Music timer

Details Music timer Music timer

2000-11-15

2001-10-09

Hsieh, Shih-Yung (Department: 2837)

Music

Instruments

Automatic

C084S094200, C084S095100, C084S095200, C446S404000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06300548

ABSTRACT:

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mechanical timer, particularly to a music timer that can play musical sound at a predetermined finishing time.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Conventional timers comprise a ticking mechanism, a power spring, an accelerating gear train and the ringing mechanism whose alarm bells ring usually when struck by the pendulum. However, there are apparent drawbacks of such a kind of timer: first, the sound produced by the alarm of the clock is monotonous; second, the duration of the alarm sound is short for it lasts only for about 5 seconds. Such a short monotonous sound of the conventional timers may produce a noisy impression, especially in quiet rooms, and it may even scare people.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In view of the foregoing disadvantages in the prior art, the object of the present invention is to provide a music timer that can play musical sound for a long time at a predetermined finishing time.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a music timer with a smaller projected cross section.
The objects of the present invention are thus realized: the music timer comprises a timing unit, a music box unit and a mounting frame, wherein the timing unit includes:
a ticking mechanism with a relatively regular ticking cycle;
a driving spring with a reel that serves as the source of power for the ticking mechanism;
an accelerating gear train, used to increase the winding speed of the rotary axis of the spring when said spring is released and transmit it to the ticking mechanism.
Said music box unit comprises:
a sound plate with comb-like vibrating teeth;
a roller that has many ejector pins on its outer circumference surface, said roller having a rotary axis and said sound plate, which is installed in the radial direction on the roller with the end of its comb-like vibrating teeth engaging with the ejector pins of said roller;
a driving spring having a reel, the reel serving as the source of power for said roller;
an accelerating gear train, used to increase the winding speed of the rotary axis of the spring when said spring is released and to transmit the power to the rotary axis of the roller;
a damping member, which is in engagement with said accelerating gear train and which can damp down the rotary movement of the accelerating gear train;
characterizing in that it also includes:
a music control wheel with a gap along its edge, and said control wheel is driven by the rotary axis of the driving spring of the timing unit through the spinning gear;
a brake rod, which is pivoted on a column of said mounting frame in the middle, its arm connected with a spring mechanism under whose force one end a of the rod is always pressed tightly against the edge of said music control wheel, while the other end b of the brake rod extends into the damping member of the music box unit in order to effect activation when the end a is pressed against the place of said music control wheel where there is no gap, and when the end a of the brake rod extends into the gap of said music control wheel the end b then moves away from the damping member of the music box unit, thus exerting no influence on the movement of the music box unit.
Compared with the prior arts, the present invention combines the mechanical timer with the music box ingeniously, enabling the timer to generate pleasant and lasting music at the end of the timing. Meanwhile, as the musical sound is generated by the music box unit having a damping member, it is smooth and can last an adequate time of more than 30 second. Furthermore, as a result of the reasonable spatial arrangement, the projected cross section of the present invention is much smaller than the sum of those of the timer and the music box unit and is only as large as any one of them; therefore, it is more convenient for use.


REFERENCES:
patent: 4319101 (1982-03-01), Bolin
patent: 4450939 (1984-05-01), Kitamura
patent: 4464969 (1984-08-01), Isaka et al.
patent: 4890528 (1990-01-01), Kamijima
patent: 5543577 (1996-08-01), Zhu et al.
patent: 5703305 (1997-12-01), Isaka

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