JP2005208143A - Cover structure and camera - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To prevent damage to a turning shaft, caused by excessive load, without spoiling a design and without increasing the rigidity of a hinge part. <P>SOLUTION: In the structure that a cover 20 is supported on a device body (e.g., camera body) 10 via the turning shaft 33 so that the cover 20 can be opened or closed, the turning shaft 33 is supported on the device body 10 with an elastic support member 32. When force in the direction in which the cover 20 is opened is further exerted to the cover 20 located in a restricted position on the open side, the turning shaft 33 moves due to the elastic deformation of the elastic support member 32, thereby allowing the cover 20 to open beyond the restriction on the open side. For example, by using, as the elastic support member, a plate resin member constituting a part of the device body, the number of components can be reduced. The turning shaft itself can be formed from an elastic body. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to a lid structure provided in a camera or the like and a camera having a lid structure.

  For example, Patent Document 1 discloses a camera having a lens cover as a lid. The lens cover is rotatably supported on the camera body via a rotation shaft, and exposes / hides the lens by opening and closing. In addition, the camera has a battery compartment cover, and the digital still camera has a card slot cover. These lids are also generally opened and closed in a pivotal manner via a pivot shaft.

Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 9-230463

  In the lid structure as described above, a part of the lid to be opened comes into contact with the camera body, so that the rotation is substantially limited. However, the force in the opening direction is still applied after reaching the rotation limit. Due to the principle of leverage, an excessive force acts on the rotating shaft portion, and the shaft and the hinge portion of the lid may be damaged. In order to reduce the force applied to the shaft part, it is only necessary to make the structure where the part away from the shaft contacts the camera body as much as possible, but in this case, a projecting contact part is provided on the lid or the body, or It is necessary to arrange the axis on the outer surface of the camera body, which is not preferable in design. Moreover, if the strength of the material is increased so that it will not be damaged even if an excessive force is applied, the thickness of the part increases, leading to an increase in size and cost. Although there is a method of preventing damage by causing the hinge to come off the shaft when an excessive force is applied, the work of reattaching the detached hinge is troublesome.

The present invention is applied to a structure in which a lid is supported on an apparatus main body (for example, a camera main body) via a rotation shaft so as to be opened and closed.
According to the first aspect of the present invention, when the rotation shaft is supported on the apparatus main body by the elastic support member, and the force in the opening direction is further applied to the lid at the open side restricted position, the rotation shaft moves due to the elastic deformation of the elastic support member. By doing so, it is configured to allow the opening beyond the limit on the opening side of the lid.
In the invention of claim 2, the elastic support member is a leaf spring.
The invention of claim 3 uses a plate-like resin member forming a part of the apparatus main body as an elastic support member.
According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, the rotation shaft is made of an elastic member, and when the force in the opening direction is further applied to the lid at the open side restriction position, the rotation shaft is elastically deformed, thereby restricting the lid on the open side. Configured to allow for excessive opening.
The invention of claim 5 is configured such that when the lid is opened to a predetermined position beyond the opening side limit, the force applied to the rotating shaft is reduced by the tip side of the lid contacting the apparatus main body. is there.
When the lid structure is applied to the camera, a part of the resin plate member for attaching the tripod seat may be used as the elastic support member.

According to the present invention, when the rotation shaft is supported on the apparatus main body by the elastic support member, and the force in the opening direction is further applied to the lid at the open side restricted position, the elastic support member is elastically deformed, thereby opening the lid. Since opening beyond the side limit is allowed, excessive force does not act on the rotating shaft, and damage to the shaft and lid can be prevented. And according to the said structure, since it is not necessary to consider the contact location of the lid | cover and an apparatus main body in an open restriction, there is no inconvenience in a design surface, and it is necessary to raise the rigidity of a rotating shaft or the hinge part of a lid | cover. Therefore, it is possible to avoid an increase in size and cost. Further, since it is not necessary to have a configuration in which the hinge is detached when an excessive force is applied, it is not necessary to perform a troublesome operation of reattaching the detached hinge.
Even if the rotating shaft itself is made of an elastic member, the same effect as described above can be obtained.

An embodiment in which the present invention is applied to a lid structure of a digital still camera will be described with reference to FIGS.
1 and 2 are perspective views of a digital still camera according to the present embodiment. A battery chamber 11 and a card slot 12 are provided on one end side of the camera body 10, and a power battery and a memory card for image recording are respectively inserted into and removed from the side of the camera. A lid 20 that exposes / hides the battery chamber 11 and the card slot 12 is provided on the side surface, and the lid 20 is rotatable between the open state of FIG. 1 and the closed state of FIG.

The lid 20 will be described in detail with reference to FIGS.
The main body 21 of the lid 20 is made of, for example, resin. When opening, the lid main body 21 is slid in the A direction with respect to the camera main body 10 and then rotated. The lock claw 21 a provided at the tip of the lid body 21 is inserted into the lock hole of the camera body 10 when the lid is closed, thereby preventing the lid 20 from rotating. Is allowed. In order to prevent the lid body 21 in the closed state from being inadvertently opened, it is desirable that a part of the slide metal plate 31 is shaped like a leaf spring and a click mechanism is provided between the lid body 21 and the lid body 21.
The slide and click mechanism of the lid 20 is not an essential requirement of the present invention.

  The lid body 21 is supported by the camera body 10 via a slide metal plate 31 and a metal leaf spring 32. As shown in FIG. 7, the slide metal plate 31 is supported by a guide portion 21 b provided on the inner surface of the lid main body 21, and is slidable by a distance d with respect to the lid main body 21. The slide is restricted by abutting a stopper (not shown) provided on the lid body 21 and the slide metal plate 31.

  As shown in FIG. 8, a hinge portion 31 a is formed at one end of the slide metal plate 31, and the hinge portion 31 a protrudes from the base end portion of the lid main body 21. A hinge portion 32a is also formed at one end of the plate spring 32, and the slide plate 31 and the plate spring 32 rotate with each other by passing the rotation shaft 33 through the hinge portion 32a and the hinge portion 31a of the slide plate 31. Connected as possible. The other end of the leaf spring 32 is fixed to the camera body 10 via a screw BS (FIG. 5). Thereby, the lid body 21 is supported so as to be rotatable with respect to the camera body 10 integrally with the slide sheet metal 31 and slidable with respect to the camera body 10 (slide sheet metal 31). Although not shown in the figure, a torsion spring is externally attached to the rotation shaft 33, and thereby the lid body 21 is always urged in the opening direction. This spring is not an essential requirement of the invention.

  In the above configuration, when the lid 20 is closed as shown in FIG. 3, the hinge portions 31a and 32a are concealed by the lid body 21 and are not visually recognized from the outside. When a force in the A direction is applied to the lid body 21, the lid body 21 slides to the position shown in FIG. 4 by a distance d, whereby the lock claw 21a is removed from the lock hole of the camera body 10, and the lid body 21 is allowed to rotate. Is done. The lid body 21 is rotated in the opening direction by the biasing force of the torsion spring (not shown) described above, and stops when the corner portion on the base end side contacts the camera body 10 as shown in FIG. This position is the normal rotation limit position of the lid 20.

  In the state of FIG. 5, the battery or the memory card is inserted into or removed from the battery chamber 11 or the card slot 12, and at that time, the force F in the opening direction may be applied to the distal end side of the lid 20 by force majeure. In this case, the force F ′ is generated in the hinge portion with the contact point between the lid body 21 and the camera body 10 as a fulcrum, but the distance L between the force point and the fulcrum is much longer than the distance M between the fulcrum and the action point. Therefore, even if the force F is relatively small, the force F ′ increases. For this reason, if the rotating shaft 33 is fixed to the camera body 10 in a non-moving state, the rotating shaft 33 may be bent by the force F 'or the hinge portions 31a and 32a may be damaged. In the present embodiment, since the rotation shaft 33 is supported by the camera body 10 by the leaf spring 32 via the hinge portion 32a, the leaf spring 32 is elastically deformed as shown in FIG. Movement to the outside of the camera is allowed, and further opening of the lid body 21 is allowed. Therefore, excessive force does not act on the rotating shaft 33, and the rotating shaft 33 and the hinge portions 31a and 32a do not break.

  When the lid main body 21 comes into surface contact with the camera main body 10 as shown in FIG. 6, the position of the fulcrum changes, so that the distance M becomes longer and the distance L becomes shorter than FIG. Becomes smaller. Therefore, the shaft 33 and the hinge portions 31a and 32a are no longer damaged regardless of the presence or absence of the leaf spring 23.

  When the force F on the lid body 21 is released, the lid 20 is rotated to the closed side by the elastic force of the leaf spring 32, and automatically returns to the state shown in FIG. In this state, when the lid body 21 is closed to the position shown in FIG. 4 and then the lid 21 is pushed in the direction B, the lock claw 21a is engaged with the camera body, and the lid 20 is locked in the closed position (FIG. 3).

  As is clear from the above, according to the lid structure of the present embodiment, it is not necessary to consider the contact position of the lid body 21 with the camera body in order to prevent the rotation shaft 33 and the like from being damaged. There is no. Further, since it is not necessary to increase the rigidity of the rotating shaft 33 and the hinge portion, an increase in size and cost can be avoided. Further, since it is not necessary to have a configuration in which the hinge is detached when an excessive force is applied, it is not necessary to perform a troublesome work of reattaching the detached hinge.

  In the above, the rotating shaft 33 is supported by the metal leaf spring 32, but a resin leaf spring may be used. In particular, when a lid is provided on the bottom surface of the camera body 110, for example, as shown in FIG. 9, a resin plate 201 for attaching a tripod seat can be used as a leaf spring. More specifically, reference numeral 202 in FIG. 9 denotes a tripod base, which is attached to the bottom surface of the camera via the plate 201 with screws BS. In the plate 201, a leaf spring portion 201a is formed between two slits, and a hinge portion 201b is formed at the tip thereof. The lid 120 is, for example, a lid of the battery chamber, and a rotating shaft 133 is passed through the hinge portion 121 of the lid 120 and the hinge portion 201b of the leaf spring portion 201a. As a result, the lid 120 is pivotally supported on the bottom surface of the camera to open and close the battery chamber. When a force in the opening direction is further applied to the lid 120 at the rotation limit position, the leaf spring portion 201a of the plate 201 is elastically deformed, and the rotation shaft 133 moves outward of the camera body 110 as in the previous embodiment. This allows further opening of the lid 120. In this way, the number of parts can be reduced by using an existing member in the camera as a leaf spring. In addition, you may use the existing resin member other than the plate for tripod seat attachment as a leaf | plate spring for rotation axis holding.

  Further, a coil spring may be used instead of the leaf spring, or the leaf shaft and the coil spring may not be used, and the rotation shaft itself may be formed of an elastic body as shown in FIG. The rotation shaft 333 is made of, for example, a NiTi superelastic alloy used for an antenna of a mobile phone, and both ends are fixed to the camera body 410 through the hinge portion 321 of the lid 320. When a force in the opening direction is further applied to the lid 330 at the rotation limit position, the rotation shaft 333 is elastically deformed as shown in FIG. 10B, and the central portion moves to the outside of the camera body 410. Further opening of the lid 320 is allowed. According to this, a separate spring member becomes unnecessary, and the number of parts can be reduced.

  In addition to the battery compartment and card slot cover, the present invention is also applied to, for example, a cover that exposes / hides the camera terminal (digital / analog terminal, power supply terminal, etc.), and a back cover for a silver salt camera. it can. Further, the present invention can be similarly applied to a lid provided in an apparatus other than the camera.

It is a perspective view of the digital still camera in one embodiment, and shows a state in which the battery chamber and the cover of the card slot are opened. FIG. 6 is a view similar to FIG. 1 showing a state where the lid is closed. It is a figure which shows the cover part of the said camera, and shows the state by which the cover was closed. FIG. 6 is a view similar to FIG. 3, showing a state where the lid is unlocked by sliding. FIG. 6 is a view similar to FIG. 3, showing a state where the lid is opened to the rotation limit. FIG. 6 is a view similar to FIG. 3 showing a state where the lid is opened beyond the rotation limit. The figure which shows the inner surface of a lid | cover. The figure which shows the structure for supporting a lid | cover to a camera main body. The bottom view of the camera in other embodiment shows the example which used a part of tripod seat mounting plate as a leaf | plate spring. Furthermore, it is a figure which shows the principal part of the camera in other embodiment, and shows the example which comprised the rotating shaft of the lid | cover with the elastic member.

Explanation of symbols

10, 110, 410 Camera body 11 Battery compartment 12 Card slot 20, 120, 320 Lid 21 Lid body 21a Lock claw 31 Slide metal plate 31a, 32a Hinge part 32 Leaf spring 33, 133, 333 Rotating shaft 121 Hinge part 201 Tripod seat Mounting plate 201a Leaf spring part 201b Hinge part 202 Tripod seat BS screw

Claims (7)

In the structure in which the lid is supported to be openable / closable on the apparatus main body via the rotation shaft,
When the rotation shaft is supported by the apparatus main body by an elastic support member, and the force in the opening direction is further applied to the lid at the open side restriction position, the rotation shaft is moved by elastic deformation of the elastic support member. The lid structure is configured to allow opening beyond the limit on the opening side of the lid. The lid structure according to claim 1, wherein the elastic support member is a leaf spring. The lid structure according to claim 1, wherein a plate-like resin member forming a part of the apparatus main body is used as the elastic support member. In the structure in which the lid is supported to be openable / closable on the apparatus main body via the rotation shaft,
When the rotation shaft is made of an elastic member, and the force in the opening direction is further applied to the lid at the open side restriction position, the rotation shaft is elastically deformed, thereby opening the lid beyond the open side restriction. A lid structure characterized by being allowed. The configuration is such that when the lid is opened to a predetermined position beyond the opening side limit, a force applied to the rotating shaft is reduced by abutting the tip end side of the lid on the apparatus main body. Item 5. The lid structure according to any one of Items 1 to 4. A camera comprising the lid body according to claim 1 provided on a camera body. The camera according to claim 6, wherein a part of a resin plate member for attaching a tripod mount to the camera body is used as the elastic support member.

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