US3748614A

US3748614A - Magnetic board

Info

Publication number: US3748614A
Application number: US00227077A
Authority: US
Inventors: H Holtz
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 1971-11-17
Filing date: 1972-02-17
Publication date: 1973-07-24
Anticipated expiration: 1990-07-24
Also published as: FR2160343B3; FR2160343A1; GB1344585A

Abstract

A magnetic board for mounting paramagnetic adhering objects, such as letters, symbols, numbers and the like, the board having at least one permanent or ferromagnetic surface and assembled in hollow rectangular or square-shaped pieces made of plastic material into which plate-like or strip-like permanent or ferromagnetic material is mounted on either one or both sides of the board. The board may also include a plurality of longitudinal ruled lines on one or both sides.

Description

mite Holtz States Patet 1 MAGNETIC BOARD [76] Inventor: Hermann Holtz, Seerobenstr. 7, 62

Wiesbaden, Germany Filed: Feb. 17, 1972 Appl. No.: 227,077

[30] Foreign Application Priority Data Nov. 17, 1971 Germany G 71 43 245.6

US. Cl. 335/285, 335/303 Int. Cl. H01! 7/20 Field of Search 335/285, 295, 303,

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1/1966 Baermann 335/285 X [451 July 24, 1973 2,958,019 10/1960 Scholten et al 335/285 3,241,198 3/1966 Baermann 335/303 X Primary Examiner-George Harris Attorney-Allison C. Collard [57] ABSTRACT 7 Claims, 8 Drawing Figures l 1P W U P 6 l' a li u PAIENIE 24 I975 3, 7 5 14 SHE 10F 2 2 w w W M a 7 Fig.7 Fig.2

h m w U 5' L U H U EVMJ m a L n Fig.3

MAGNETIC BOARD The present invention relates to a permanent magnet or ferromagnetic board on which magnetically adhering objects may be placed;

More specifically, the present invention relates to a magnetic board having adhering letters, numbers, symbols, and the like.

Permanent magnet or ferromagnetic boards are well known in the art. These generally consist of aboard, or strip-like permanent magnet material, or a ferromagnetic material which is mounted onto a base plate or carrier. One of these conventional permanent or ferromagnetic boards consist essentially of a plurality of layers which are mounted onto each other in a sandwichlike construction, whereby the top layer consists of a permanent or ferromagnetic material. The permanent magnet may consist of a-suitable plastic resin, or rubber based material which may be constructed in form of plates, and mounted on a base plate or carrier. The board may also be constructed in the form of a U- shaped permanent magnet consisting of a rubber base or plastic resin material, whereby the U,-shaped pieces are mounted onto a base plate in a tight arrangement with respect to each other. This board is also provided with ruled lines which run longitudinally along the board. The letters, symbols, numbers and the like, may be placed between the ruled lines and stay on the board by magnetic adherence.

When ferromagnetic boards are made, usually thin ferromagnetic sheet metal is mounted onto the base plate, for example, by bonding. Because of their construction, the conventional permanent or ferromagnetic boards are very expensive to make. This is particularly true if boards of different sizes have to be made which cannot be produced in series. The-present invention provides a board of the aforementioned type which can be made of any suitable size and manner and is thus inexpensive. The invention also provides boards of large sizes, or boards having subdivided faces which could be used, for example, as an indicator board. In the invention, a permanent or ferromagnetic board is provided for mounting paramagnetic objects which have at least one face of a permanent magnetic or ferromagnetic material. The board consists of a plurality of hollow rectangular or square-shaped pieces made of plastic material in modular fashion, onto which a plate-like, or strip-like permanent or ferromagnetic material is mounted. The magnetic material can be mounted on one or both faces of the board.

The permanent or ferromagnetic board has advantages over the conventional boards since the carrier or base plate for the plate or strip-like permanent or ferromagnetic material consists of hollow rectangular, or square plastic pieces which can be assembled into any size by simply cutting them into the desired shape. Thus, the permanent or ferromagnetic material consisting of either plates or strips can be easily mounted on one or both sides of the carrier or base plate. In accordance with the invention, the novel board is relatively light in weight, and very rigid, since it may be used to assemble the individual board pieces.

Instead of bonding the permanent or ferromagnetic plates onto the carrier or base plate, the upper and lower pieces may be provided with a flange or a groove at their outeredge onto which the permanent or ferromagnetic material may be mounted. When the novel board is used as an indicator board, the individual pieces may be provided with one or a plurality of longitudinal ruled lines which subdivide the pieces into separate fields. After the individual pieces are assembled, a strip-like permanent or ferromagnetic material may be mounted between the individual ruled lines. Thus, a ruled indicator board is provided so that letters, numbers, or other symbols can be placed onto the permanent magnetic strips to indicate a desired text or picture. The ruled lines guarantee that an even border exists between the lines of letters, numbers, or other symbols. When strip-like permanent magnetic material is used, the letters, numbers, or other symbols may be made of a suitable ferromagnetic material. In contrast, however, it is also possible that permanent magnetic letters, numbers, symbols or the like, can be mounted onto a strip-like ferromagnetic material between the ruled lines, so that on one face of the board, the space between the individual lines is different from the other side of the board. It is thus possible to have a variable choice in indicating the desired objects. For example, one would be able to have twice the number of lines on one face of the board than on the other.

7 The individual pieces can be connected to each other by any suitable means. In accordance with one embodiment of the invention, grooves are provided along the front edges of the individual pieces correspondingly formed connecting pieces may be placed into these grooves to guarantee suitable locking of the individual pieces with each other.

It is therefore an object according to the present invention to provide a magnetic board constructed'of a permanent magnet or ferromagnetic material constructed of hollow rectangular or square-shaped pieces of plastic material receiving strip-like magnetic material mounted on one or both sides of the board.

It is another object according to the present invention to provide an' improved magnetic board for receiving paramagnetic objects for adhering tothe surface of the board.

It is still a further object according to the present invention to provide a magnetic board which is simple in design, easy to manufacture and inexpensive in cost.

Other objects and features of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description considered in connection with the accompanying drawings which disclose the embodiments of the invention. It is to be understood, however, that the drawings are designed for the purpose of illustration only and not as a definition of the limits of the invention.

In the drawings, wherein similar reference characters denote similar elements throughout the several views:

FIG. 1 is a longitudinal cross-sectional view of a rectangular piece for making the base construction of a permanent or ferromagnetic board in accordance with the invention;

FIG. 2 shows a partial section of the piece of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 shows a cross section of a board constructed of the individual pieces of FIGS. 1 and 2;

FIG. 4 is a plan view of the embodiment of 'FIG. 3;

FIG. 5 shows the enlarged cross section of the front part of the connecting portion of FIG. 1;

FIG. 6 shows the cross section of a connecting portion;

FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional view of another embodiment of the inventiveindicator board; and

FIG. 8 is a partial plan view of the indicator board according to FIG. 7.

Referring to FIGS. 1-4, the base construction of the permanent or ferromagnetic board consists essentially of right angular, shaped hollow pieces 1, made of plastic material. The front edges are provided with longitudinally extending grooves 2. Connecting pieces 3 are mounted in the grooves, thus connecting and interlocking the individual pieces with each other. The upper and lower pieces are provided with flanges 4 which extend beyond the upper and lower edges and are provided with a groove. A permanent or ferromagnetic plate 6 is inserted into groove 5. The front face of the permanent or ferromagnetic plate forms the adhering face of the board. It is to be understood that the permanent or ferromagnetic plate may be mounted onto the base plate consisting of individual pieces 1, for example, by bonding, or any other suitable means. In the same manner, the other side of the board may be provided with a similar plate made of permanent or ferromagnetic material, and inserted in groove of extensions 4. The board may thus be used on both sides. Different colors can be used for each side of the board, if desired.

FIG. 5 shows an enlarged and detailed front face of a piece. A groove 2 is provided in the front face having a zig-zag edge 7. As can be seen from FIG. 6, the outer face of connecting portion 3 is also provided with a zigzag face 8. This connecting piece 3 is inserted into groove 2 and is fixedly interlocked because of the engaging zig-zag faces. A counterpiece 1 is mounted on the extending portion of connecting piece 3, thus interlocking the individual parts. It is to be understood that the interlocking of the parts may be enhanced by additional bonding, or by bonding alone.

A further embodiment of the invention is shown in FIGS. 7 and 8. In this embodiment, an indicator board is divided into lines. In this embodiment, parallel ruled profiles or shoulder-like projections 9 are provided on one or both sides of plastic piece 1, which also extend parallel with respect to the edges of the pieces. Thus, projections 9 form segmented fields 10 after the individual board pieces 1 have been assembled. Permanent or ferromagnetic strips 11 may be mounted on these segmented fields. The strips receive the magnetizable letters 12 or numbers 13. The ruled projections 9 guarantee that the letters, numbers, and the like will be aligned in one even direction. For example, only one projection 9' may be provided on the obverse side of the board so that the distance between the individual lines is wider. Indicator boards of different sizes may be provided by varying the width of the individual pieces 1. Furthermore, one or a plurality of smooth pieces may be interconnected as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, between pieces 1 which are provided with the ruled projections 9. In this way, the distance between the different lines may be chosen at random. Finally, it is to be understood that individual pieces 1 may be made in any size, so that boards of any given size can be made.

While only a few embodiments of the present invention have been shown and described, it will be obvious that many changes and modifications may be made thereunto without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.

What is claimed is:

1. An apparatus for mounting magnetically adhering objects and having at least one flat exterior mounting surface, comprising:

a plurality of hollow modular rectangular pieces one of which has at least one longitudinally projecting flange integrally formed on an edge;

magnetic strip means engaging said at least one flange and mounted on the exterior of said modular rectangular piece for magnetically attracting the ferromagnetic objects placed adjacent thereto; and

interlocking means positioned within said modular rectangular pieces so as to interconnect said modular rectangular pieces adjacent in a board-like array.

2. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, wherein said interlocking means comprises at least one interengaging tongue and groove.

3. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, further comprising means for securing said magnetic strip means to said modular rectangular pieces.

4. The apparatus as recited in claim 3, wherein said means for securing said magnetic strip means comprises an adhesive material.

5. An apparatus for mounting magnetically adhering objects and having at least one flat exterior mounting surface, comprising:

a hollow modular rectangular piece having a plurality of parallel spaced-apart shoulder projections, the projections extending perpendicular to the plane of display;

magnetic strip means disposed between the shoulder projections for attracting ferromagnetic objects placed adjacent thereto; and

means for fastening said magnetic material within said shoulder projections.

6. The apparatus as recited in claim 5, wherein said magnetic strip means are constructed of permanent magnetic material.

7. The apparatus as recited in claim 6, wherein the number of parallel spaced apart shoulder projections formed on one side of said modular rectangular piece differs from the number of parallel spaced apart shoulder projections formed on the opposite side of said modular rectangular piece.

Claims

1. An apparatus for mounting magnetically adhering objects and having at least one flat exterior mounting surface, comprising: a plurality of hollow modular rectangular pieces one of which has at least one longitudinally projecting flange integrally formed on an edge; magnetic strip means engaging said at least one flange and mounted on the exterior of said modular rectangular piece for magnetically attracting the ferromagnetic objects placed adjacent thereto; and interlocking means positioned within said modular rectangular pieces so as to interconnect said modular rectangular pieces adjacent in a board-like array.

2. The apparatus as recited in claim 1, wherein said interlocking means comprises at least one inter-engaging tongue and groove.

5. An apparatus for mounting magnetically adhering objects and having at least one flat exterior mounting surface, comprising: a hollow modular rectangular piece having a plurality of parallel spaced-apart shoulder projections, the projections extending perpendicular to the plane of display; magnetic strip means disposed between the shoulder projections for attracting ferromagnetic objects placed adjacent thereto; and means for fastening said magnetic material within said shoulder projections.