JP2000027426A - Expansion leg with lock visual confirming mechanism - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an expansion leg capable of being continuously adjusted in length and surely and safely fixing the set length. SOLUTION: An expansion leg is adjusted in length by the amount of insertion of a sliding member 20 into a leg man body 10. A number of projecting lines 25 are formed longitudinally on the inner surface of the sliding member 20 and a locking lever 40 having an arm 43 projected sideways from a rack shoe formed with a plurality of protrusive streaks 41 engaging the projecting lines 25 is oscilltably pivoted to a mounting bracket. The locking lever 40 is energized by a compression spring 38 in the direction for pressing the ribs 41 against the projecting lines 25. An alarm pin 50 is placed upright at the end of the arm 43 of the locking lever 40. The engagement between the projecting lines 25 and the rack shoe is checked according to whether or not the end 51 of the alarm pin 50 has receded from the upper surface of a stepping frame 5.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a mechanism for connecting telescopic legs, such as a work platform, a stepladder, a ladder, and a horse, whose height can be freely adjusted according to a work place.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art When constructing walls and ceilings indoors in a building site, work platforms such as work scaffolds, stepladders, and horses are used to raise a work floor in accordance with the height of a work place. In addition, similar work benches are used for caring for and harvesting fruit trees at farms and for various tasks at home. As this type of work table, there is a work table having telescopic legs for adjusting the height of a work floor. For example, a working scaffold introduced in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 6-42163 discloses a leg length, that is, a height of a working floor, by inserting a telescopic leg into a main leg and pinning the telescopic leg at a predetermined position. I am adjusting. In addition, actual Kaihei 6-2
In Japanese Patent No. 4133, a telescopic leg of a pedestal fitting for fixing the telescopic leg by locking the telescopic leg with a pin is introduced.

[0003]

However, bolts and bolts are formed in locking holes formed at appropriate intervals along the longitudinal direction of the telescopic legs.
In the method of adjusting the length by inserting a locking tool such as a pin, the length of the telescopic leg only changes stepwise. for that reason,
The work surface cannot be adapted to the floor and ground with various undulations, and the workbench will be installed with the work floor inclined.
The posture of the worker is unstable and dangerous. As a steplessly adjustable leg, a method is known in which a sliding portion is pressed by a pressing plate, and the length of the leg is fixed using a frictional force between the sliding portion and the pressing plate. However, in this method, when an excessive load is applied to the counter, the frictional engagement between the sliding portion and the pressing plate is released, and the counter may be rapidly lowered.
For this reason, the load applied to the counter is limited, and the use form of a scaffold, a work table, or the like is restricted. Further, since the sliding portion is gripped by friction, the action of fixing the length of the leg may be deteriorated with time due to wear of the member. In addition, it is troublesome to set the legs to the required length, and it is one of the drawbacks that it is difficult to use. Therefore,
The inventor of the present invention has proposed a worktable telescopic leg in which the length of a leg can be adjusted steplessly and easily by selecting the engagement between a row of protrusions provided on a slide member and a rack shoe, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Application No. Hei 9-1997.
No. 159455. The present invention is a further improvement of the previously proposed telescopic leg, in which the engagement between the projection row of the slide member and the rack shoe is strong, and the length of the telescopic leg is inadvertently increased even when a large load is applied. An object of the present invention is to provide a telescopic leg with improved usability and improved safety by adding a function of displaying whether or not the meshing state is complete, taking advantage of the fact that it does not change.

[0004]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In order to achieve the object, an extendable leg according to the present invention has a leg body having a rectangular internal space, and a number of protrusions which are inserted into the leg body and extend in the longitudinal direction. A slide member having a row formed on the inner surface, a mounting bracket fixed to an end of the leg body on the side where the slide member is inserted, and a pivotally pivotally mounted on the mounting bracket, meshing with the projection row of the slide member. A lock lever with an arm protruding laterally from a rack shoe on which a plurality of ridges are formed,
A compression spring that is interposed between the mounting bracket and the lock lever and urges the lock lever in a direction to press the ridges of the rack shoe against the projection row of the slide member, and an alarm pin that stands at the tip of the arm. The length of the alarm pin is adjusted so that the tip protrudes outside the frame when the projection row rack shoes of the slide member are not engaged. The alarm pin is preferably made of a flexible material such as a synthetic resin.

[0005]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention will be described in detail with telescopic legs provided on a horse. However, the telescopic leg connecting mechanism of the present invention can be applied to all telescopic mechanisms such as work platforms, stepladders, ladders and the like. Of course, the same can be applied to this. As shown in FIG. 1, a pedestal to which the present invention is applied has legs 2 attached to four corners of a top plate 1 serving as a work floor. The upper end of the leg portion 2 is swingably attached to the top plate portion 1 by a mounting bracket 3. The leg 2 in the upright state is maintained in a fixed positional relationship with the top plate 1 by the bendable reinforcing member 4. A plurality of steps 5 and 5 corresponding to the height of the work floor are provided between the adjacent legs 2 and 2. Top plate 1, Leg 2, Reinforcing member 4,
The step frame 5 is preferably made of an extruded aluminum material having excellent lightness, corrosion resistance and surface properties, but a steel member can also be used. As shown in FIG. 2, the leg 2 includes a slide member 20 that is inserted into the leg body 10, and the positional relationship of the slide member 20 with respect to the leg body 10 is fixed by the locking mechanism 30.

The leg body 10 is made of an extruded aluminum material having a substantially rectangular hollow cross section (FIG. 3), and forms a fitting mounting space 11 with a part of a side face cut away.
The rib 16 rising from both ends of the inner side surface where the fitting mounting space 11 is provided is bent inward on the way, and the fitting seating portion 1 is formed.
It becomes 2. Rivet fixing holes 13 for fixing the mounting bracket 31 (FIG. 2) of the locking mechanism 30 are formed on a side surface orthogonal to the inner side surface where the bracket mounting space 11 is provided. In the inside of the side near the other surface of the leg body 10 located on the opposite side of the bracket mounting space 11, there are guide grooves 14, 14 slightly widened to the side. Further, the ribs 16 forming the metal fitting seating portion 12 are cut out at appropriate intervals in the longitudinal direction of the leg main body 10 to form a notch portion 17 for positioning the end of the step frame 5. Slide member 20
Is made of an extruded aluminum material slightly smaller than the internal space of the leg body 10, and has a cross-sectional shape in which a portion where the fitting mounting space 11 faces when inserted into the leg body 10 is open. The slide member 20 has both sides 21, 21 of a hollow double-walled structure to ensure strength.
Both ends 21 and 21 of the hollow double-walled structure have sliding ends 22 and 22 whose one ends slightly protrude laterally and fit into the guide grooves 14 of the leg body 10.

A plurality of ridges 24 extending in the longitudinal direction of the slide member 20 are formed on the inner surface of the side surface 23 between the side portions 21 of the hollow double wall structure. The ridges 24, 24,... Are partially crushed by knurling, pressing, or the like in the effective length range of the leg portion 2 to form a large number of projection rows 25. Point-like projection row 2 shown in FIG.
Instead of 5, a number of protrusions extending in the width direction of the inner surface of the slide member 20 may be formed to serve as meshing portions. A shoe 27 made of an elastic material is fixed to an end of the slide member 20. Since the shoe 27 is installed on the floor surface (FIG. 1), the shoe 27 has a bottom surface 28 inclined so as to cancel the inclination of the leg 2 and make surface contact with the floor surface. As shown in FIG. 2, anti-slip irregularities 29 are formed on the inclined bottom surface 28. The mounting bracket 31 (FIG. 4) of the locking mechanism 30 has a mounting portion 32 fixed to the side surface of the leg body 20 with a rivet 39 (FIG. 5) or the like, and also functions as a support for the step frame 5 (FIG. 1). For this reason, the mounting portion 33 for fixing the side surface of the step frame 5 is projected from the mounting portion 32. Mounting part 32
The angle between and 33 is set slightly larger than 90 degrees in consideration of the lower spread state of the legs 2 and 2 (see FIG. 1).
Between the mounting portions 32 and 33, flanges 34 and 35 for mounting the lock lever 40 also serving as reinforcement are provided.

As shown in FIG. 4, the lock lever 40 has an arm 43 projecting from a rack shoe 42 having a plurality of projections 41 formed therein for engagement.
Passes between the flanges 34 and 35 and slides 20
Are provided so as to oppose the projection rows 25 of the first row. Arm 43
Are formed with anti-slip irregularities 44 on the lower surface thereof.
The upper surface of the arm 43 is provided with a projection 46 that forms a pin housing 45 through which a pivot pin 49 (FIG. 5) is inserted. A pivot pin 49 inserted into the pin housing 45 (FIG. 5)
Is supported by the pin holes 36 provided in the flanges 34 and 35, so that the lock lever 40 is swingably attached to the mounting bracket 31. A spring receiving projection 37 is formed on the lower surface of the mounting portion 33. On the side of the lock lever 40, the legs of the spring receiver 48 fixed to the lower surface protrude upward. A compression spring 38 is interposed between the spring receiving projection 37 and the leg of the spring receiving member 48, and the elasticity of the arm 43 in the opening direction is urged by the lock lever 40 by the compression spring 38.

In a system in which the rack shoes 42 are engaged with the projection rows 25 to fix the telescopic legs to a required length, according to a subsequent investigation and research conducted by the present inventors, the engaged state is such that the meshing state is not affected by a vertical load. It turned out to have sufficient strength. That is, as long as the rack shoe 42 and the projection row 25 are securely engaged, the previously proposed Japanese Patent Application No. 9-159445.
It can be said that the double lock mechanism adopted in the telescopic legs of the No. can be omitted. Therefore, in the present invention, the alarm pin 50 is incorporated as a mechanism for confirming a reliable engagement state. The lock lever 40 is provided with an alarm pin 50 that rises from near the tip of the arm 43. The alarm pin 50 is made of a flexible material such as a synthetic resin, and it is preferable that the tip portion 51 be colored in order to facilitate visual recognition. At the position corresponding to the alarm pin 50,
A pin insertion hole 52 (FIGS. 4 and 6) is formed in the mounting bracket 31, and a pin insertion hole 53 (FIG. 5) is formed in the step frame 5. The alarm pin 50 is set to have a length that slightly retreats from the upper surface of the step frame 5 in a state where the rack shoe 42 of the lock lever 40 is engaged with the projection row 25 of the slide member 20 (FIG. 5). In this example, since the present invention is applied to a horse, the alarm pin 5 is set with reference to the upper surface of the step frame 5.
Although the length is set to 0, the length of the alarm pin 50 is selected so as to slightly protrude or retreat from the frame of the device main body for other devices.

When the finger pressure F is released after adjusting the amount of insertion of the slide member 20 into the leg body 10 according to the length of the leg 2 required, the lock lever 40 is actuated by the elastic spring force of the compression spring 38. Rotate clockwise in FIG. 6,
The engagement ridge 41 is pressed against the projection row 25 of the slide member 20. As a result, the engagement ridge 41 and the projection row 25 are engaged with each other in a positional relationship where the leg 2 has a predetermined length, and the movement of the slide member 20 along the longitudinal direction of the leg body 10 is regulated. At this time, since the pin tip 51 is lower than the upper surface of the step frame 5, the ridge 41 and the projection row 25 are formed.
Is confirmed. When the engagement between the ridge 41 and the projection row 25 is not complete, the lock lever 40 is in a posture rotated counterclockwise about the pivot pin 49 as shown in FIG. Therefore, the tip of the arm 43 is located at the upper side, and the pin tip 51 of the alarm pin 50 that has moved upward projects slightly from the upper surface of the step frame 5. At this time, since the alarm pin 50 is made of a flexible material,
The turning motion of the arm 43 is smoothly converted to the upward movement of the alarm pin 50, and the pin 50 is not clogged by the pin insertion holes 51 and 52.

The pin tip 51 is colored, for example, red to indicate danger, and has a silver-white surface in the step frame 5 made of extruded aluminum. for that reason,
The contrast of the alarm pin 50 with respect to the surface of the step frame 5 is high, and the pin tip 51 projecting even slightly is easily identified. The fact that the pin tip 51 is visually recognized on the surface of the step frame 5 means that the engagement between the ridge 41 and the projection row 25 is incomplete, and that the ridge 41 and the projection row 25 are completely engaged. It is possible to know that it is necessary to re-operate the lock lever 40 to bring the combined state into a safe state.

In the above example, the lock lever 40 having the alarm pin 50 fixed to the tip of the arm 43 is used. However, the alarm pin 50 can also be arranged so that the base 54 contacts the upper surface of the arm 43 without being fixed to the arm 43. For example, the base 54 of the alarm pin 50 is brought into contact with the tip of the arm 43 of the lock lever 40 as shown in FIG. The tip 51 of the alarm pin 50 protrudes upward from a pin insertion hole 53 formed in the step frame 5 as in the case of FIGS. A spring 55 is mounted on a pin shaft 56 of the alarm pin 50, and presses the base 54 downward to the end of the arm 40. The pin tip 51 is slightly thicker so as not to fall out of the pin insertion hole 53. The protrusion of the alarm pin 40 is visually recognized by the thick pin tip 51 and the neck 57, and the locked state is confirmed. Again, in this case,
If the pin tip 51 and the neck 57 are colored, visual recognition is facilitated.

When the rack shoe 42 is engaged with the projection row 25 (FIG. 7A), the pin tip 51 of the alarm pin 50 pressed against the arm 43 by the spring 55 is retracted from the upper surface of the step frame 5 (FIG. 7). 7b). On the other hand, when the engagement between the rack shoe 42 and the protruding row 25 is incomplete,
The tip of the arm 43 is slightly upwardly inclined (FIG. 77).
c). The alarm pin 50 is lifted by the inclined arm 43, and the pin tip 51 and the alarm pin 50 protrude from the upper surface of the tread frame 5 (FIG. 7D). Therefore, the engagement state between the rack shoe 42 and the protruding row 25 can be easily known by visually recognizing the neck 57. As described above, in the telescopic leg of the present invention, the slide member 20 is provided with a large number of projection rows 25, and the projection row 25 with which the engagement ridge 41 of the lock lever 40 meshes is changed, so that the leg 2 The length is adjusted almost steplessly. Further, since the engagement state between the projection row 25 and the engagement projection 41 is confirmed by the alarm pin 50, the length of the leg 2 is prevented from being carelessly changed. In addition, since the main constituent members such as the leg body 10 and the slide member 20 are made of extruded aluminum having excellent light weight, corrosion resistance, strength, and surface appearance, the worktable can be easily transported, stored, and handled. become.

[0014]

As described above, the workbench telescopic leg according to the present invention provides a slide set at a predetermined insertion amount by securely engaging the rack shoe of the lock lever with the projection row of the slide member. A work table can be obtained in which inadvertent sliding of the members is prevented, and the work table is stably adjusted to the required work floor height. In addition, since the engagement between the rack shoe and the row of projections is confirmed by the alarm pin, the length of the telescopic leg does not change carelessly due to incomplete engagement. Further, in the unlocked state, since the amount of insertion of the slide member with respect to the leg body can be continuously changed, a work floor having a predetermined height can be reliably provided even on a floor surface or a ground surface having various undulations. Work at the site is also safe and easy. In addition, since the main constituent members are made of extruded aluminum members excellent in light weight, corrosion resistance, durability, and aesthetic appearance, a worktable that is easy to transport, store, handle, etc. and has a good appearance can be obtained.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a front view (a) and side view (b) of a horse with telescopic legs according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an exploded perspective view of a telescopic leg.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view showing an insertion portion of a slide member with respect to a leg body.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of a locking mechanism fixed to the leg body.

FIG. 5 is a side view of a locking mechanism connected to a leg and a step frame.

FIG. 6 is a partial cross-sectional view for explaining swing of a lock lever.

FIG. 7 is a partial sectional view (a, b) of a locking mechanism having a lock lever in which an alarm pin is brought into contact with an arm, and a portion for explaining the position of the alarm pin when engagement of the lock lever is incomplete. Cross section (c, d)

[Explanation of symbols]

1: Top plate part 2: Leg part 3: Mounting bracket 4: Reinforcement member 5: Step frame 10: Leg body 11: Bracket mounting space 12: Bracket seating part 13: Rivet fixing hole 14: Guide groove 16: Rib 17: Notch 20: Slide member 21: Side of hollow double wall structure
22: sliding portion 23: side surface 24: ridge 25: projection row 27:
Shoe 28: Inclined bottom surface 29: Non-slip projection 30: Locking mechanism 31: Mounting bracket 32, 33:
Mounting parts 34, 35: Flange 36: Pin hole
37: spring receiving projection 38: compression spring 39: rivet 40: lock lever 41: engagement projection 42:
Rack shoe 43: Arm 44: Non-slip unevenness 45: Pivot pin insertion housing 46: Projection 47: Lock fitting 48: Spring receiver 49: Pivot pin 50: Alarm pin 51: Pin tip 52, 5
3: Pin insertion hole 54: Base 55: Spring 5
6: Pin axis 57: Neck F: Shiatsu D: Expansion / contraction direction

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continuing from the front page (72) Inventor Masato Kobayashi 2-2-220 Higashishinagawa, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo Japan Light Metal Co., Ltd. F-term in Kiki Kogyo Co., Ltd. (Reference) 2E003 BA02 2E044 AA06 BA05 BB01 BB02 CA04 CB03 CC01 DA01 DB01 EA04 EB02 ED00

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A leg body having a rectangular internal space, a slide member inserted into the leg body, and having a plurality of projection rows formed on an inner surface along a longitudinal direction, and a side on which the slide member is inserted. An arm protrudes laterally from a mounting shoe fixed to the end of the leg body and a rack shoe formed with a plurality of protrusions pivotally pivotally attached to the mounting metal and meshing with a projection row of the slide member. A lock lever, a compression spring interposed between the mounting bracket and the lock lever, and a biasing spring for urging the lock lever in a direction of pressing the ridges of the rack shoe on the projection row of the slide member; An alarm pin, wherein the alarm pin is adjusted to have a length protruding outside the frame when the projection row rack shoes of the slide member are not engaged. Telescopic legs with structure. 2. The telescopic leg according to claim 1, wherein the alarm pin is made of a flexible material. 3. The telescopic leg according to claim 1, wherein the base of the alarm pin is pressed against the tip of the arm by a spring mounted on the alarm pin.