horizontal direction. The displacement of the second tightening element causes the first tightening element and thus also the clamping elements fixed to it to be displaced and, in particular, raised so as to achieve a clamping effect by frictional engagement, and, in particular, the abovementioned protrusion is clamped between the housing and the projections. Finally, the appliance according to the invention also comprises a positioning device which has a fixed spacing from the clamping elements and is provided to effect a releasable force-maintained connection to the vehicle or the fixing component fixed to the latter.
Thanks to the combination of force-maintained engagement of the positioning device and the frictional engagement produced by the clamping elements, it is possible to achieve a connection which is very strong overall and which is not released even when acted upon by large forces. The fixed spacing between the positioning device and the clamping elements furthermore prevents the clamping elements from slipping and thus prevents possible disengagement. Once the positioning device and the clamping elements have been released, displacement can take place, which can be arrested rapidly by means of the positioning device, after which it is sufficient to move the clamping elements back into engagement by a relative motion of the tightening elements. It is particularly advantageous here if the clamping elements are coupled mechanically to the positioning device. On the one hand, this thus provides the possibility of locking or releasing the appliance by simple actuation. On the other hand, this provides the possibility of allowing the release of the clamping elements only when the positioning device has been released or vice versa.
According to the invention, the tightening elements have mutually opposite complementary surfaces, these being designed as oblique or wedge faces. This is a particularly simple means of converting a vertical movement of the second tightening element linearly into a horizontal displacement of the first tightening element. With appropriate alignment, the provision of wedge faces can additionally increase the reliability of the appliance. If, for instance, the appliance is mounted in a motor vehicle, the wedge faces can be aligned in such a way that in the case of a braking action, for example, the clamping effect of the clamping elements is increased by virtue of the occurring inertia forces by means of the conversion via the oblique faces. In the case of a particularly simple configuration, it would be possible, by way of example, for a first tightening element to be provided for each clamping element, in which case an oblique face would have to be provided in each case for its actuation. If a plurality of clamping elements is fixed in a g
Carpenter Scott
Casella Anthony J.
Hespos Gerald E.
Pape Joseph D.
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