CN110382807B

CN110382807B - Hinge for hinging openable parts of the hood type for closing an engine compartment on a motor vehicle body

Info

Publication number: CN110382807B
Application number: CN201880014099.7A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 达米安·贝塞特
Original assignee: PSA Automobiles SA
Current assignee: PSA Automobiles SA
Priority date: 2017-02-24
Filing date: 2018-01-23
Publication date: 2021-09-28
Anticipated expiration: 2038-01-23
Also published as: CN110382807A; EP3585966A1; FR3063301A1; FR3063301B1; WO2018154203A1

Abstract

The invention relates to a hinged hinge (4) for hinging openable parts of the hood type closing an engine compartment on the body of a motor vehicle, the hinge (4) comprising a fixed part (5) and a movable part (6), the movable part (6) being mounted so as to be rotatably drivable about a pivot axis (A) of the fixed part (5) between an open position and a closed position of the hinge (4), the movable part (6) having a retaining element (7) which extends in a pivot plane of the hinge (4) projecting from the movable part (6) to the fixed part (5). The invention is characterized in that the fixed part (5) comprises a complementary retaining element (8) along which the retaining element (6) of the movable part extends in the closed position of the hinge (4).

Description

Hinge for hinging openable parts of the hood type for closing an engine compartment on a motor vehicle body

Technical Field

The invention relates to a hinge for an openable component of a motor vehicle, which comprises a body structure on which body components such as openable components are assembled, which body structure is realized by assembling a substructure and at least one cockpit side, and the openable component is hinged on the body structure by the at least one hinge.

Background

Hinge hinges are known which comprise a fixed portion defining an axis of rotation about which a movable joint is adapted to pivot in order to move an openable part, such as a hood for closing an engine compartment, between an open position and a closed position.

The hinge joint of the hood for closing the engine compartment is generally made of a material with minimal resistance to deformation, which allows easy forming and has the advantage of being less expensive.

Such hinges are insufficient to adequately maintain the hood connected to the vehicle body structure by the hinge when the vehicle collides with an obstacle, which results in vehicle defects with respect to certain regulatory standards.

In fact, it is noted that the hinge is not sufficient to resist the lateral movements of the engine upon impact, which increases the risk of deformation of the surrounding bodywork parts, such as the front wing portion.

In particular, in the event of a repairable frontal impact crash, defined as a 40% coverage collision at 16km/h, facing a rigid wall with 10 °, moving the hood laterally (along the longitudinal axis Y of the vehicle) to the outside of the hood also causes deformation of the flaps and therefore additional maintenance costs related to the replacement or repair of the flaps.

To avoid such displacement in the Y direction, the movable portion or movable joint of the hinge may be strengthened. However, such reinforcement leads to a reduction in the pedestrian head impact performance, since the deformation stroke of the movable joint between the hood and the engine element becomes considerably limited. The frontal impact can be repaired with 16km/h facing a 10 ° rigid wall with 40% coverage.

In FR 2993230 a hinge is proposed for hinging an openable part, such as an engine compartment cover on a motor vehicle body, the movable part of the hinge having a projection which extends from the movable part to the fixed part in the pivoting plane of the hinge. The fastening support of the hinge allows fastening the hinge to and constitutes a structural element of the vehicle body. The fastening plate of the support thus allows fastening the hinge in the Z direction (vertical axis of the vehicle) to the body of the vehicle, while the wall perpendicular to the fastening plate of the support makes it possible to fasten in the Y direction to the structural element of the body by means of its outer surface.

When the openable member fastened to the hinge movable portion is in the closed position, the projection of the projecting movable joint extends along the inner surface of the wall of the fastening support, so that the wall of the fastening support is interposed between the projection and the structural element to which the support is fastened, and in the event of frontal impact against the wall, the hood or openable member, which tends to be driven in translation in the direction Y of the vehicle, is arrested by abutment against the projection of the wall of the hinged fastening support, which is itself fastened to the structural element of the bodywork. Thus, in the event of a collision, the projection abuts against a wall of the fastening support, which is interposed between the projection and an element of the vehicle body, which enhances the retention of the hood and prevents the hood from tilting in the Y direction.

This solution allows avoiding the contact of the hinge with the right wing (in case of a left side collision) and therefore reducing the repair costs of the vehicle (gain in repairable class) in case of a collision at 16 km/h.

Despite the numerous advantages of such hinges, in certain vehicle profiles the positioning of the hinge is such that there are no structural elements facing the hinge that can fasten the hinge support, which is therefore fastened on the wing lining.

In fact, when a crash of the repairable frontal crash type, defined as a 40% coverage, impact at 16km/h facing a rigid wall with an angle of 10 °, without antagonistic structural elements, the lateral displacement of the hood (along the lateral axis Y of the vehicle) would cause deformation of the wings, which would result in additional maintenance costs related to the replacement or repair of the wings.

Disclosure of Invention

The present invention aims to overcome this drawback by proposing a hinge which can be mounted directly with respect to the wing, without the need for interposed structural elements, and which does not cause a lateral tilting of the hood-type openable member which damages the wing in the event of a crash of the type which can be repaired, while satisfying the constraints associated with head/pedestrian crashes.

To this end, the invention relates to a hinge for hinging openable parts of the hood type which close an engine compartment on the body of a motor vehicle, the hinge comprising a fixed part and a movable part mounted so as to be rotatably drivable about a pivot axis of the fixed part between an open position and a closed position of the hinge, the movable part having a retaining element which, in a pivot plane of the hinge, extends from the movable part to the fixed part, the hinge being characterized in that the fixed part comprises a complementary retaining element along which the retaining element of the movable part extends in the closed position of the hinge.

Advantageously, therefore, the hinge according to the invention comprises retaining elements for preventing the hood from deflecting in the event of a repairable collision, the retaining elements being arranged to extend facing each other so that, when the hinge is mounted on one side of the body of the vehicle, the retaining elements of the fixed portion are interposed between the retaining elements of the movable portion and the outside of the body, for example the wings of the body, and therefore, after a repairable collision on the opposite side, the retaining elements of the fixed portion prevent the hood from deforming laterally along the axis Y of the vehicle.

In fact, when the bonnet moves in the Y direction, the retaining elements of the movable part abut against the retaining elements of the fixed part, which allows to limit or even avoid deformations in the Y direction, and in particular to avoid damaging the wings.

According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the movable part of the hinge comprises a shape called a gooseneck, that is to say has at least one curved portion. The first curve of the movable part corresponds to a hook-shaped part which is pivotally mounted at the proximal end of the fixed part about the axis of the fixed part of the hinge, while the distal end of the movable part to which the hood is fastened may be straight or have a second curve of opposite curvature.

Preferably, the retaining element of the movable portion is a deformation-preventing projection which extends radially protrudingly on the distal end portion of the movable portion in the pivot plane of the movable portion with respect to the fixed portion, for example in a second curve with respect to the hood side. The fixed portion has a stopper element such as a holding projection provided on a distal end portion of the fixed portion so as to extend, with respect to the fixed portion, in a plane parallel to a pivoting plane of the movable portion, facing the deformation-preventing projection of the movable portion.

Such a hinge therefore allows to prevent the hood from deforming in the Y direction in the event of a so-called repairable collision, and moreover ensures good performance in the event of a collision with the head of a pedestrian, since the deformation stroke of the movable portion at the gooseneck is sufficient.

According to another preferred specific form of the present invention, the holding projection of the fixing portion is formed by an end of the distal end portion of the fixing portion by: the end portion is folded to extend perpendicularly with respect to the fixed portion and then extends again parallel to the fixed portion to face the deformation preventing projection so that in the closed position of the hinge, the deformation preventing projection of the movable portion extends against the holding projection to stop when the holding member is laterally moved, the holding member being on one side and in a position mounted on the vehicle body.

Thus, when the hinge is intended to be fastened to the wing lining, the fixing portion may comprise fastening means for fastening to a fastening support of the hinge, which fastening means are arranged opposite the stop element, so that the fastening support of the hinge extends on the opposite side of the fixing portion with respect to the stop element, whereby the retaining projection is located between the deformation-preventing projection and the wing.

Advantageously, therefore, the hinge according to a particular form of the invention makes it possible to place the bonnet laterally deformed in the direction Y, even without structural elements facing the hinge.

As described above, the deformation-preventing protrusion is integrally formed with the movable portion or the movable joint, so that the number of parts is reduced and the assembly of the hood is also facilitated.

Furthermore, advantageously, the hinge according to the invention can be used only on the side opposite to the impact. Therefore, the increase in mass is small.

The present invention relates to a vehicle body including at least one hinge for hinging an openable component such as a hood as described above according to the present invention, the hinge being mounted on the body such that a retaining element of a fixed portion of the hinge is interposed between a retaining element of a movable portion and an outer side of the body formed by at least wing portions, whereby in the event of a so-called restorative collision, a stopper element of the movable portion abuts against a stopper element of the fixed portion, which prevents the hood from moving laterally to the outer side of the body.

The hinge according to the invention can therefore be fastened to the wing lining, the hinge according to the invention avoiding damage to the wing by preventing deformation of the bonnet.

The present invention also relates to a motor vehicle including openable members such as a hood for closing an engine compartment, the openable members being hinged to a vehicle body by hinges for hinging the openable members, at least one of the hinges for hinging the openable members being a hinge according to the present invention.

Drawings

Further advantages and features of the invention emerge from a reading of the following description of an embodiment given with reference to the attached drawings:

FIG. 1 is a partial schematic view of a motor vehicle, seen from the side, comprising a hinge for hinging openable parts according to the invention,

figure 2 is a side view of a hinge according to the invention in the closed position;

figure 3 is a side perspective view of the opposite side of the hinge of figure 2;

figure 4 is a side perspective view of the hinge mounted on the body;

figure 5 is a simplified view of figure 4.

Detailed Description

Referring to fig. 1, a region D defined by a chain line positions a possible arrangement region of the hinge of the openable member 2 on the vehicle 1, which is advantageously used for protecting other parts around the vehicle body such as the front wing portion 3 in the event of a collision between the vehicle and an obstacle.

The openable member 2 is a closure cover of an engine compartment located at the front of the vehicle, which is a vehicle body member extending laterally through left and right front wing portions. Only the right front wing part 3 is shown in fig. 1, which is known to be present by symmetry with respect to a median plane extending parallel to the longitudinal axis x of the vehicle.

In the following, the terms "left", "right", "front" and "rear" are to be understood in accordance with the normal movement of the vehicle. This is non-limiting and for the sake of clarity in the following only one side of the vehicle is described, it being understood of course that, by symmetry, the other side of the vehicle may also relate to the same technical details.

The hinge 4 of the openable member is generally provided in the region D, that is, near the rear region of the hood 2.

Preferably, the motor vehicle comprises hinges 4 arranged in the region D of the vehicle, each hinge 4 being mainly used to ensure the opening or closing of the engine compartment by moving the hood 2 up and down, respectively. For this purpose, the hinge 4 comprises a hinge axis a about which the bonnet 2 can be moved rotatably.

In a simple and inexpensive design, the hinge 4 has a low impact resistance, especially when the impact generates lateral stresses relative to the vehicle. Thus, in order to avoid bending of the hinge 4 hinging the hood, which bending causes a lateral movement of the hood supported by this hinge 4 and thus damages the front wing, the hinge 4 is provided with means for preventing this lateral movement of the engine.

According to the illustrations given in fig. 2 and 3, the hinge 4 comprises a fixed portion, also called fastening knuckle, which is connected to the body structure of the vehicle by means of a fastening support.

In the example shown, the hinge 4 is positioned at the wing lining relative to the wing 3. The hinge 4 thus comprises a fixed part 5 or fastening section and a movable part 6 or movable section, the movable part 6 being pivotably driven relative to the movable part along a pivot axis a.

The fixed part 5 comprises a plate 51, which plate 51 mainly extends in the pivoting plane of the hinge 4. The fixation portion 5 comprises a distal portion 5b and a proximal portion 5a, the distal portion 5b extending along a first axis and the proximal portion 5a extending along a second axis intersecting the first axis. The proximal portion or connecting portion 5a comprises an axis a about which the movable portion 6 of the hinge 4 is driven in rotation.

The connecting portion 5b is oriented substantially vertically in the Z direction as mounted and comprises, at the end vertex of this connecting portion 5a, an aperture 10, this aperture 10 forming a bearing for a rod of complementary shape rotating along the axis a, this rod belonging to the movable joint 6, whereas the distal end portion of the fixed portion is oriented substantially in the longitudinal direction X (longitudinal direction of the vehicle).

The rod of the movable part 6 extends transversely to the outside of the vehicle. Preferably, the rod is arranged at the apex of the proximal portion 6a of the movable portion 6. The opposite distal end portion 6b of the forwardly positioned movable member 6 is connected to the engine hood 2 in an integrally connected manner by, for example, fastening screws.

The openable member 2 is composed of a decorative portion, which is visible from the outside of the vehicle, also referred to as an outer skin, and a rigid portion, also referred to as an openable member liner, which is connected to the movable portion 6.

Preferably, the movable part 6 has the shape of a gooseneck, that is to say has at least one curved shape. Thus, the proximal end portion 6a of the movable portion 6 is provided with a lever that allows the movable portion 6 to be pivotably mounted on the fixed portion 5. The proximal portion 6a extends along the proximal connecting portion 5b and then forms a first curve by moving away from the distal portion 5a of the fixed portion before extending linearly so that the distal portion 6b of the movable portion 6 extends substantially above the distal portion 5a and parallel to the distal portion 5 a. The distal end portion of the movable portion 6 has fastening means for fastening the hood 2.

At the distal end portion 6b of the movable portion 6, a holding element such as a projection 7 is provided, the projection 7 being provided to project from the movable portion 6, and the projection 7 extending in the plane in which the movable portion 6 pivots relative to the fastening tab 5 and towards the fastening segment 5.

Preferably, the projection 7 extends substantially radially to the distal portion 6c of the movable portion 6. The projection 7 thus forms a stop which projects from the movable joint 6 in the pivoting plane of the hinge 4.

Thus, the projection 7 is provided on the hinge 4 such that the projection 7 extends laterally from the movable portion 6 to the fixed portion 5 when the hood 2 is in a position to close the engine compartment.

However, the end of the projection 7 is spaced apart from the distal end portion 5b so as not to obstruct the downward depression (Z direction) of the movable portion 6 of the hinge in a pedestrian collision.

The projection 7 is made integral with the movable part 6, for example by moulding, stamping.

The distal part 5b of the fixed part 5 comprises a holding element 8, which holding element 8 extends protruding the fixed part 5 and forms a bearing surface against which the projection 7 of the movable part 6 should extend in the closed position of the hinge 4.

The stop element 8 is formed by the end of the plate 51 in the following way: this end portion is folded to extend in a direction perpendicular to the main axis of distal end portion 5a, and then folded again to extend again along an axis parallel to this main axis. The bearing surface 81 of the holding element 8 extends at a distance from the fixing portion 5, which allows positioning the projection 6 facing the bearing surface 81 of the stop element 8.

The distance separating the projection 7 from the bearing surface 81 of the stop element 8 is between 3 and 8mm, preferably 3mm, taking into account the clearance and the flushness that should be observed in the body part of the assembled vehicle.

Advantageously, such a small clearance limits all the inertia of the bonnet 2 in the event of a collision, which allows directly loading the lugs 7, while limiting the risk of impact force dispersion.

Once the hinge 4 is mounted on one side of the body, the retaining element 8 of the fixed part 5 is inserted between the retaining element 7 of the movable part 6 and the outside of the body. It is thus foreseen that the hinge 4 can be mounted on the wing lining 11 by the surface of this hinge 4 facing towards the outside and therefore towards the wing 3. Therefore, the holding member 8 is closest to the outside, and by forming a stopper for the holding member 7 of the hinge movable portion 6, the holding member 8 prevents the hood from moving laterally toward the outside in the event of a collision.

The fixing portion 5 of the hinge 4 can thus have fastening means for fastening on the wing lining, the side of the fixing portion 5 provided with which fastening means is opposite to the side on which the retaining element 8 is located. Therefore, the fastening plate 51 further includes a fastening portion 52, the fastening portion 52 including an aperture for fastening the fixing portion 5 to a hinge fastening support serving as a mounting interface for mounting on a vehicle body (as shown in fig. 3).

The articulation according to the invention allows a good compromise to be achieved between impacting the head of a pedestrian and a serviceable impact which is not achieved by strengthening the articulation. In fact, the articulated hinge according to the invention allows the hood and the hinge to be recessed freely, which is essential for a pedestrian head impact.

Claims

1. A hinged hinge (4) for an openable section of the type of a hinged hood (2) for closing an engine compartment on the body of a motor vehicle, the hinge (4) comprising a fixed part (5) and a movable part (6), the movable part (6) being mounted so as to be rotatably drivable about a pivot axis (A) of the fixed part (5) between an open position and a closed position of the hinge (4), the movable part (6) having a retaining element which protrudes from the movable part (6) in the pivot plane of the hinge (4) to extend to the fixed part (5), characterized in that the fixed part (5) comprises complementary retaining elements, the retaining elements of the movable part (6) extending along the retaining elements of the fixed part (5) in the closed position of the hinge (4),

the retaining element of the movable part (6) is a projection (7) which extends radially projecting on a distal end portion (6b) of the movable part (6) in a pivoting plane of the movable part (6) relative to the fixed part (5),

the retaining element of the fixed part (5) is a retaining lug (8) provided on a distal portion of the fixed part so as to extend with respect to the fixed part (5) facing the lug (7) of the movable part (6) in a plane parallel to the pivoting plane of the movable part (6),

and, the holding projection (8) of the fixing portion (5) is formed by the end of the distal end portion (5b) of the fixing portion by: the end portion is folded to extend perpendicularly with respect to the fixing portion (5) and then extends again parallel to the fixing portion.

2. Hinge (4) according to claim 1, characterized in that the retaining element of the fixed part (5) and the retaining element of the movable part (6) are arranged to extend facing each other so that, when the hinge is mounted on one side of the vehicle body, the retaining element of the fixed part (5) is interposed between the retaining element of the movable part (6) and the outside of the body.

3. A vehicle body comprising at least one hinge (4) for hinging an openable member according to any one of claims 1 to 2, the hinge being mounted on one side of the body, characterized in that a holding element of a fixed portion (5) of the hinge (4) is interposed between a holding element of the movable portion (6) and the outside of the body.

4. The vehicle body of claim 3, wherein the hinge is fastenable to a wing lining, the wing lining facing the wing.

5. A motor vehicle comprising openable members hinged on a body of the vehicle by hinges for hinging the openable members, at least one of the hinges being a hinge according to any one of claims 1 to 2.