GB2444827A

GB2444827A - Construction toy with rods having c-shaped gripping clips at both ends thereof and a connecting element into which at least one torus segment is connected

Info

Publication number: GB2444827A
Application number: GB0723780A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Rabah Aggar; Smail Aggar
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2006-12-07
Filing date: 2007-12-02
Publication date: 2008-06-18
Also published as: GB0624445D0; GB0723780D0; GB2444828A; GB0723781D0

Abstract

A construction toy comprises a plurality of rod elements having a C-shaped gripping clip (13,Fig.1) at both ends and a plurality of sphere like connecting elements (42,43)formed of a torus element into which at least one torus segment is connected. The rods may be of variable length.

Description

CONSTRUCTION TOY AND EDUCATION SET

The present invention relates to a construction toy and education set for building structures of various two or three dimensional configurations.

These construction toy or education sets are known which are comprised of a plurality of rod elements having a C-shaped dip attached at both ends and a plurality of torus connecting elements, which are combined to form composite structures.

Two examples of such known construction toy sets are these in the patent specifications n US 3,698,123 and US 4,758,196 which uses a plurality of rod or link elements having C-shaped clips at both ends with a plurality of torus or disk elements.

However these two above mentioned patents have these shortcomings: -The rod or link elements cannot be assembled with the torus or disk element by lateral snap fit assembly, so that the centre to centre distance of a pair of disks does not have to be enlarged in order to receive a rod element, therefore it is impossible to modify a structure after it has reached a stage of substantial rigidity, such as adding or removing a diagonal to a square in a two or three dimensional structure which has already been built without distorting the structure.

-The rod and disk elements requires axial insertion of one element into another, centre to centre distances are temporarily enlarged, which requires great care and in some cases makes it impossible to build some kind of structures.

-Cannot create complex structures such as salt crystal lattice by using simple connecting elements such as disk or torus connecting elements.

-Time consuming and inconvenient during assembly and disassembly, especially when building large structures, because of the complicated mechanical means employed for assembling and disassembling the component parts.

-Difficult to use without adult supervision and/or aid as a certain level of dextricity and finger strength is needed in order to make full advantage of the features offered, therefore such systems cannot be suitable and attractive to children especially girls.

-Such systems cannot create structures that would resemble to real-life models having interesting visual characteristics and fancy figures, therefore cannot be useful to explaining geometrical designs, demonstrating engineering principles, architectural designs or chemical bonds, furthermore such systems are not suitable for artistic creative expression in the areas of craft items and it fails to enable the infinite creativity and aesthetic appeal.

-The rod elements of the US 3,698,123 patent number are made of wood, therefore they cannot be mass produced with very low price mass production techniques such as plastic injection molding, furthermore the wooden rods require painting and if not painted there will be a lack of visual interest to the resulting built structures, furthermore the wooden jaws of the bifurcation of the wooden rod elements are very sensitive to crack, whereby the child could be injured as by picking up sharp splinters.

The device of the present invention, while being known includes advantageous features which greatly enhance its performance by introducing new elements such as a sphere-like connecting element, which is an inventive step, formed of a torus element into which one or more torus se9ments are connected to build special and complex structures such as salt crystal lattice, furthermore another improvement is made within the rod elements where the jaws of the C-shaped dip are provided to extend perpendicularly to the longitudinal axis of the rod elements to allow lateral snap-fit assembly with the torus connecting elements so that the centre to centre of a pair of torus elements does not have to be enlarged in order to receive a rod element, such as adding or removing a diagonal to a square of a large rigid structure which has already been built. This improvement is very useful in demonstrating and explaining some technical points in certain fields such as chemical bonding and engineering principles where large built structures are often modified, by adding and/or removing rod elements by lateral assembly or disassembly, without having to distort or disassemble the whole structure to rebuild a new one.

Accordingly, the structural possibilities using the sphere-like connecting element together with the Improved rod elements, are greatly enhanced and the usefulness and versatility of the construction system are highly increased.

Ills another object of the present invention to provide a construction toy and education set, very easy and quick to assemble and disassemble. It would further be advantageous to employ very simple elements which may be movable relative to one another without disengagement but which facilitate simple and quick assembly and disassembly.

It is another object of the present invention to provide with a set of rod elements to be assembled or disassembled by a lateral snap-fit connection so that the centre to centre distance of a pair of torus connecting elements does not have to be enlarged in order to receive or remove a rod element such as adding or removing a diagonal to a square of a rigid structure which has already been built.

It is another object of the present invention to provide with a construction toy set comprising a secure and rigid snap-fit connection requiring very little pressing effort producing an attractive clicking noise where the connection is released in the reverse order.

It is another object of the present invention to provide with a construction toy set used by all ages to build an aesthetic pleasing of realistic shapes and structures without use of any other assembly means.

It is another object of the present invention and there is a need to provide a construction toy and education set useful for explaining and demonstrating chemical bonding principles, engineering principles, crystallographic structures, architectural prototypes and artistic and creative expressions in the areas of craft item with infinite creativity and aesthetic appeal.

Still a further object of this present invention is to provide a construction toy and education set made from suitable plastic material that can be mass produced with plastic injection molding techniques, so as to be capable to manufacture at a very low cost.

Still a further object of the present invention is to provide with a construction toy and education device to allow the building of prototypes, models or shapes of simple and complex structures having very realistic shapes that would resemble to real-life models at a large or very reduced scale.

The construction toy and education set of the present invention comprises a plurality of first rod members having a first length with a C-shaped gripping clip connected at both ends; a plurality of second rod members having second lengths with a C-shaped gripping clip connected at both ends; a plurality of sphere-like connecting elements formed of a torus element into which one more torus segments are attached to form a sphere-like connecting element; According to the present invention, said second length of second rod element is chosen equal to the diagonal of a square formed of four first rod elements as sides, coupled each other in correspondence of the corners of the square by four torus elements.

Still according to the present invention, said second length of second rod members is equal to half of the diagonal of a square formed of four first rod elements as sides, coupled each other in correspondence of the corners of the square by four torus elements, minus the external radius of the torus element.

Furthermore at least one of said first rod element and/or one of said second rod element, include a U-shaped gripping socket between its ends to receive and retain such rod elements to provide with a cruciform composite member.

Furthermore at least one of first rod element andlor one of second rod element have a body which has a cruciform cross section having arms and in which the extremity of each arm is part cylindrical to receive and retain decorative plate and shaped members having means of snap-fit connectors.

Furthermore at least one of first rod element and/or one of second rod element have cylindrical body which has one or more longitudinal cylindrical slots spaced around its circumference where each slot is made to receive and retain decorative plate and shaped members having cylindrical ends.

Other objects and advantageous features of the present invention will be more apparent on the description carried out in accordance to the drawings included, in which; FIG.1 shows a front view of a first rod element with a first length according to the present invention.

FIG.2 shows a front view of a second rod element with a second length according to the present invention.

FIG.3 shows a front view of another rod element according to the present invention.

FIG.4 shows a perspective front view of two sections of an adjustable length of a rod element according to the present invention.

FIG.5 shows a perspective front view of two sections of an adjustable length of another rod element according to the present invention.

FIG.6 shows a front view of the C-shaped gripping clip of the rod elements of the present invention.

FIG.7 shows a front view of another rod element having a U-shaped socket between the ends.

FIG.8 shows a cruciform shaped composite member formed by assembling two such rod elements of FIG.7 according to the present invention.

FIG.9 shows a top view of a tows element used t6 join the rod elements according to the present invention.

FIG.10 shows a top view of another alternative of the torus element of FIG.9 which is provided with a radial slot.

FIG.1 I shows a top view of another torus element similar to the one of FIG.9 with two diametrically opposed through holes.

FIG.12 shows a top view of half a tows element of FIG.9with a stem at each end to be connected to the torus element of FIG.1 1.

FIG.13 shows a sphere-like connecting element formed of a torus element into which two torus segments are attached, used to join the rod elements according to the present invention.

FIG.14 shows a perspective view of another sphere-like element similar to the one of FIG.13.

FIG.15 is a top view of a two dimensional square structure provided by assembling the elements of the present invention.

FIG.16 shows a top view of another alternative of the square of FIG.15.

FIG.17 is yet another alternative of the square of FIG.15.

FIG.18 shows a perspective view of a three dimensional cubical structure formed by combining sphere-like elements of FIG.13 with the rod elements of the present invention.

FIG.19 is a perspective view of a three dimensional salt crystal assembled with the sphere-like elements of FIG.13 and the rod elements of the present invention.

FIG.20 is a perspective view of a three dimensional tetrahedron built with the elements of the present invention.

FIG.21 is a front view of another rod element according to the present invention.

FIG.22 shows a cross section through line 1-1 of the rod element of FIG.21.

FIG.23 shows a perspective view of a plate member for attachment to a rod element of FIG.21.

FIG.24 is a front view of another rod element according to the present invention.

FIG.25 is a cross section through line 2-2 of the rod element of FIG.24.

FIG.26 is a perspective view of a plate member for attachment to a rod element of FIG.24.

FIG.27 is a perspective top view of a panel element according to the present snvention.

FIG.28 is a bottom perspective view of another alternative of the panel element of FIG.27.

Referring to the drawings, FIG.1 illustrates a first rod element 10 formed with cylindrical or polygonal shaped body having a first length. The distal ends of the rod element are formed with a tapered portion 15 in which a C-shaped gripping clip 13 is integrally connected so that to snap-fit into the torus element 30 or spherical element 40 of respectively FIGS.9andl3. The C-shaped gripping clip 13 is formed of two symmetrically opposed gripping jaws 14 which extend parallely to the longitudinal axis of the first rod element 10 as shown in FIG.1.

As shown from FIGS.6, 8 and 15, each jaw 14 is symmetrically tapered reducing the width W of the jaw towards its distal end to make a generally smaller pointed end 19.

The internal width R of the C-shaped clips 13, as shown in FIG. 1, is frictionally smaller than the cross section of the torus element 3Oso that the jaws 14 slightly extend and snap to hold firmly into the torus element and its disassembly is made in the reverse order.

FIG.2 illustrates the embodiment of a second rod element 23, similar to the one of FIG. I having a second length. Here the jaws 14 of the C-shaped gripping clip 14 extend perpendicularly to the longitudinal axis of the rod element to allow the rod elements to be connected to the torus elements of FIG.9 or to the spherical element of FIG.10 by lateral snap-fit connection, so that the centre to centre distance of a pair of torus elements does not have to be distorted and enlarged in order to receive a rod element, therefore it will be very easy to modify a structure that has been built after it has reached a stage of substantial rigidity by adding or removing rod elements, such as adding a diagonal to a square or to a rectangle in a structure that has already been built and this can only be achieved with rod elements having at least one of the C-shaped clips which has jaws extending perpendicularly to the longitudinal axis of the rod element as shown in FIGS.2and3 of the present invention.

FIG.3 illustrates a rod element 24 which is another alternative to the rod elements of FIGS.land2. Here the rod element is formed with one C-shaped clip similar to the one of rod element of FIG.1 and the other opposed C-shaped clip is similar to the one of rod element of FIG.2. The first end A of the rod element can be assembled from any angular position by snap-fit, then the other end B is swivelled for a radial snap-fit connection and its disassembly is made in the reverse order. The use of the rod elements of FIGS.2and.3 is very important in demonstrating some technical structures, where a rod element can be added or removed or changed in large built structures without having to be disassembled to rebuild another one.

In FIG.4, a generally cylindrical or polygonal rod element 25 is illustrated having adjustable length. Here the rod element is formed in two sections one having a stem 12 formed with an external screw thread 16, the other being formed with an internal screw thread 18 to accommodate the external thread. The jawsl4 of

Claims

claims 1.A construction toy and education set for assembling two and

three dimensional structures comprising; a plurality of rod elements having C-shaped gripping clip at both ends; a plurality of three-dimensional sphere-like connecting elements formed of a torus connecting element into which one or more torus segments are connected.
2.A construction toy and education set wherein said sphere-like connecting element is formed in two or more separate sections to connect to each other, thereby creating a composite sphere-like connecting element.
3. A construction toy and education set according to claim 1, wherein said rod elements are provided in two different first length and second length.
4. A construction toy and education set according to claim 3, wherein said first length of said rod element is equal to the length of the diagonal of a square formed of four first rod elements as sides, coupled each other in correspondence of the corners of the square by four torus elements.
5. A construction toy and education set according to claim 3, wherein said second length of said rod element is equal to half the diagonal of a square formed of four first rod elements as sides, coupled each other in correspondence of the corners of the square by four torus connecting elements, minus the outer radius of said torus connecting element.
6. A construction toy and education set according to daim 1, wherein at least one of said rod elements is formed in two sections one having a stem formed with external screw threads, the other being formed with internal screw threads to accommodate the said external screw threads so that the length of said first and/or second rod elements can be adjusted.
7. A construction toy and education set as claimed in claim 1, in which at least one of said rod element has cylindrical body which has one or more longitudinal cylindrical slots spaced around its circumference, where each slot is made to receive and retain decorative plate and shaped members having cylindrical ends.
6. A construction toy and education set as claimed in claim 1, in which at least one of said rod element has a body which has a cruciform cross section having arms and in which the extremity of each arm is part cylindrical, where the extremity of each arm is made to receive and retain decorative plate and shaped members having means of snap fit connectors.
9. A construction toy and education set according to claim 1, wherein at least one of said rod element include a U-shaped socket between its ends.
10.A construction toy and education set according to claim 1, wherein at least one of said rod element is formed in two sections one having a generally cylindrical stem, the other being formed with a bore in which the said stem is received and removably retained by friction, thereby creating a composite rod element of variable length.