US2800168A

US2800168A - Spring seated construction for upholstered furniture

Info

Publication number: US2800168A
Application number: US569468A
Authority: US
Inventors: Calder James Donald
Original assignee: LOUIS SKLAR
Current assignee: LOUIS SKLAR
Priority date: 1956-03-05
Filing date: 1956-03-05
Publication date: 1957-07-23
Anticipated expiration: 1974-07-23

Description

July 23 1957 J. D. CALDER 2,800,168 I SPRING SEATED CONSTRUCTIGN FOR UPHOLSTERED FURNITURE Filed Iarchj, 1956 Inventor JAMES B. CALDER.

United States Patent SPRING SEATED CONSTRUCTlON FOR UPHOLSTERED FURNITURE James Donald Calder, Frenchmens Bay, Ontario, Canada, assignor to Harry Sklar, Joseph Sklar, Samuel Sklar, and Louis Sklar Application March 5, 1956, Serial No. 569,468

4 Claims. (Cl. 155-179) This invention relates to spring seating construction for upholstered furniture.

Over a period of years, linearly extending sinuous or zig-zag springs have largely replaced coil spring construction in upholstered furniture. In terms of seat construction, such springs extend between the back and front rails of the furniture and are prestressed to provide a yieldable seat when under load. Two difliculties present themselves in the employment of such springs for this purpose in providing a practical and economical structure; viz., providing a yielding forward edge on the seat and avoiding dead bottom effect, i. e. an unyielding seat once under load when accordingly does not provide the effect of spring depth.

Numerous attempts have been made to provide a yieldable forward edge employing such springs by forming what may be termed a bellows-fold at the front or an addition to the spring which in effect provides a bellowsfold, but in most cases there results a receding of the forward edge of the seat when under load whereas attempts to eliminate dead bottom effect have usually culminated in complicated and expensive structures.

The present invention provides spring seating construction employing this type of spring in a relatively simple structure which provides a practical yieldable forward edge for a seat and a structure through which dead bottom effect is eliminated, thus to provide a seat of practical economical construction with full spring depth.

According to the invention, the spring units which are inter-tied in a simple conventional manner to provide the whole seat generally comprise a unit having a bellowsfold at one end to constitute that portion of the unit disposed at the front of the seat, the apex of the bellowsfold being disposed inwardly of the front rail of the seat, the upper extremity of the bellows-fold constituting the front edge of the seat and the lower extremity'of the bellows-fold constituting a pivotal anchoring point for securement to the frame in combination with a second zig-zag spring arched to extend from an anchoring point on the frame and secured to the apex of the bellowsfold, said spring members forming said unit being secured together intermediate the linear extent of said unit, the latter formed by said spring members extending between the front and rear frame to form with like intertied units a spring construction resistant to recession of the front seat edge and to dead bottom effect when said units are under compression load. Preferably said units are designed for a seat but may be employed as a backrest for such furniture.

The invention will be clearly understood by reference to the following detailed specification taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

In the drawings:

Fig. 1 is a cross-section taken through a simple furniture base frame showing the spring unit construction applied thereto.

Fig. 2 is a plan view showing the manner in which 2,800,168 Patented July 23, 1957 the spring units are inter-tied and secured at the ends of the frame.

Fig. 3 is a fragmentary detailed perspective view of a spring unit to illustrate the manner in which the two spring elements forming the unit are interconnected; and

Fig. 4 is a view similar to Fig. 1 showing an alternative arrangement of spring construction to form a spring unit.

Referring to the drawings, A indicates a simple frame foran upholstered piece of seating furniture and B indicates one of the spring units according to the present invention employed as an inter-tied group to form the yieldable seat. In the preferred construction, the unit is comprised by a linear zig-zag spring 10 having a free rear end 11 and which is formed at the front end with a bellows-fold 12 having an apex 13, a forward free end 14, and a folded extremity 15 which forms the front edge of the seat. The free end 14 is anchored by a conventional anchoring clip 16 to the front frame piece 17 while the rearward free end 11 is designed to bear against the inner face of the rearward frame piece 18 of frame A being secured inwardly of its free end to the frame by means of an anchoring clip 19.

The second spring element of the unit B comprises a linearly extending zig-zag spring 20 which is anchored on the frame preferably to the forward frame. piece 17 on its inner face by means of a clip 21 which is disposed somewhat towards the lower extremity of frame piece 17 and it is pre-stressed or arched to extend below spring 10 and in particular is secured to the apex 13 of its bellows-fold 12 by means of a conventional spring clip 22 and is secured also adjacent to its free rearward end 23 to spring 10 by means of clips 24 and 25 at a point intermediate the front and rear ends of spring 10. This point is chosen in accordance with the degree of deflection desired when under load and in combination with the location of the point of anchorage between clip 19 and spring 10, which latter may be varied, the effect of spring depth under load is chosen. This may be further varied by employing selected gauges of spring as may be desired.

The spring 20 effectively reinforces the spring 10 in such manner that the connection between it and the apex 13 of bellows-fold 12 has the result of resisting the normal tendency of the front edge 15 of spring 10 to recede when the spring is subjected to load, thus providing for a normal depression or vertical flexing of the forward edge of the seat as may be understood by reference to the dotted line position of the spring unit as shown in Fig. 1. Moreover, the spring 20 also functions to avoid dead bottom effect since it is pre-stressed and anchored at an appropriate point intermediate the ends of spring 10 and thus, in combination with the rearward anchoring of spring 10 at a chosen point inwardly of the free end 11 thereof, will operate to produce a predetermined degree of flexing of the whole unit such that it does not give to a point where it will not yield further under load or rigorous testwhich would otherwise give dead bottom effect but, under load it gives the effect of further or full spring depth. This is completely achieved solely by two simple linearly extending zig-zag spring units interconnected in a simple manner and anchored also in a simple manner on the base frame. Y

1 As shown in Fig. 2, the units B are inter-tied by conventional spring typing clips 26 while the end spring units 13-1 of identical construction are secured to the end frame piece 27 of frame A by means of coil tension spring 28. The overall effect, therefore, is a very substantial seat which will not recede rearwardly to any substan ial extent when under load and in which the units B will not tend to sway laterally when under load.

In the alternative form of construction shown in Fig. 4,

the units B are comprised by the linearly extending zigzag spring 29 which is pre-stressed and extends between the anchoring point 30 on the front of the frame and the anchoring point constituted by the clip 31 securing it to the rear frame piece 18. In this construction, the second spring element 32 is secured at its inner end to spring 29 at the

points

33 and 34, which spring is formed with the bellows-fold 35, the apex of which is secured to spring 29 by suitable clip 36 and the free end of this spring is anchored as at '37 by the clip 38 on the forward frame piece 17. The same effect is thus achieved whether the longer of the two springs constitutes the bottom member extending between the

frame pieces

17 and 18 or whether it constitutes the top member and includes the bellowsfold as well, as in the case in the showing of Fig. 1. In both cases, there results a very simple spring unit composed merely of two springs of the same character so connected and mounted as to achieve economically a practical full spring depth seat with a yieldable front seat edge.

It -is obvious, of course, that units according to the invention could be grouped and arranged to form a yieldable back for the seat wherein the front seat edge may becomethe yieldable top edge of the back. However, the yieldable back of seating furniture does not require the spring depth required in the seat due to the fact that it assumes a lesser load and other constructions may, therefore, be usefully employed in a back support.

I claim:

1. A spring unit for a seating frame employed with other similar units inter-tied to form a combined spring base, said unit comprising a pair of linear zag-zag spring members, the first of said members having a bellows-fold at one end to constitute that portion of the unit having a yieldable edge, said bellows-fold having an apex to be disposed inwardly of the frame of the seating construction, the upper extremity of the bellows-fold constituting the yieldable edge and the lower extremity of the bellowsfold constituting an anchoring element for securement to the frame, the second spring member being arched to extend from an anchoring point on the frame inwardly of the first spring member, and secured intermediate its extent to the apex of the bellows-fold of the first spring member, said spring members being secured together intermediate the linear extent of said unit, the latter extending between spaced apart, opposed members of said seating frame to form with like inter-tied units a spring construction resistant to recession of the yieldable edge in the axial direction of said unit and to dead bottom efiect when said units are under compression load.

2. A spring unit for a seating frame employed with other similar units inter-tied to form a combined spring base, said unit comprising a pair of outer and inner linear zig-zag spring members, the outer of said members extending from one portion of the frame to an opposed portion thereof and having a bellows-fold at one end thereof to constitute that portion of the unit having a yieldable edge, said bellows-fold having an apex to be disposed inwardly of the frame of the seating construction, the upper extremity of the bellows-fold constituting the yieldable edge and the lower extremity of the bellows-fold constituting an anchoring element for securement of that end of said member to the frame, said inner spring member being arched to extend from an anchoring point on the frame inwardly of the outer spring member and being secured intermediate its extent to the apex of the bellows-fold of the outer spring member and secured at a second point to said outer spring member intermediate the bellows-fo1d and the opposite end ofsaid outer springmember, said unit together with said corresponding units being designed to'be inter-tied to form a composite spring construction resistant to recession of the yieldable edge in the axial direction of each unit and resistant to dead bottom effect when said units are under compression load.

3. A spring unit for a seating frame employed with other similar units inter-tied to form a combined spring base, said unit comprising a pair of outer and inner linear zig-zag spring members, the outer of said members having a bellows-fold at one end to constitute that portion of the unit having a yieldable edge, said bellows-fold having an apex to be disposed inwardly of the frame of the seating construction, the upper extremity of the bellows-fold constituting the yieldable edge and the lower extremity of the bellows-fold constituting an anchoring element for securement to the frame, said inner spring member being arched to extend from an anchoring point on the frame to an anchoring point on an opposed portion of the frame, the apex of the bellows-fold of the outer spring member being secured to said arched'inner member at a point intermediate the extent of the latter and the end of said outer member opposed to the anchored end being secured to said inner spring member at a point intermediate its anchored ends, said unit together with said corresponding units being designed to be intertied to form a composite spring'construction resistant to recession of the yieldable edge in the axial direction of each unit and resistant to dead bottom effect When said units are under compression load.

4. Spring seating construction formed from a plurality of inter-tied zig-zag springs, each comprising a unit having a bellows-fold at one end to constitute that portion of the unit disposed at the front of the seat, the apex of the bellows-fold being disposed inwardly of the front rail of the seat, the upper extremity of the bellows-fold constituting the front edge of the seat and the lower extremity of the bellows-fold constituting a pivotal anchoring point forsecurement to the frame in combination with a second z ig-zag spring arched to extend from an anchoring point on the front frame member and secured adjacent its opposite end to the first mentioned Zig-zag spring ata point intermediate its extent, said second zig-zag spring being secured to the apex of the bellows-fold and forming the unit resistant to recession of the front seat edge and dead bottom ,eflect when said spring is under compression load.

References Cited in the file of this patent FOREIGN PATENTS Great Britain Nov. 12, 1952 Great Britain Nov. 12, 1952