FR2718052A1 - Large, mechanical, removable educational game. - Google Patents

Abstract

Building set comprised of a plurality of pieces capable of being assembled to produce a self-supporting vehicle of various shapes, wherein the set includes: a plurality of rigid tubular elements; a plurality of connection pieces for assembling two tubular elements; a set of mechanical fittings such as wheels, gears, shafts, linkages, rack, rods, chain, sleeves and struts, capable of being attached to one another and to the tube and connecting piece structure; and a set of decorative and seating fittings such as a seat, a back support, handles, housings and stationary elements capable of being attached to the tube and connecting piece structure.

Description

LARGE MECHANICAL EDUCATIONAL GAME,
REMOVABLE SHOWABLE.

 The present invention relates to a large mechanical educational game, which can be dismantled and assembled.

 A device described in French patent application FR2690407 is known in the prior art. This document discloses a multifunctional self-supporting toy. This toy can in particular take the form of a multifunction bicycle. I1 is composed of a frame formed by two identical U-shaped bars, one end of which extends further than the other end and forms a rear wheel mounting fitting, a front fork mount being fixed to the other ends of these bars. A connecting piece having one end of reduced diameter is intended to be introduced into one of the ends of the front fork mount. A projection on its upper surface cooperates with a fastening element formed on top of a push rod. The toy also comprises a support block for rear wheel axles on which two axes are mounted. The toy can be assembled in the form of a device constituting a child's stroller, a tricycle, a "baby walker", a learning bicycle or an ordinary bicycle by rearranging the components.

 The device according to the state of the art does not however make it possible to produce a large number of variants.

 The object of the present invention is to provide a construction set allowing a wide variety of assembly of self-supporting vehicles to be achieved, the strength of which is sufficient to allow real use by a child or a teenager, the assembly of which is carried out without specialized tools, the elements of which are limited.

To this end, the invention relates more particularly to a construction set for the production of a plurality of self-supporting vehicles, composed
- a plurality of parts in the form of rigid tubular elements,
- a plurality of connecting pieces for assembling two tubular pieces,
- a set of mechanical accessories such as wheels, pinions, axles, articulation arms, rack, linkage, chain, sockets, spacers, these accessories being capable of being assembled together and to the structure of tubes and connecting parts,
- a set of decoration and comfort accessories such as a seat, a backrest, handles, casings, fixed elements assembling to the structure of tubes and connecting pieces.

 Any simple mechanical construction is possible with this system. It was originally designed to make self-supporting toy models such as a rack-and-pinion pedal car, a rear-direction tractor or a tricycle. The advantage of the device according to the invention is to offer numerous possibilities of embodiments (mountable and dismountable) with a reduced number of elements, and to be of sufficient size and strength to carry a child. For the achievements presented as examples, it combines the qualities of a self-supporting toy and those of a construction toy.

 According to a particular embodiment of the invention, the assembly parts are constituted by rigid blocks pierced with two orthogonal bores whose internal section corresponds to the external section of the tubular parts.

 According to a variant, the rigid block is cut by two half-planes (P1 and P2) perpendicular and intersecting at a point, center of symmetry of the block, these planes each passing through the axis of the bores for receiving the tubes. The block is also cut by two symmetrical quadrants (Q1 and Q2), the first of which (Q1) joins the two half-lines, edges of the two half-planes, and the second of which, symmetrically, joins the two opposite half-lines, edges of the same half shots.

 Advantageously, the assembly parts and the accessories have bores whose section is standardized, for the reception of the tubular parts.

 According to a preferred embodiment, the accessories such as the seat, the backrest, the front casing have at least two housings for assembly with the tubular parts, the spacing of said housings being constant.

 According to an alternative embodiment, the casing has means of connection with the tubular parts determined so as to make it necessary to mount the protective casing at the same time as the crankset to center the latter.

The invention will be better understood on reading the description which follows, referring to the accompanying drawings in which:
- Figures 1 to 3 show views, respectively from above, front and front of a first embodiment of a self-supporting vehicle produced with the game according to the invention;
- Figures 4 and 5 show views, respectively from above and from the front, of a second embodiment of a self-supporting vehicle produced with the game according to the invention
- Figures 6 and 7 show respectively side and rear views of a third embodiment of a self-supporting vehicle produced with the game according to the invention;
- Figures 8 to 11 show perspective views of different variants of assembly parts
- Figure 12 shows an exploded view of a wheel for the self-supporting vehicle according to the invention.

 Figures 1 to 7 illustrate three mounting possibilities offered, among others, by this system of elements according to the invention.

The construction set according to the invention is composed of a plurality of parts, and in particular
- tubular beams (3) formed by steel tubes, or any other rigid material;
- connection pieces (1 and 2)
- accessories such as a seat (4), a front casing (5), a crankset (6) and wheels (7).

The assemblies and functions of the connecting parts are:
the assembly of the orthogonal tubes, in two different planes for the main type 1 connection part shown in FIG. 8 to 10, and in the same plane for the second type 2 shown in FIG. 11,
- the assembly of a rotary axis (8) to the structure transmitting the movement of a flywheel (9), a wheel (7), a toothed wheel (10), this by enclosing in the jaws of the main connecting piece a plastic bushing or a known type of bearing.

The functions of the tubes (3) are:
- to give a rigid structure to the whole,
- to guide a longitudinal movement, such as that of the rack (11),
- Or to guide a rotary movement by sheltering in its center an axis rotating in rings, as for example for the direction axis.

 The following elements which are added to the structure also have technical assembly characteristics allowing their membership to be identified.

 The wheels, an embodiment of which is shown in FIG. 12, consist of two half-rims (12) assembled by the same screws (13) as those of the main connection piece, four recesses of hexagonal shape in each half-rim are designed to receive the nuts (14) or screw heads; a housing (15) centered on the axis is arranged in the half-rim to receive the drive square (16) for the interior side or the wheel bush (17) for the exterior side; the inside diameter of the wheel socket is the same as the diameter of the rolling pins.

 The drive squares (16) are the same for the wheels or the steering wheel; fixing on the axis is done using the same standard screw, a hexagonal recess is provided to accommodate the nut or the screw head.

 The toothed wheels are fixed to the drive axes by the same screw, the same hexagonal recess is provided to accommodate the nut or the screw head.

 The diameter and pitch of the threads on the steering linkage are the same as those of the standard screw.

 The fixing of the linkage on the rack (11) is still done with the same nuts.

 The rack is bored to the diameter of the tubes and slides on them.

 The transmission, bearing, steering, crankset, brake pins have the same diameter, and use the same bearing sleeves (18).

 The brake (20) is actuated by a lever welded on an axis and transmitting its movement to two bent rods welded on the same axis and thus rubbing on the tires; the dimension of the axle is adjusted to the wheel spacing.

 The cap nuts (21) are special, they are designed to be tightened at the bottom of the thread thanks to a release groove.

 The seat and the backrest (4) are identical, they have housing for receiving the tubes, aligned with the spacing given by the mounting of the bottom bracket (6) and the front casing (5). The fixing screws are the same as for the main connection piece, and hexagonal recesses are arranged to accommodate nuts or screw heads.

 The front casing fits into two of the tubes of the central beam, the spacing of which is given by this interlocking and confirmed by the mounting of the bottom bracket.

 The bottom bracket protection is a spacer to center it, it cannot be mounted without it.

 The chain (22) has two quick couplers to adapt its length to the models.

 The macaron of the tricycle (23) is clipped onto two tubes, the spacing of which is given by the mounting of the front wheel on an axis determining the spacing of the fork.

 Figures 1 to 7 illustrate three mounting possibilities offered, among others, by this system of elements.

 The tubes (3) of the front steering car model corresponding to FIGS. 1 to 3 are fully used and completed by two handles (24) for making the rear steering vehicle corresponding to FIGS. 4 and 5.

The tricycle corresponding to Figures 6 and 7 uses some of the previous tubes and in addition two large tubes to make the new central beam and two small tubes (1) to make the fork (25).

 A style specific to the construction system is determined by the shape of the elements, and by the possible arrangements and functions of these elements.

 Each element has at least one mounting character, or a particular function, which identifies its membership in the system.

 Figures 8 to 10 relate to fittings for assembling orthogonal tubes along two different planes.

Figure 11 relates to a connector for assembling two coplanar tubes.

 When assembled, the connecting piece according to FIGS. 8 to 10 appears as a parallelpipedic block, square on its section, pierced by two orthogonal bores in which two tubes are clamped.

This parallelepiped shape, in fact, appears as cut in an original way in two parts
- by two half-planes (P1 and P2) whose edges are perpendicular and intersecting at a point, center of symmetry of the parallelepiped shape, and these planes each passing through the axis of the bores for receiving the tubes,
- and by two symmetrical quadrants (Q1 and Q2), the first of which (Q1) joins the two half-lines, edges of the two half-planes, and the second of which, symmetrically, joins the two opposite half-lines, edges of the same half -plans.

 The two connecting half-pieces thus cut are either straight or left, depending on the direction of rotation of the quadrants.

 The invention is described in the foregoing by way of nonlimiting example. It is understood that the skilled person will be able to produce different variants without departing from the scope of the invention.

Claims (6)

RESELL I CAT IONS  1 - Construction set consisting of a plurality of parts capable of being assembled together to form different forms of self-supporting vehicle characterized in that it is composed  - a plurality of parts in the form of rigid tubular elements (3),  - a plurality of connecting pieces (1 and 2) for assembling tubular pieces;  - a set of mechanical accessories such as wheels, pinions, axles, articulation arms, rack, linkage, chain, bushes, spacers, these accessories being capable of being assembled together and to the structure of tubes and connecting parts,  - a set of decoration and comfort accessories such as a seat, a backrest, handles, casings, fixed elements assembling to the structure of tubes and connecting pieces.  2 - Construction set according to claim 1 characterized in that the assembly parts (1 and 2) are constituted by rigid blocks pierced with two orthogonal bores whose internal section corresponds to the external section of the tubular parts.  3 - construction set according to claim 2 characterized in that the assembly parts (1) consist of rigid blocks cut by two half-planes (P1 and P2) perpendicular and intersecting at a point, center of symmetry of the block , these planes each passing through the axis of the bores for receiving the tubes, these blocks are further cut by two symmetrical quadrants (Ql and Q2), the first of which (Q1) joins the two half-straight lines, edges of the two half-planes, and the second of which, symmetrically, joins the two opposite half straight lines, edges of the same half-planes.  4 - Construction set according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the tubular parts, the assembly parts and the accessories are assembled with a single screw model.  4 - Construction set according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the assembly parts and the accessories have bores whose cross section is standardized, for the reception of tubular parts.  5 - Construction set according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the accessories such as the seat, backrest, front casing have at least two housings for assembly with the tubular parts; the spacing of said housings being constant.  6 - Construction set according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the casing has means of connection with the tubular parts determined so as to make it necessary to mount the protective casing at the same time as the crankset to center the latter. .