Supports: racks – Shelf type – Shelves
Reexamination Certificate
1998-04-09
2001-10-16
Stodola, Daniel P. (Department: 3634)
Supports: racks
Shelf type
Shelves
C211S150000, C248S242000, C108S006000, C108S152000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06302282
ABSTRACT:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
None.
STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH
Not applicable.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Shelving is widely employed in the retail merchandising of products. Where merchandise is both stacked and displayed on shelves for direct access by the customer, a number of design considerations for the display technique come to bear. The shelving should be both aesthetically pleasing and exhibit an openness permitting both a desirable customer visualization of the product and an open ease of manual access to it. Such criteria usually call for a cantilevered structure extending to an aisle from upstanding mounts located at each end of a display bay. Very often, the products supported for display, collectively, are relatively heavy. For instance, caulking gun refills, paints, and the like can require a shelf structural capability for retaining about 400 pounds worth of merchandise. Such requirements have in the past led to solid shelf structures evidencing quite robust structuring with size and bulk militating against desirable aspects of customer access and the aesthetics of customer visualization.
Because consumer demand for products generally varies with time and the products displayed by merchants change, it is preferable that display shelving system have a modularity to it. The shelves, for the most part, are mounted using a hook or notch plate and slot connector structure, the slots being formed in standards which, in turn, are either mounted upon a store wall or upon aisle defining supports which are either L-shaped or have the shape of inverted T. In the retail trade, the aisle defining shelf and support systems are referred to as “gondolas”.
In addition to being aesthetically pleasing and capable of carrying substantial loads, retailers also prefer that display shelving be relatively light in weight in and of itself, inasmuch as store personnel very often are called upon to move them about, adjust shelf heights and the like. For some displays, it is particularly desirable that some form of tilt downwardly or upwardly from horizontal, i.e. a sloping attitude be made available. In such an arrangement, the display can be made more visual to the customer and a feed forward form of stacking of product becomes more simply provided. Such attitude or tilt adjustment calls for some form of pivoting structure at the rear of the shelves, and robust tiltable structures generally defeat the aesthetic attributes of the shelving because of the large forces imposed on their components such as bolts which permit pivotal adjustment at the rear of the shelf.
Associated with essentially all shelving displays is a requirement for signage at the front of the shelves. Generally, the signage is provided at the front edge of the shelf where it may be difficult for the customer to read. This particularly holds true where the shelves are canted downwardly and the edge signs cannot be tilted upwardly for customer visualization. Such situation also holds true for shelves at higher levels where vertical signage must be read at a visual angle from the customer's eye station.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is addressed to an improved, open frame display shelf assembly which is configured for use with conventional, pre-existing shelf supports or gondolas. A salient feature of the shelves is a bracket assembly which permits facila tilting or changing of the attitude of the shelves, while remaining unobtrusive due to its compact size. Notwithstanding its compact size, the bracket assembly is structurally robust, importantly due to a geometry featuring three connectors provided as steel bolts and arranged in a triangular pattern. These connectors include a pivot bolt and two outboard bolts located within arcuately disposed apertures spaced a predetermined radius away from the center of the pivot bolt. The outboard connector bolts are angularly spaced apart a predetermined and mandated angle with respect to the position of the pivot bolt. This is achieved through the use of two, sheet steel bracket adjusting components, one of which is fixed to a sidewall of the open frame shelving and the other of which incorporates two conventional notch plates or hooks which are inserted within the slots of a conventional supporting standard. The pivot bolt connects these two adjusting components in a pivoting relationship. One component is formed having one or more arrays of attitude defining apertures regularly spaced along arcuate loci. Such aperture spacing corresponds with a predetermined radially defined angle with respect to the pivot bolt. The second adjusting component is formed with one or more arrays of pairs of apertures, those paired apertures being located at radii which are angularly separated by the predetermined and mandated angle, for example 18°. Store personnel who adjust the amount of tilt or attitude of the shelves can insert the outboard connector bolts only through aligned apertures located at the mandated angle of spacing. All other apertures of the two adjusting components will be blocked. Thus, the structural integrity of this tri-strut bracket assembly geometry is assured without resort to written instructions, labels or the like describing necessary outboard connector bolt positioning.
The open frame shelf assemblies each are formed with walls positioned at each of the four sides. These walls are configured having receptor slots into which merchandise retaining components such as U-shaped guideways and the like may be inserted. The receptor gaps are accessible from either side of the shelves. In this regard, the shelves may be mounted with the sidewalls facing downwardly or upwardly at the desire of the user. To provide for this reversible arrangement, one adjusting component, that carrying the hooks, is switched from one side of the shelf to the other.
The shelving assembly also features a sign mount which is connectable with the forward wall and which contains two couplers and a sign engaging surface. The entire mount may be rotated or tilted in correspondence with the tilt or attitude of the shelf itself. Thus, the tilting signage may be provided to accommodate low or high positioned shelves as well as shelves which have been tilted either upwardly or downwardly.
Other objects of the invention will, in part, be obvious and will, in part, appear hereinafter. The invention, accordingly, comprises the system and apparatus possessing the construction, combination of elements, and arrangement of parts which are exemplified in the following detailed description.
REFERENCES:
patent: 942965 (1909-12-01), Kramer
patent: 945280 (1910-01-01), Lindberg
patent: 1440883 (1923-01-01), Millice
patent: 1915371 (1933-06-01), Lowman
patent: 2949323 (1960-08-01), Moorhead
patent: 3080980 (1963-03-01), Gibbons
patent: 3082986 (1963-03-01), Campanizzi
patent: 3151576 (1964-10-01), Patterson
patent: 3417872 (1968-12-01), Close
patent: 3426993 (1969-02-01), Johansson
patent: 3490600 (1970-01-01), Reed et al.
patent: 3508665 (1970-04-01), Goldstein et al.
patent: 3550891 (1970-12-01), Scott
patent: 3561713 (1971-02-01), Berkowitz
patent: 3665377 (1972-05-01), MacKenzie, Jr.
patent: 3795379 (1974-03-01), Gray
patent: 4065088 (1977-12-01), Shell
patent: 4098480 (1978-07-01), Neumann
patent: 4350098 (1982-09-01), Shirono et al.
patent: 4552272 (1985-11-01), Field
patent: 4730738 (1988-03-01), Bartus et al.
patent: 4934645 (1990-06-01), Breslow
patent: 5738019 (1998-04-01), Parker
Gay Kenneth F.
Gay Kenneth R.
Mueller and Smith, EPA
Stodola Daniel P.
Tran Khoa
LandOfFree
Open frame shelf assembly does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.
If you have personal experience with Open frame shelf assembly, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Open frame shelf assembly will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-2614721