Land vehicles – Wheeled – Attachment
Patent
1994-10-24
1997-03-18
Camby, Richard M.
Land vehicles
Wheeled
Attachment
180184, B62D 5508
Patent
active
056115725
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a splash guard for a tracked vehicle. The tracked vehicle including a track unit, which includes a frame, a track wheel, possible auxiliary wheels and a track. The splash guard is placed in the immediate vicinity of the track and is attached to the track unit by means of a support. In particular, this invention relates to a splash guard for a motor sled.
BACKGROUND ART
The splash guard of a motor sled is normally a splash flap made of rubber which is attached to the frame of the motor sled so that it hangs freely from its upper edge somewhat behind the track unit. The splash guard is generally attached to the rear of the frame by screws having relatively large washers.
The splash guard suffers from poor durability and poor performance. A splash guard that is attached at its upper part tends to turn even at low speeds, due to air flow and snow and slush hitting the flap, to a position such that the snow and the slush flying from the rotating track can fly nearly unhindered underneath the flap.
When the motor sled is run on a terrain or when the flexible play between the track and the frame of the motor sled otherwise decreases during the travel, a freely swinging splash guard may touch the forward moving upper part of the track so that the upper part of the track pulls the splash flap partly on top of the track. In this position, the splash flap does not prevent the rotating track from flinging snow and slush far away behind the motor sled. Sometimes the splash flap, which has been pulled on top of the roll, does not return to the original position but the motor sled has to be stopped and the splash flap has to be drawn by hand away from the top of the track. This drawback may of course be improved by shortening the splash flap, but this results in an even poorer splash guarding.
The patent publication EP 0391 282 describes a light terrain vehicle in which the splash guard is attached to the track unit so that it moves with the up and down motions of the track unit. The distance between the splash guard and the track is constant and sufficiently small to prevent the snow and slush flinging from the rotating track from flying behind the vehicle. The drawback with this splash guard is, however, that the rotating track quickly wears out the splash guard as it hits the wall of the splash guard. Furthermore, the splash guard has a shape that cannot completely prevent the snow from being thrown behind the vehicle.
SUMMARY OF THE PRESENT INVENTION
The object of the present invention is to obtain a decisive improvement and substantially eliminate the above drawbacks. This object is achieved by the structure of a splash guard according to the present invention. The splash guard includes, on the side facing the track, preferably two slide rails extending in the longitudinal direction of the track. That is, the splash guard and the track are fitted to slide against the slide rails as the splash guard touches the track due to the up and down motions of the track unit during travel. The splash guard according to the invention is attached to the track unit of the motor sled at two points on the opposite sides relative to the longitudinal axis, of, for example, the rearmost track wheel, so that the front part of the splash guard starts at least from the front of the rearmost track wheel and extends in the immediate vicinity of the track curving behind the track nearly to the level of the lower surface of the track.
The invention will be described in details in the following with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 represents schematically the track unit of a tracked vehicle seen from the side and
FIG. 2 represents a cross-section of the splash guard according to this invention.
FIG. 3 represents a cross-section of the splash guard showing another embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 4 is a cross-sectional view of another embodiment of the splash guard and the rearmost track wheel.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF
REFERENCES:
patent: 1314225 (1919-08-01), Souchek
patent: 1759793 (1930-05-01), Lund
patent: 2197183 (1936-08-01), Keeler
patent: 2982584 (1961-05-01), Uemura
patent: 4146101 (1979-03-01), Plourde
patent: 4174653 (1979-11-01), Appelblatt
patent: 4613006 (1986-09-01), Moss et al.
Derwent's abstract, No. 78-J5071A/43, week 7843, Abstract of SU, 583020 (Polshakov) 17 Dec. 1977.
Camby Richard M.
Vanaman Frank
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