WO2010118460A1

WO2010118460A1 - Manual aid mountable to a hand-held device or to apparel

Info

Publication number: WO2010118460A1
Application number: PCT/AU2010/000407
Authority: WO
Inventors: Jared Luke Brady
Original assignee: Jared Luke Brady
Priority date: 2009-04-14
Filing date: 2010-04-14
Publication date: 2010-10-21

Abstract

A manual aid is provided which is mountable to a handle of a hand-held device or to apparel. The manual aid comprises a resiliently deformable protuberance which is capable of interacting with a selected portion of a user's hand to modify the grip of the user's hand with the hand-held device. The protuberance may be hemispherical or saddle or ear-shaped. The hand-held device may be equipment, tools or implements, such as sporting equipment. One particular example is a cricket bat. The apparel may be a glove, mitten, mitt, gauntlet or inner, such as a cricket glove or cricket glove inner worn on the hand of the user of the hand-held device.

Description

TITLE MANUAL AID MOUNTABLE TO A HAND-HELD DEVICE OR TO

APPAREL

FIELD OF THE INVENTION THIS INVENTION relates to a manual aid for use with hand-held devices. More particularly, this invention relates to a manual aid which is mountable to a hand-held device or apparel, such as glove, which assists use of hand-held devices including equipment and/or tools, sporting equipment, and the like.

BACKGROUND

Hand-held equipment is frequently used in many areas of activity, including industry, the military, sports and recreation. Hand-held equipment includes tools and implements such as hammers, shovels, axes, crowbars, levers, picks and the like, weapons and also equipment used for recreational activities, such as sports. In all such cases, use of the hand-held equipment requires transferral of force from the user to the hand-held equipment.

In particular, many sports are played using a sporting device such as a bat, paddle, oar, racquet, club or the like that is held by the sportsperson's hand during play. Such sports include cricket, baseball, softball, tennis, hockey and golf, for example. Accordingly, correct grip of the sporting device can greatly improve the performance of the sportsperson using the device. Indeed, both professional and amateur sportspeople often spend many hours perfecting their grip to maximize performance. This is particularly the case in "bat and ball" sports such as cricket, softball and baseball, where the ability to hit the ball long distances can assist scoring.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In one form, although not necessarily the only or broadest form, the invention provides a manual aid or a hand-held device and/or apparel comprising said manual aid, which manual aid comprises a protuberance which is capable of modifying the grip of a user's hand on said hand-held device.

Preferably, in use the manual aid thereby improves the performance of the hand-held device by the user. One preferred advantage of the manual aid is that it may also act as a shock absorber which reduces or minimizes jarring of a user's hand when using the hand-held device.

In one aspect, the invention provides a manual aid which is mountable to a hand-held device, said manual aid comprising a resiliently deformable protuberance which is capable of interacting with a selected portion of a user's hand to modify the grip of the user's hand with said hand-held device.

In another aspect, the invention provides a hand-held device comprising a manual aid which is mounted to said hand-held device, said manual aid comprising a resiliently deformable protuberance which is capable of interacting with a selected portion of a user's hand to modify the grip of the user's hand with said hand-held device.

In yet another aspect, the invention provides apparel comprising a manual aid, said manual aid comprising a resiliently deformable protuberance which is capable of interacting with a selected portion of a user's hand to modify the grip of the user's hand with a hand-held device.

Suitably, said protuberance is a single protuberance.

Preferably, the manual aid is removably mountable to said handheld device and/or said apparel. In certain embodiments the manual aid further comprises a mounting member for mounting the manual aid to the hand-held device or to the apparel. In such embodiments, the mounting member is mountable to a handle of the hand-held device.

Alternatively, the manual aid may be integrally formed in said hand- held device and/or in said apparel. By way of example only, the manual aid may be integrally formed in a handle of the hand-held device.

The hand-held device may be any hand-held equipment, tool, implement or the like.

Preferably, the hand-held device is sporting equipment In particular embodiments, the sporting equipment is a bat, paddle, club, cue, mallet, racquet, oar or the like.

Preferably, the sporting device is used in a sporting game to strike, guide, propel or otherwise contact a ball. Particular non-limiting examples of sporting games include cricket, tennis, softball, baseball, hockey, badminton, squash and golf, although without limitation thereto.

In a particularly preferred form, the sporting equipment is a cricket bat and said sporting aid is mountable to the cricket bat handle. Suitably, the apparel of the aforementioned aspect is worn on the hand, such as a glove, mitten, mitt, gauntlet or inner.

Preferably, the apparel is sporting apparel.

In a particularly preferred form, the apparel comprising the manual aid is a cricket glove or cricket glove inner. The manual aid may be stitched or glued to the apparel, or integrally formed therewith.

Alternatively, the manual aid may be removably mounted to the apparel, such as by a hook and loop fastener, adhesive or other releasable means. Throughout this specification, unless the context requires otherwise, the words "comprise", "comprises" and "comprising" will be understood to imply the inclusion of a stated integer or group of integers but not the exclusion of any other integer or group of integers.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Reference is made to non-limiting embodiments of the invention described with reference to the following drawings wherein:

FIG. 1 shows (A) a cricket bat; (B) an embodiment of a manual aid mounted to a cricket bat handle under a handle grip; and (C) an embodiment of a manual aid mounted to a cricket bat handle by way of a mounting member;

FIG. 2 shows an embodiment indicating where a manual aid interacts with a user's hand; FIG. 3 shows an embodiment of a manual aid fitted to an inner glove;

FIG. 4 shows another embodiment of a manual aid (A) face view; (B) base view; and (C) side view; FIG. 5 shows the embodiment of the manual aid of FIG. 4 gripped by a hand engaging a bat handle; and.

FIG. 6 shows another embodiment of a manual aid fitted to an inner glove.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Referring to FIG. 1A-C, sporting aid 10 comprises single protuberance 11 and mounting member 12. In FIG. 1B, sporting aid 10 is shown removably mounted to handle 21 of cricket bat 20, positioned under handle grip 22. FIG. 1C shows sporting aid 10 comprising mounting member 12. In this embodiment, sporting aid 10 is mountable to handle 21 of cricket bat 20 by way of mounting member 12 fitting over around curved surface 23 of handle 21.

Mounting member 12 may be in the form of a strap, band or loop that can be removably fitted around circumference 23 of handle 21. The strap or loop may be formed of an elastic material and/or in the case of a strap may comprise a fastener, such as a hook and loop fastener (e.g.

Velcro™).

Preferably, protuberance 11 comprises a resiliently deformable and/or compressible material. Preferably, the material imparts elasticity. Non-limiting examples of elastic materials include polyurethane, rubber, silicone, latex, resilient resins, synthetic foams and polyethylene, such as low density (LDPE) polyethylene which is substantially elastically deformable, and very low density polyethylene and very low density (LLDPE) which is even more deformable. Protuberance 11 may be at least partly hollow or solid or comprise particles (which may be resiliently deformable) inside a resiliently deformable shell.

Referring particularly to FIG. 1C, protuberance 11 is substantially hemispherical in shape with convex face 14, although this could be any shape or configuration which comfortably interacts with a selected portion of a user's hand. Protuberance 11 also comprises concave base 13, which is configured to form a "flush" mating fit with curved surface 23 of handle 21. It will be appreciated that the shape and configuration of base 13 can be adapted to suit different types of bat handles.

Referring now to FIG. 2, typically for a game such as cricket, the selected portion of a user's hand 30 is portion 31 of palm 35 of hand 30, which is generally or approximately located in line with base 34 of thumb 32 and in line with ring finger 33 (i.e approximately at the intersection of these lines). In cricket use, hand 30 would be the "bottom hand" when batting, which for a right handed batsmen is the right hand and for a left handed batsmen, the left hand.

In another embodiment shown in FIG. 3, sporting aid 110 is fitted to sporting apparel in the form of inner glove 140 worn on hand 130. Typically for a game such as cricket, protuberance 111 is fitted to palm 145 of inner glove 140 roughly located in line with base 144 of thumb 142 and in line with ring finger 143 of inner glove 140 (Ae approximately at the intersection of these lines).

Protuberance 111 may be stitched, glued or integrally formed with inner glove 140.

Referring also to FIG. 2, inner glove 140 is arranged so that protuberance 111 engages portion 31 of palm 35 of hand 130 in line with base 34 of thumb 32 and ring finger 33. As previously described, protuberance 111 comprises a resiliently deformable and/or compressible material and is substantially hemispherical in shape. For cricket, an outer glove (not shown) would normally be worn over inner glove 140.

Another embodiment is shown in FIG. 4 A-C and FIG. 5, in which sporting aid 210 comprises protuberance 211 which approximates to a "saddle" or "ear" shape. In this embodiment, protuberance 211 comprises concave base 213 and face 214 that comprises convex or raised portion 215. As best seen in FIG. 4B, concave base 213 is configured to form a "flush" mating fit with curved surface 223 of handle 221. As shown in FIG. 5, face 213 interacts with palm 236 of hand 230 so that convex or raised portion 215 is located between base or "ball" 234 of thumb 232 and handle 221. An embodiment such as shown in FIG. 4 and 5 is preferably, although not exclusively, formed of a polyurethane material.

It will also be appreciated that this embodiment of sporting aid 210 is shown for right-handed use. However, it will be appreciated that sporting aid 210 may be readily constructed for left-handed use. Alternatively, a left- or right-handed sporting aid 210, may simply be reversed for right- or left-handed use so that face 214 interacts with handle 221 and base 213 interacts with handle 221. Furthermore, for "two-handed" grips of handle 221 (such as in cricket, Softball, hockey, baseball etc.) both left- and right- handed orientations of sporting aid 210 may be used.

Referring to FIG. 6, another embodiment of inner glove 340 is shown, which includes manual aid 310 comprising protuberance 311 as described in FIGS 4 and 5. Inner glove 340 comprises protuberance 311 located in (e.g. stitched, adhered or otherwise affixed, or integrally formed with) palm 345 of inner glove 340 in line with base 344 of thumb 342 and ring finger 343. Concave base 313 is oriented to engage a bat handle surface (not shown), with raised portion 315 approximately in line with ring finger 343 of inner glove 340.

Although not wishing to be bound by theory, in the particular context of cricket, it is proposed that when a batsman swings bat 20 prior to contact with a cricket ball (not shown), there is pressure on bottom hand 30. This pressure compresses protuberance 11 thus storing energy in protuberance 11. Immediately after the ball hits bat 20, the pressure of hand 30 on bat 20 relaxes, whereby energy stored in protuberance 11 is released, the decompressing protuberance 11 imparting kinetic energy to the bat. The result is that 20 bat moves faster than normal, transferring increased momentum to the ball. In a game such as cricket, when an object traveling further before hitting the ground. Therefore it results in more "sixes" and "fours" being scored. Although the embodiments described herein in detail relates to cricket, cricket bats and cricket gloves, it is proposed that the inventive principle is extendable to hand-held devices in general, inclusive of handheld equipment, tools, implements and the like. For example, apparel may be in the form of a protective glove or mitten worn in a working environment, such as a gardening glove.

In particular embodiments relating to sporting equipment, the sporting equipment may be a bat, paddle, club, cue, mallet, racquet, oar or the like used in sporting games that include cricket, tennis, Softball, baseball, hockey, badminton and squash

In each case, stored energy released by the manual aid may be transferred to the device thereby improving the performance of the handheld device in the hand(s) of the user. Another advantage of the manual aid is that it may also act as a shock absorber which reduces or minimizes jarring of a user's hand when using the hand-held device, particularly when the hand-held device impacts a hard object.

Throughout the specification the aim has been to describe the preferred embodiments of the invention without limiting the invention to any one embodiment or specific collection of features. It will therefore be appreciated by those of skill in the art that, in light of the instant disclosure, various modifications and changes can be made in the particular embodiments exemplified without departing from the scope of the present invention.

Claims

1. A manual aid which is mountable to a hand-held device or to apparel, said manual aid comprising a resiliently deformable protuberance which is capable of interacting with a selected portion of a user's hand to modify the grip of the user's hand with said hand-held device.

2. The manual aid of Claim 1 , wherein said protuberance is a single protuberance.

3. The manual of aid of Claim 1 or Claim 2, which is hemispherical in shape.

4. The manual aid of Claim 1 or Claim 2, wherein the protuberance has a saddle or ear shape.

5. The manual aid of Claim 3 or Claim 4, wherein the protuberance comprises a concave portion, which in use forms a mating fit with curved surface of a handle of said hand-held device...

6. The manual aid of any one of Claims 2 to 5, wherein the protuberance comprises a convex portion, which in use interacts with said selected portion of the user's hand.

7. The manual aid of any preceding claim, further comprising a mounting member.

8. The manual aid of Claim 7, wherein the mounting member is in the form of a strap, band or loop.

9. The manual aid of any preceding claim which is removably mountable to said hand-held device or said apparel.

10. A hand-held device comprising the manual aid of any one of Claims 1-9 mounted thereto.

11. The hand-held device of Claim 10, wherein said hand-held device is hand-held equipment, tool or implement.

12. The hand-held device of Claim 11 , which is sporting equipment

13. The hand-held device of Claim 12, wherein said sporting equipment is a bat, paddle, club, cue, mallet, racquet or oar.

14. The hand-held device of Claim 13, wherein the sporting equipment is a cricket bat.

15. Apparel comprising the manual aid of any one of Claims 1-9 mounted thereto.

16. The apparel of Claim 15, wherein the manual aid is stitched or glued thereto, or integrally formed therewith.

17. The apparel of Claim 15 or Claim 16, which is suitable to be worn on the hand.

18. The apparel of Claim 17, which is a glove, mitten, mitt, gauntlet or inner.

19. The apparel of Claim 18, which is a cricket glove or cricket glove inner.