WO2023057063A1

WO2023057063A1 - Furniture system, piece of furniture, and moving device

Info

Publication number: WO2023057063A1
Application number: PCT/EP2021/077716
Authority: WO
Inventors: Marcel Leber
Original assignee: Marcel Leber
Priority date: 2021-10-07
Filing date: 2021-10-07
Publication date: 2023-04-13

Abstract

The invention relates to a furniture system, by means of which the area provided in an apartment can be better utilized in that at least one piece of furniture can assume at least two positions, said piece of furniture automatically moving between the two positions. For this purpose, the piece of furniture has a furniture body (12) and at least one moving mechanism which is connected to the furniture body and by means of which the furniture body can be moved on a plane in at least two degrees of freedom by means of a motor. The invention additionally relates to a suitable moving device (20, 20') as part of such a moving mechanism.

Description

Furniture system, furniture and traversing device

Description

The invention relates to a furniture system according to claim 1, a piece of furniture according to claim 14 and a traversing device, in particular as part of such a piece of furniture, according to claim 15.

Small residential units are increasingly being built for a variety of reasons. The reasons for this include the relatively large number of single households, the lack of space in large cities with the associated high rents per unit area, and efforts to reduce heating energy requirements per person.

Proceeding from this, the object of the present invention is to provide a furniture system that takes into account the small amount of space available.

This problem is solved by a furniture system with the features of claim 1. A piece of furniture for use in such a furniture system is specified in claim 14, a traversing device, in particular as part of such a piece of furniture, in claim 15.

The invention is based on the idea that when relatively little living space is available, it can be advantageous if at least one piece of furniture can regularly occupy at least two different positions in an apartment, in particular in a room, in order to thus position the same Being able to use space and the same furniture in different ways. Probably the most important example here - but not the only relevant one - for such a piece of furniture is a sofa bed, which can be used in a known manner for sitting and sleeping. However, if little space is available, then, to stay with this example, the case can arise that the sofa bed in the position in which it is to be used for sitting cannot be pulled out for sleeping because there is not enough space for this

According to the invention, the piece of furniture therefore has at least one traversing device, by means of which the piece of furniture can be moved by motor in one plane in at least two, preferably three, degrees of freedom. According to the definitions made here, the piece of furniture thus has a furniture body and the traversing device. This traversing device is connected to the furniture body, in particular to its underside. The piece of furniture can thus be transferred from a first position into a second position without the exertion of a person or possibly even several people being necessary for this. In the following, “different position” means any change in position, ie a translatory and/or rotary change in position.

In particular, in order to enable the piece of furniture to be able to carry out an exclusively rotary movement - which is important in view of the usually limited space available - the traversing device according to one exemplary embodiment has at least one, preferably two balls, which can be rotated in two directions (in particular in two mutually orthogonal directions) can be driven. The use of the at least one drivable ball also has the advantage that “turning on the spot” is also possible without any problems on a relatively soft surface, such as a carpet.

It will often be the case that the furniture in the furniture system only occupies exactly two defined positions in everyday life. To stay with the example above, these are the "sitting" position and the "sleeping" position. In this case in particular, it is preferred that the furniture system also has a control system for automatically controlling the displacement device, so that the furniture of the furniture system can be displaced fully automatically. This means that the control system "knows" and/or calculates the movement path of the furniture from the first position to the second position and back. The activation of the movements of the piece of furniture can, for example, take place in a time-controlled manner, by means of an actuating element directly on the piece of furniture, or by radio. In the latter case, a connection via W-LAN or Bluetooth is particularly suitable. In particular if the piece of furniture is W-LAN-capable, the user can use a smartphone to change the position, for example.

The control system can consist exclusively of elements which are fixed in or on the body of the furniture. In this case, the furniture can be completely self-sufficient. However, the control system can also have external devices, ie devices which are not connected to the furniture body. This will be discussed in more detail later.

In one embodiment, the control system includes an electronic control unit. This can be a control unit which is provided exclusively for controlling the traversing device. In this case, the control unit can be attached in or on the furniture body.

However, it is also possible to use an external processing unit such as a computer, mobile phone or tablet. In this case, the corresponding software is part of the control system.

Regardless of how the control system is designed, in one embodiment it is necessary for it to “know” the path of movement from the first position to the second position and back. There are basically several options for this:

One possibility is that the control system has a movement recording system which, in a recording state, records and stores a movement path of the furniture body. In an automatic state, the control system controls the traversing device based on the data of the recorded data in such a way that it moves the furniture body along the recorded movement path. In other words: the furniture system learns its trajectory by moving the furniture body. in the In this case, it is sufficient for the movement path to be “taught” in one direction in order to enable the control system to control the traversing device in such a way that it moves the furniture body from a first position to a second position and back.

Motion recording can be done in several ways:

In one embodiment, the movement recording system has at least one—usually at least two—displacement sensors connected to the furniture body. This can, for example, work mechanically, for example in the manner of an original computer mouse, ie by means of a mounted ball whose rolling movement is determined in two axes. The rolling movement can be determined in particular mechanically, optically or magnetically. In the first case, the ball can transfer its rolling movement to corresponding rollers, whose rotary movements are recorded by electromagnetic revolution counters.

The ball can be part of the traversing device, as can the rollers in the mechanical case. In this case, the electric motors of the traversing device can also serve as revolution counters.

Of course, the displacement sensors can also work optically, for example in the way that is known from computer mice currently in use. In other exemplary embodiments, the movement recording system has sensors which are not connected to the furniture body and which record the movement of the furniture body. Such a sensor can be a camera, or it is also possible to arrange electromagnetically acting transponders or other markers on the furniture body, which can be located by one or more suitable sensors.

In another embodiment, the control system does not have a movement recording system, but rather the control system uses the data from the space and from the desired two positions the trajectory itself.

In a further embodiment, the control system calculates the trajectory itself from case to case, for example using current photographs of the room.

It will often be sufficient for the furniture system to include only one piece of furniture. However, the principle according to the invention can also be extended to a furniture system with several pieces of furniture. In particular, this has the advantage that movement paths of a piece of furniture can be carried out, which are only possible if another piece of furniture is moving beforehand or during this time. In this case, a common control system is necessary.

As has already been mentioned, a suitable traversing device for a piece of furniture according to the invention has a ball which can be driven in two directions relative to the furniture body, preferably orthogonally to one another, for which purpose two drive devices are necessary. Such a traversing device preferably has a carrying device with a fastening device and a bearing element, the ball being held by the bearing element and the carrying device also having a first drive device and a second drive device, by means of which the ball can be divided into two mutually different ones with respect to the fastening device , Preferably mutually orthogonal directions can be driven having.

In a preferred embodiment of such a traversing device, the fastening device is part of a fastening element. Furthermore, the traversing device has an outer element—also referred to as a housing element—that is held on the fastening element such that it can rotate about a vertical axis. In this case, the first drive device acts between the fastening device and the outer element and the second drive device acts between the outer element and the ball. The invention will now be explained in more detail using preferred exemplary embodiments with reference to the figures. Here show:

1 shows a schematic floor plan of a one-room apartment in which there are three pieces of furniture, one of the pieces of furniture, namely a sofa bed, being a piece of furniture according to the invention and being located in a first location in a first orientation (first position),

2 shows what is shown in FIG. 1, with the sofa bed being in a second location and a second orientation (second position) in an extended state,

Figs. 3-7 the path of movement of the sofa bed from the first position shown in Figure 1 to the second position shown in Figure 2,

8 shows a schematic top view of the floor of the sofa bed of FIGS. 1 to 7, a control unit and a battery also being shown, which do not necessarily have to be arranged on the outside of the floor,

9 shows a schematic side view of a passive rolling element of the piece of furniture from FIG. 8,

10 shows a second exemplary embodiment of a displacement device in a raised state,

11 shows what is shown in FIG. 10 in a lowered state,

12 shows a further exemplary embodiment of a displacement device in a highly schematic lateral plan view,

13 shows a further exemplary embodiment of a displacement device according to the invention and Figs. 14-20 the one-room apartment of FIG. 1 with three movable pieces of furniture, which are parts of a furniture system.

FIG. 1 shows a floor plan of a one-room apartment in which there are four pieces of furniture, namely a movable sofa bed 10, a table 90 and a sideboard 92 with a television set. The one-room apartment has a hallway F, a living area W, in which the furniture just mentioned is located, a kitchenette K and a bathroom B.

In FIG. 1, the movable sofa bed 10, which forms the piece of furniture according to the invention in this exemplary embodiment, is at a first location in a first orientation (first position). This first position corresponds to the "sitting" state.

FIG. 2 shows what is shown in FIG. 1, with the movable sofa bed 10 being in the extended state from a second location in a second orientation (second position). Compared to the position in Figure 1, the sofa bed 10 is rotated 90 degrees and also slightly translated. Due to the limited space, it would not be possible to rotate the sofa bed directly 90 degrees, which is why it has to go through a relatively complex trajectory to get from the first position to the second position. This is shown in Figures 3-7.

According to the invention, the corresponding piece of furniture, ie here the movable sofa bed 10, can automatically carry out this movement and also the inverse movement from the position in FIG. 7 back to the position in FIG. For this purpose, the piece of furniture has a traversing device and a control system for automatically controlling this traversing device. In the illustrated embodiment, this control system has a movement recording system, so that the control system stores (i.e. learns) a movement that has been carried out manually once and after this step can initiate the movement once it has been learned and also the movement inverse thereto, i.e. the traversing device can control accordingly. With reference to FIG. 8, an exemplary embodiment of the traversing device and the control system with a movement recording system will now be described schematically, with some elements belonging both to the traversing device and to the movement recording system.

Regarding the schematic representation of FIG. 8, it should first be said that in this exemplary embodiment represented schematically, all the elements of the control system are arranged in or on the furniture body itself, so that the furniture is completely self-sufficient. In other embodiments, this does not have to be the case, as was explained in the introduction to the description.

As already mentioned, FIG. 8 shows a schematic top view of the bottom of the piece of furniture, ie the movable sofa bed 10. Two passive rolling elements 14, 14' and two moving devices 20, 20' are arranged on the bottom of the furniture body of the piece of furniture . The passive rolling elements 14, 14' each consist of a ball 18, 18' and a support device 16, 16' with a bearing in which the ball 18, 18' is mounted in such a way that a section of the ball protrudes from below protrudes from the bearing, as shown schematically in FIG. The carrying device 16 also has a fastening plate 42 serving as a fastening device for fastening to the furniture body (not shown in FIG. 8).

The traversing devices 20, 20' also each have a bearing device 22, 22' which has a bearing and a ball 24, 24' held by it. The fastening plates of the support devices 22, 22' are also not shown in FIG. In addition, there are two drives 24a, 24b; 24a'. 24b' and two rotary knives 26a, 26b; 26a', 26b' are provided. Drives and rotary cutters can also be structurally the same, but are shown separately here for the sake of better understanding. The drives 24a, 24b can be formed, for example, from a motor, in particular a servomotor, and a roller which is driven by this motor and acts on the ball. Such a servo motor can also act as a revolution counter, so that, as thinks the drive and rotary blade can fall together. In the case shown, that is, if rotary cutters designed separately from the drives are provided, the rotary cutters can also each consist of a roller and an electromagnetic rotation sensor. A sphere and the two rotary knives assigned to it each form a 2-axis displacement transducer.

A control unit 30 is provided which controls the drives 24a, 24b; 24a', 24b' and which signals from the rotary meters 26a, 26b; 26a', 26b'. A rechargeable battery 32, for example, is used to supply energy to this control unit. The control unit 30 can be equipped with an interface, for example a radio interface such as a Bluetooth interface or a WLAN interface, so that it can communicate with a WLAN network or a mobile phone, for example .

On the one hand, the control unit 30 forms the control system for controlling the traversing devices 20, 20' and is also part of a movement recording system, which also uses the balls 24, 24' and the rotary knives 26a, 26a', 26b, 26b', i.e. the displacement sensors, having.

How it works is as follows:

In a recording state (“learning mode”), the piece of furniture (here the mobile sofa bed 10) is manually moved, for example, from the position shown in FIG. 1 to the position shown in FIG. 7 along the path shown in FIGS. This trajectory, including the rotations performed, is completely recorded by the two balls and the associated rotation gauges, which form the corresponding displacement sensors, and the trajectory is stored by the control unit 30 . In the "automatic mode" this movement path is then retrieved and the control unit controls the drives 24a, 24a', 24b, 24b' accordingly. In this case, it is basically sufficient if the movement path extends in only one direction (for example from the first position in FIG. 1 to the second position in FIG. 7). is drawn; this control device can generate this trajectory as well as the reverse trajectory.

FIGS. 10 and 11 show a second exemplary embodiment of a traversing device, which can also serve as a displacement sensor. Here, too, the central element is a ball 24, which is held by a support device 22 and which can be driven in two directions. In this exemplary embodiment, the support device 16 has a more complex design and has a fastening element 40 with a fastening plate 42, an outer element 70 in the form of a housing open at the bottom, a bearing element 50 having the bearing, and an actuator 84 acting between the fastening element 40 and the bearing element 50 .

The outer element 70 is connected to the fastening element so that it can rotate about a vertical axis via a rotary bearing—here a ball bearing. A first direction drive consisting of a first motor (not shown in detail) and a first drive wheel 62 acts between the mounting member 40 and the outer member 70 to rotate the outer member relative to the mounting member about the horizontal axis to be able to turn.

At its lower end, the outer element 70 carries a second drive unit, of which only the second drive wheel 82 is shown in FIG. In a driving state, as shown in FIG. 10, this second drive wheel 82 rests against the ball 24, so that it is driven by the drive wheel 82 when the associated motor (not shown) is activated.

The ball 24 is held by the bearing element 50 which is held on the fastening element 40 in an axially displaceable manner. The actuator 84 acts between the fastening element 40 and the bearing element 50, which in the actuated state (FIG. 10) presses the bearing element (and thus the ball 24) downwards, so that the ball protrudes from the bottom of the housing 70 on the one hand and makes contact on the other hand with the second drive wheel 82 comes. In the unactuated state (Figure 11) of the actuator 84, the ball is in an inactive position in which it does not protrude from the housing 70 protrudes, so that in this case the lower edge of the housing 70 stands up on the floor, so that the piece of furniture is automatically in a locked, non-movable state and is lowered in relation to the state in FIG. By rotating the outer element 70 about the vertical axis, the second drive unit also moves relative to the fastening element 70, resulting in the necessary two degrees of freedom for driving the ball.

FIG. 12 shows a further exemplary embodiment of a displacement device 20 in a highly schematic plan view. A multi-part carrying device 22 is also provided here. As in the previous exemplary embodiment, this has a fastening element 40 which carries a first motor 60 and a first drive wheel 62 . Here, too, an outer element is provided which can be rotated about a horizontal axis and driven by the first drive wheel 82 . This can also be designed as a housing or, as shown, as a fork 74 . A horizontal shaft 85 extends through this fork 74 and is connected to the ball 24 in a rotationally fixed manner. This horizontal shaft can be driven by a second motor 80. This also results in a ball 24 that can be driven in both spatial directions. FIG. 13 shows an exemplary embodiment of a displacement device which is very similar to the exemplary embodiment in FIGS. The main difference is that there are no drive wheels: the power is transmitted directly electromagnetically, namely between a magnetic ring 65; 85 and at least one pair of electromagnets 66a, 66b; 86a, 86b, the second magnetic ring 85 being part of the ball 24.

As shown in FIGS. 15 to 20, the principle according to the invention can also be extended to a furniture system with more than one movable piece of furniture, it being particularly preferred here that a common control system is responsible for controlling the furniture , so that furniture movements can also be implemented, which make it necessary for the movement paths of the furniture to be coordinated with one another. The traversing devices and movement recording systems can basically be designed in this way as described above. Here, too, the movement paths of the moveable furniture can be stored by the control system in a recording state (“learning step”), with the movement sequences of the individual furniture being stored as additional information so that the correct sequence is maintained when the furniture is moved automatically.

reference list

10 trundle sofa bed

12 furniture bodies

14, 14' passive rolling element

16, 16' carrying device

18, 18' ball

20, 20' traversing device

22, 22' carrying device

24, 24' ball

24a, 24a' drive in first direction

24b, 24b' drive in second direction

26a, 26a' first direction rotary knife

26b, 26b' rotary knives in the second direction

30 control unit

32 accumulator

40 fastener

42 mounting plate (mounting device)

50 bearing element

60 first engine

62 first drive wheel

65 first magnet wreath

66a, b electromagnets acting on the first magnetic ring

70 outer element (housing)

72 vertical shaft

73 gear

74 fork

75 horizontal wave

80 second engine

82 second drive wheel

84 actuator

85 second magnet wreath

86a, b electromagnets acting on the second magnetic ring 90 table

91 movable table

92 sideboard

95 mobile sofa B bathroom

F hallway

K kitchenette

W living area

Claims

patent claims

1. Furniture system with at least one piece of furniture (10, 91, 95), which has a furniture body (12) and at least one moving device connected to the furniture body, by means of which the furniture body can be moved by motor in at least two degrees of freedom in one plane

2. Furniture system according to claim 1, characterized in that the furniture body can be moved by motor in three degrees of freedom by means of the moving device in the plane.

3. Furniture system according to Claim 1 or Claim 2, characterized in that the displacement device has at least one ball (24, 24') that can be driven in two directions of rotation, the displacement device preferably having two balls (24, 24') that can be driven in two directions of rotation. ) having.

4. Furniture system according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that it also has a control system for automatically controlling the traversing device, so that when the traversing device is controlled by the control system, the furniture (10, 91, 95) automatically from a first location and a first orientation is moved to a second location and/or in a second orientation.

5. Furniture system according to claim 4, characterized in that the control system has a movement recording system which records and stores a movement path of the furniture body in a recording state and in that the control system controls the traversing device in an automatic state based on the data of the recorded data in such a way that this moves the furniture body along the recorded movement path.

6. Furniture system according to claim 5, characterized in that the movement recording system has displacement sensors connected to the furniture body.

7. Furniture system according to claim 3 and claim 6, that the ball is also part of the transducer.

8. Furniture system according to claim 5, characterized in that the movement recording system has at least one, preferably at least two, locating device(s) not connected to the furniture body and at least two position determining elements arranged at different points of the furniture body and locatable by the locating device.

9. Furniture system according to claim 5, characterized in that the movement recording system has a camera.

10. Furniture system according to claim 4, characterized in that the control system further comprises a movement calculation device which calculates the movement path from the first position and the first orientation to the second position and/or the second orientation, taking into account stored and/or recorded data Data of the space available for movement is automatically calculated.

11. Furniture system according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the furniture element is a piece of seating and/or reclining furniture, a table, a chest of drawers, a cupboard or a shelf.

12. Furniture system according to claim 11, characterized in that the traversing device is arranged below, preferably completely below, or to the side of the furniture body. Furniture system according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that it has at least two pieces of furniture. Furniture for use in a furniture system according to one of claims 1 to 12. Traversing device (20) for moving an object, in particular a furniture body (12), with: a carrying device (22) having a fastening device (42) and a bearing and a ball (24) held by the bearing, the support device (22) further having a first drive device and a second drive device, by means of which the ball (24) can be driven in two mutually orthogonal directions with respect to the fastening device (42). Traversing device (20) according to Claim 15, characterized in that the fastening device (42) is part of a fastening element (40), that it also has an outer element (housing element) (70) which is held on the fastening element (40) so that it can rotate about a vertical axis. has that the first drive device (60) acts between the fastening device (42) and the outer element (70) and that the second drive device (80) acts between the outer element (70) and the ball (24). Traversing device according to Claim 16, characterized in that the bearing is part of a bearing element (50) which is held on the fastening element (40) so that it can be displaced in the vertical direction, with an actuator for actively displacing the bearing element with respect to the fastening element (40) preferably being . Traversing device according to Claim 15, characterized in that that the fastening device (42) is part of a carrying device (22) and that the two drive devices act directly between the carrying device (22) and the ball. Traversing device according to one of Claims 16 to 18, characterized in that the bearing supports the ball (24) so that it can rotate freely. Traversing device according to one of Claims 15 to 19, characterized in that at least one of the two drive devices has an electric motor and a drive wheel. Traversing device according to one of Claims 15 to 20, characterized in that at least one of the two drive devices has an electromagnet, that the ball is a magnet or has one and that the electromagnet acts on this magnet. Traversing device according to Claim 15, characterized in that the fastening device is part of a fastening element on which the bearing element is held so as to be rotatable about a vertical axis, the first drive device acting between the fastening element and bearing element, and the second drive device acting between the bearing element and ball. Traversing device according to claim 22, characterized in that the ball is held on the bearing element by means of a shaft.