EP0965764B1 - Spring lock device - Google Patents

Spring lock device Download PDF

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Publication number
EP0965764B1
EP0965764B1 EP19990111560 EP99111560A EP0965764B1 EP 0965764 B1 EP0965764 B1 EP 0965764B1 EP 19990111560 EP19990111560 EP 19990111560 EP 99111560 A EP99111560 A EP 99111560A EP 0965764 B1 EP0965764 B1 EP 0965764B1
Authority
EP
European Patent Office
Prior art keywords
spring
rod
locking
lock device
spring lock
Prior art date
Legal status (The legal status is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the status listed.)
Expired - Lifetime
Application number
EP19990111560
Other languages
German (de)
English (en)
French (fr)
Other versions
EP0965764A2 (en
EP0965764A3 (en
Inventor
S.P.A. Univer
Current Assignee (The listed assignees may be inaccurate. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation or warranty as to the accuracy of the list.)
Univer SpA
Original Assignee
Univer SpA
Priority date (The priority date is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the date listed.)
Filing date
Publication date
Application filed by Univer SpA filed Critical Univer SpA
Publication of EP0965764A2 publication Critical patent/EP0965764A2/en
Publication of EP0965764A3 publication Critical patent/EP0965764A3/en
Application granted granted Critical
Publication of EP0965764B1 publication Critical patent/EP0965764B1/en
Anticipated expiration legal-status Critical
Expired - Lifetime legal-status Critical Current

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Classifications

    • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
    • F15—FLUID-PRESSURE ACTUATORS; HYDRAULICS OR PNEUMATICS IN GENERAL
    • F15B—SYSTEMS ACTING BY MEANS OF FLUIDS IN GENERAL; FLUID-PRESSURE ACTUATORS, e.g. SERVOMOTORS; DETAILS OF FLUID-PRESSURE SYSTEMS, NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
    • F15B15/00—Fluid-actuated devices for displacing a member from one position to another; Gearing associated therewith
    • F15B15/20—Other details, e.g. assembly with regulating devices
    • F15B15/26—Locking mechanisms
    • F15B15/262—Locking mechanisms using friction, e.g. brake pads

Definitions

  • the present invention relates to a spring lock device for high loads provided for preventing axial and/or rotational motion of a rod or elongated member in respect to a housing that surrounds and through which the same rod is axially sliding and/or rotates; in particular, the invention is directed to a spring lock device for locking a shaft or a rod of a machine, or of an actuator, for example a pneumatic cylinder or for any other application in which it is required to allow or to lock a movement of a member connected to or movably supported by a shaft or by the same rod.
  • the spring lock device according to the invention is particularly suitable for applications in any field; however, only by way of illustration of the innovative features of the invention, the spring lock device will be described hereinafter with reference to locking of a linearly movable shaft or rod of a pneumatic cylinder, without this having to be considered as limiting as regards other possible applications.
  • lock devices for shafts comprising locking jaws suitably hinged and provided with aligned holes for the shaft against which the two jaws are resiliently biased and urged to prevent any movement.
  • a pneumatically actuated thrusting member acts on the free ends of the jaws against counteraction springs to release the shaft, thus allowing again a linear movement.
  • a locking device of this kind is described for example in EP-A-0,824,994.
  • devices of this kind are able to achieve correct positioning of a shaft or a load at the locked condition, in practice they provide relatively small locking forces as a result of simple misalignment of the locking jaws.
  • each jaw is acting against the peripheral surface of the shaft with an edge of a side surface, high locking forces could cause irreparable damage to of the shaft or the rod to be locked; moreover the locking force of each jaw acts over a small arc of a circle, exerting locally a high pressure force which tends to engrave or to cut into the surface of the shaft.
  • Locking devices of this kind therefore require that the rod or the shaft to be made of, or lined with a very hard material, by using special steel or by subjecting the shaft to a rolling or surface hardening process.
  • these lock devices provide a clamping force which is equal to or slightly greater than the thrust exerted by a so-called “equivalent cylinder”, where "equivalent cylinder” is understood as meaning the thrust, in kilogrammes, exerted by a pneumatic cylinder in accordance with existing standards, having a diameter of the rod corresponding to the shaft to be locked.
  • a shaft of 12 mm diameter in accordance with the standards referred to above, corresponds to a cylinder having a diameter of 32 mm, to develop a thrust of about 48 kg with an air pressure of 6 atm, which must therefore be overcome by the locking device.
  • Spring lock devices are also known, to prevent axial and/or rotational motion of a rod with respect to a housing through which the rod is sliding or rotate; the device comprises at last one coil spring encircling or fitted over the rod, in which the coil spring has inside diameter slightly differing in respect to the peripheral diameter of the rod, and in which control means are provided for causing the coil spring to grip or disengage the rod, preventing or respectively allowing a relative movement between the housing and the same rod.
  • the main object of the present invention is to provide a pneumatically controlled spring lock device which does not use any locking jaw, and which at the same time is able to provide the required high load locking force without damaging, by using at least one or more coil springs suitably and simply fitted over a shaft or a rod to be locked.
  • a further object of the present invention is to provide a spring lock device as referred to above which is able to differently distribute the locking forces over a wide area so as to significantly reduce the superficial stresses on the rod, ensuring at the same time high clamping forces and a greater safety factor.
  • Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a spring lock device which is constructionally simple, of low-cost and selectively actuable to control the locking force.
  • each coil of the spring by loosely supporting the spring or leaving each coil of the spring free to oscillate or slightly rotate around an axis orthogonal to the longitudinal axis of the shaft or rod, owing to the misalignment of the coils of the same spring, an increased locking force is obtained to more tightly gripping the rod or the shaft.
  • the spring lock device according to the invention may be made in any desired shape and size, with a normally open or disengaged spring, by envisaging a suitable form or arrangement of the spring itself as well as the thrusting member and the respective pressure actuated control device.
  • the device comprises an external casing 10 defining a chamber 11 for housing a spring locking member 16 which can be pneumatically actuated to prevent and allow a sliding and/or rotational movement of a shaft or rod 12 through guide openings 13, 14 which are axially aligned at the two ends of the casing 10, as shown.
  • Reference 15 in Fig. 1 denotes moreover a cover for the casing 10 comprising a pneumatic cylinder or pneumatically actuated control means 17 for the spring lock device as explained further below.
  • the innovative aspect of the lock device according to the invention resides in the use of a locking member 16 provided by at lest one coil spring having a required number of coils or turns, made from steel wire of suitable diameter, as schematically shown.
  • the coil spring 16 is encircling the rod 12 and is intended to clamp its coils against the rod 12 so as to lock movement upon actuation.
  • the coil spring 16 is therefore of "normally open” type; for the purposes of the present invention, the expression “normally open” is understood as meaning a coil spring loosely supported by the rod 12 which, in the unstressed condition, have an internal diameter of the coils slightly larger, for example a few tenths of a millimeter greater than the peripheral diameter of the rod 12 against which the said coil spring 12 locks as a result of the gripping force caused by a twisting or coiling action of the control means 17 on the spring itself.
  • each end terminates at each end with shaped arms 16A and 16B which are inwardly bent, the end portion of each arm 16A, 16B being bent in a direction parallel to the longitudinal axis of the coil spring 16.
  • the coil spring 16 is loosely fitted over the rod 12, inside the chamber 11 of the casing 10 to allow each coil of the spring 16 to freely perform a slight longitudinal and/or rotational movement in respect to the rod 12, about an axis perpendicular to the same rod, so as to considerably increase the locking force, as will be explained further on.
  • the gripping action of the coil spring 16 against the rod 12 is performed by a thrust member 18 actuated by a pneumatic cylinder inside the cover 15 of the lock device.
  • the thrust member 18 is in the form of a fork-shaped member downwardly pending from a piston 19 of a pneumatic cylinder.
  • the arms of the fork member 18 have facing sides 18' outwardly slanted or diverging towards the coil spring 16 to engage the arms 16A and 16B of the same coil spring 16.
  • the piston member 19 of the pneumatic cylinder is normally urged toward the lock spring 16 by back springs 20 provided between the piston member 19 and the bottom wall of the cover 15.
  • Pressurized air is fed into a side of the piston chamber 21 facing the casing 10, by a feeding conduit 22, while the other side is vented to the atmosphere by a venting hole 15A.
  • the coil spring 16 is normally open that is it does not grip the rod 12 when pressurized air is fed into the piston chamber 21; therefore, in the absence of pressurized air the back spring 20 prevails to forward the piston 19 and the thrust member 18 against the arms 16A, 16B to close the coils of the lock spring 16 against the rod 12 gripping the same; therefore the spring lock device of figure 1 may be referred to as a normally locked device. Obviously by reversing the disposition of the back springs 20 and the air feeding, the spring lock device will be in the form of a normally unlocked device.
  • the lock spring 16 is loosely supported by the rod 12 to allow each coil to freely twist and/or rotate around an axis orthogonal to the longitudinal axis of the rod 12, causing twisting of the coils merely by a pushing action on the arms 16A and 16B of the same coil spring. Consequently the coils of the spring 16 will tend to adhere tightly against the peripheral surface of the rod 12, with an increase of the gripping force.
  • Figures 4 and 5 show a second solution similar to the solution of figures 1 and 2, which makes use of a thrust member of different type; therefore in this case also, the same reference numbers as in the preceding example have been used to indicate similar or equivalent parts.
  • FIG. 4 uses a normally open locking spring 16 which is similar to the locking spring 16 of figure 1, with the difference that the spring 16 in Figures 4 and 5 has intersecting arms 16A and 16B against which a disk-shaped thrust member 24 acts.
  • the thrust member 24 is in turn connected to the piston 19 of the pneumatic cylinder via a connecting pin 25 sliding through a guiding hole in partition wall 26 which closes the bottom side of the piston chamber 21 of the cylinder.
  • Back springs 20 are again provided on the side of the piston member 19 which is opposite to the side in which the air feeding conduit 22 opens.
  • the coil spring 16 comes directly into contact with the rod 12 which, consequently, must be made of suitable material or treated to have a harden surface.
  • a protective annular member between the locking spring 16 and the rod 12 such as a bushing or an intermediate coil spring of material which is softer than the steel material of the rod 12 so as to avoid scoring or damage to the same rod.
  • Figure 8 of the drawings shows a further embodiment which makes use of a pair of locking springs 32, 33 which are co-axially arranged to the rod 12; each spring 32, 33 is provided with respective shaped arms 32A, 32B and 33A, 33B so as to be made close and lock the rod 12 by using a single pressure actuator control device 17, in the manner described above.
  • the two locking springs 32 and 33 may be oppositely wound as shown, or in the same direction.
  • the use of two or more separate locking springs, compared to a single spring of the preceding examples, in certain cases allows an improvement in the locking conditions, also providing an anti-rotational action in the opposite directions.
  • the locking device are usually actuated by cylinders supplied with air at 6 atm (6 x 10 5 Pa) , to which a thrust of 48 kg corresponds for the test cylinder, it is obvious that with a locking device according to the present invention it is possible to obtain locking forces of up to twice and several times greater than that which can be obtained with a conventional locking device.
EP19990111560 1998-06-17 1999-06-15 Spring lock device Expired - Lifetime EP0965764B1 (en)

Applications Claiming Priority (2)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
ITMI981387 1998-06-17
ITMI981387 IT1301738B1 (it) 1998-06-17 1998-06-17 Dispositivo di bloccaggio a molla, per unita' di comando a movimentolineare.

Publications (3)

Publication Number Publication Date
EP0965764A2 EP0965764A2 (en) 1999-12-22
EP0965764A3 EP0965764A3 (en) 2000-11-02
EP0965764B1 true EP0965764B1 (en) 2004-12-08

Family

ID=11380266

Family Applications (1)

Application Number Title Priority Date Filing Date
EP19990111560 Expired - Lifetime EP0965764B1 (en) 1998-06-17 1999-06-15 Spring lock device

Country Status (3)

Country Link
EP (1) EP0965764B1 (it)
DE (1) DE69922444T2 (it)
IT (1) IT1301738B1 (it)

Cited By (2)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
DE102005003613A1 (de) * 2005-01-26 2006-07-27 Rexroth Mecman Gmbh Druckmittelzylinder mit einer Klemmvorrichtung
DE102006034469A1 (de) * 2005-12-28 2007-07-05 Volkswagen Ag Befestigungssystem zur aktiven radialen Klemmung von axial verschiebbaren Lagerelementen

Families Citing this family (4)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
DE19934750B4 (de) * 1999-06-07 2010-03-11 Frenotech Establishment Feststelleinrichtung
US6907961B2 (en) * 2002-06-11 2005-06-21 Cooper Cameron Corporation Apparatus and method for retarding translation between two bodies
DE10344211A1 (de) * 2003-09-24 2005-04-21 Bosch Gmbh Robert Vorrichtung zur Positionseinhaltung einer drehbar oder verschiebbar gelagerten Welle
US10018009B2 (en) * 2015-02-26 2018-07-10 Cameron International Corporation Locking apparatus

Family Cites Families (9)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3230595A (en) * 1963-06-04 1966-01-25 Kedem Abraham Rod clamping device
US3874480A (en) * 1972-04-03 1975-04-01 Porter Co P L Friction brake mechanism
JPS522656A (en) * 1975-06-24 1977-01-10 Nhk Spring Co Ltd Chair
US4201096A (en) * 1977-12-19 1980-05-06 Raytheon Company Spring lock knob assembly
US4425987A (en) * 1980-06-16 1984-01-17 P. L. Porter Company Dual rotating mechanical lock
DE3328352A1 (de) * 1983-08-05 1985-02-14 Robert Bosch Gmbh, 7000 Stuttgart Bremseinrichtung fuer arbeitszylinder oder dergl.
DE3810388A1 (de) * 1988-03-26 1989-10-05 Kontec Gmbh Vorrichtung zum festspannen eines linear bewegbaren, langgestreckten bauteils
US5150771A (en) * 1990-05-11 1992-09-29 P. L. Porter Company Coil spring or friction-lock mechanisms
CH689114A5 (de) * 1996-08-23 1998-10-15 Pwb Ag Feststellvorrichtung einer Linearbewegungseinheit.

Cited By (2)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
DE102005003613A1 (de) * 2005-01-26 2006-07-27 Rexroth Mecman Gmbh Druckmittelzylinder mit einer Klemmvorrichtung
DE102006034469A1 (de) * 2005-12-28 2007-07-05 Volkswagen Ag Befestigungssystem zur aktiven radialen Klemmung von axial verschiebbaren Lagerelementen

Also Published As

Publication number Publication date
ITMI981387A1 (it) 1999-12-17
EP0965764A2 (en) 1999-12-22
IT1301738B1 (it) 2000-07-07
DE69922444D1 (de) 2005-01-13
EP0965764A3 (en) 2000-11-02
DE69922444T2 (de) 2005-12-08

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