Patent Application
20240183634
The invention generally relates to air guns, their components, and their methods of use.
The term “air gun” is commonly used to refer to a gun that shoots a projectile by releasing an amount of compressed air, carbon dioxide (CO2), or other gas (hereinafter sometimes simply referred to as gas as a matter of convenience) to propel the projectile upon actuating a trigger assembly, such as by pulling a finger trigger. In some air guns, the compressed gas is supplied from a canister that contains the compressed gas until a charge of a preselected quantity of the gas is released from the canister by means of the trigger assembly, and the air is conducted to a firing assembly to forcefully propel the projectile from the gun through a barrel. As with any gun, an unintended discharge of the gun, for example, because of accidentally activating the trigger mechanism by encountering an object or accidental activation when handling, is undesirable. Therefore, guns typically have one or more safety mechanisms that prevent an unintended discharge.
Some air guns, typically in the general form of semi-automatic air pistols, have a removable ammunition magazine that holds both a compressed gas canister and a number of projectiles. The magazine is typically removably received within a pistol grip carried by the frame of the gun. A challenge with such designs, however, is to allow reloading of projectiles into the magazine without releasing unused compressed air from the gas canister during such reloading. Therefore, it would also be desirable to have a removable magazine in which the projectiles can be reloaded without losing unspent pressurized gas from gas canister.
The intent of this section of the specification is to briefly indicate the nature and substance of the invention, as opposed to an exhaustive statement of all subject matter and aspects of the invention. Therefore, while this section identifies subject matter recited in the claims, additional subject matter and aspects relating to the invention are set forth in other sections of the specification, particularly the detailed description, as well as any drawings.
The present invention provides, but is not limited to, air guns, their components, and their methods of use.
According to a nonlimiting aspect of the invention, an air gun is provided. The air gun includes a firing mechanism for firing a projectile from the air gun by means of compressed gas, a gas supply duct configured to direct a supply of compressed gas to the firing mechanism, a trigger configured to actuate the firing mechanism when the trigger is shifted from a non-firing position to a firing position, and a safety mechanism having a safety-on position and a safety-off position. The safety mechanism in the safety-on position prevents the trigger from actuating the firing mechanism and closes the gas supply duct. The safety mechanism in the safety-off position enables the trigger to actuate the firing mechanism and opens the gas supply duct to enable actuating the firing mechanism with compressed gas to fire a projectile.
According to another nonlimiting aspect of the invention, a removable magazine for an air gun is provided. The removable magazine includes a magazine body, a projectile feeder carried in the magazine body, a cavity defined inside the magazine body for receiving a gas canister therein, a push valve carried by the magazine body for selectively releasing pressurized gas from a gas canister disposed in the cavity, and a valve actuator carried by the push valve. The valve actuator includes a socket configured to releasably receive therein a nipple of a gas supply coupling carried by an air gun and form a seal with the nipple and to open the push valve when operatively coupled with the gas supply coupling.
According to yet another nonlimiting aspect of the invention, a method of using the air gun is provided. The method includes switching the safety mechanism to the safety-off position by simultaneously enabling the trigger to actuate the firing mechanism and opening the gas supply duct. The method may further include switching the safety mechanism to the safety-on position by simultaneously preventing the trigger from actuating the firing mechanism and closing the gas supply duct.
In some arrangements, the air gun of the present disclosure may provide an improved safety mechanism to prevent unintended discharge, and/or provide a simpler and/or more efficient mechanism for loading and/or reloading projectiles in a removable magazine without losing unspent pressurized gas in a gas canister carried by the removable magazine.
These and other aspects, arrangements, features, and/or technical effects will become apparent upon detailed inspection of the figures and the following description.
The intended purpose of the following detailed description of the invention and the phraseology and terminology employed therein is to describe what is shown in the drawings, which depict one or more nonlimiting embodiments of the invention, and to describe certain but not all aspects of the embodiment(s) to which the drawings relate. The following detailed description also identifies certain but not all alternatives of the embodiment(s) depicted in the drawings. As nonlimiting examples, the invention encompasses additional or alternative embodiments in which one or more features or aspects shown and/or described as part of a particular embodiment could be eliminated, and also encompasses additional or alternative embodiments that combine two or more features or aspects shown and/or described as part of different embodiments. Therefore, the appended claims, and not the detailed description, are intended to particularly point out subject matter regarded to be aspects of the invention, including certain but not necessarily all of the aspects and alternatives described in the detailed description.
Although the invention will be described hereinafter in reference to air guns in the form of a hand pistol shown in the drawings, it will be appreciated that the teachings of the invention are more generally applicable to a variety of types of air guns that operate to use a supply of compressed gas, such as air, CO2, or other (non-ignited) gases, to forcefully eject a projectile, such as, but not limited to, long guns, other styles of hand guns, and nail guns.
To facilitate the description provided below of the embodiment(s) represented in the drawings, relative terms, including but not limited to, “proximal,” “distal,” “anterior,” “posterior,” “vertical,” “horizontal,” “lateral,” “front,” “rear,” “side,” “forward,” “rearward,” “top,” “bottom,” “upper,” “lower,” “above,” “below,” “right,” “left,” etc., may be used in reference to the orientation of the air gun and its components during its use and/or as represented in the drawings. All such relative terms are useful to describe the illustrated embodiment(s) but should not be otherwise interpreted as limiting the scope of the invention.
Turning now to the drawings, an air gun 10 is represented in
A removable ammunition magazine 38 that carries the gas canister 28 and a supply of the projectiles 22 is configured to be releasably locked into a cavity inside the grip 30 that forms a magazine receiver 39, for example, by sliding into a bottom end of the grip 30, so as to provide the supply of projectiles 22 into the firing chamber 24 and provide a source of pressurized gas for actuating the firing mechanism 14. The magazine 38 may be locked into the magazine receiver 39 by any suitable releasable locking mechanism such that the magazine 38 may be removed from the magazine receiver 39 when the locking mechanism that releasably locks the magazine 38 inside the grip 30 is released. As best seen in
As best seen in
The safety mechanism 20 is configured to prevent unintended discharge of a projectile 22 (e.g., accidental firing). The safety mechanism 20 has a safety-on position that prevents the trigger 16 from actuating the firing mechanism 14 and simultaneously closes the gas supply duct 18. The safety mechanism 20 also has a safety-off position that enables and/or allows the trigger 16 to actuate the firing mechanism 14 and simultaneously opens the gas supply duct 18 in order to enable and/or allow compressed gas from the gas canister 28 to flow to the firing mechanism 14 so as to fire the projectile 22. In order to accomplish this, the safety mechanism 20 includes two separate mechanisms, a first sub-mechanism that enables and disables the trigger 16 from operatively engaging the hammer 36, and a second sub-mechanism that enables and disables the supply of compressed gas to the firing mechanism 14. Because operation of the air gun 10 is such that it cannot fire if either there is no supply of compressed gas or the trigger 16 cannot operatively activate the hammer 36, the safety mechanism 20 provides at least one redundant safety mechanism for preventing an unintended discharge of a projectile 22. In addition, the safety mechanism 20 may help prevent or reduce loss of unused pressurized gas from the gas canister 28 by disabling unintended discharges of compressed gas to the firing mechanism 14.
As perhaps best seen in
The safety actuator 60 in this example is in the form of a grip safety that is engaged essentially automatically when a user operatively grasps the grip 30 in the palm of the hand with thumb and fingers wrapped around the grip, although other arrangements for the safety actuator 60 are also possible. In this example, the safety actuator 60 comprises a lever that extends from a pivot 72, such as a pin or hinge, downwardly from just underneath the firing mechanism 14 along an upper portion of the rear surface of the grip 30. A resilient member (not shown), such as a torsion spring, coil spring, or other suitable resilient member, may be provided to urge the safety actuator 60 away from the rear outer surface of the grip 30 in its disengaged position. Then, when a user grasps the grip 30, the palm will automatically engage and depress the safety actuator 60 toward the rear surface of the grip into its engaged position. In other arrangements, however, the safety actuator 60 need not necessarily be a pivoting member, but could simply shift linearly between the disengaged position and the engaged position. As a result, when the safety actuator 60 is in the disengaged position projecting away from the rear surface of the grip 30, the overall safety mechanism 20 is in the safety-on position that prevents firing of the air gun 10, and when the safety actuator 60 is in the engaged position pressed toward the rear surface of the grip 30, the overall safety mechanism 20 is in the safety-off position that allows firing of the air gun 10.
The finger 62 is operatively coupled to the safety actuator 60 so as to move in response to movement of the safety actuator 60 between its disengaged position and engaged position. In this example, the finger 62 is operatively coupled with the upper end of the lever of the safety actuator 60 so as to rotate about the pivot 72 in direct response to pivoting motion of the lever about the pivot 72. The finger 62 may be integral with and/or connected directly to the lever, or the finger 62 may be separate from the lever and otherwise caused to rotate about the pivot 72 in response to corresponding pivoting of the lever. In this example, each of the finger 62 and the lever of the safety actuator 60 are coupled to and rotate about the same axis defined by the pivot 72.
As best seen in
In operation, the safety mechanism 20 functions to engage and/or disengage each of the two safety sub-mechanisms (the hammer safety mechanism and the gas supply safety mechanism as described above) in response to engagement and/or disengagement of the single safety actuator 60. Thus, in this example each of the lever of the safety actuator 60, the finger 62, and the first gear 76 are operatively fixedly connected with each other to move as a single unit that pivots about the single axis through the pivot 72. The lever, the finger 62, and the first gear 76 may be formed as a single unitary component, or may be otherwise operatively fixedly connected with each other, for example, by each being fixedly coupled to a pin that forms the pivot 72.
To operate the air gun 10, a user can easily remove the magazine 38 from the magazine receiver 39 inside the grip 30, for example by releasing the magazine 38 from the cavity within the grip 30 and sliding the magazine 38 downwardly and out of the bottom end of the grip 30. Once removed from the grip 30, the magazine 38 can be loaded with projectiles 22 in the projectile feeder 42, and the gas canister 28 with pressurized gas therein can be inserted into the cavity 44. The plunger mechanism 50 can be advanced upwardly, driving the top end of the gas canister 28 against the puncture needle 46 to sealingly couple with the push valve 48. Thus loaded, the magazine 38 can be inserted into the magazine receiver 39, for example, by sliding the top end of the magazine 38 upwardly into the magazine receiver 39 from the bottom end of the grip 30, until the magazine 38 locks into its operative position inside the grip 30. In this operative position, the nipple 56 of the gas supply coupling 54 is inserted into the socket 58 of the valve actuator 52 to form a sealed connection therebetween that fluidically couples the gas canister 28 with the gas supply duct 18. The nipple 56 simultaneously pushes down on the valve actuator 52, which opens the push valve 48 and allows compressed gas within the gas canister 28 to travel into the gas supply duct 18. At this point, however, the safety mechanism 20 is typically in its safety-on position and the valve 74 is in its corresponding closed position, which prevents the compressed gas from reaching the firing mechanism 14. Thereafter (or possibly simultaneously), a projectile 22 may be fed into the firing chamber 24 from the projectile feeder 42 by any appropriate feeding mechanism.
To fire the projectile 22, the user must first switch the safety mechanism 20 to its safety-off position by depressing the safety actuator 60, for example by grasping the grip 30 in the palm and wrapping the thumb and fingers around the grip 30 in the usual manner to cause the lever of the safety actuator 60 to rotate or otherwise move toward the grip 30, thereby shifting the safety actuator 60 from its disengaged position to its engaged position. This action simultaneously shifts the trigger bar 32 into its ready position and shifts the valve 74 to its open position. Thereafter, when a user squeezes the trigger 16, the trigger 16 is able to move from its non-firing position to a firing position, which shifts the trigger bar 32 rearwardly to activate the hammer 36, which in turn causes a charge of the compressed gas from the gas supply duct 18 to enter the firing mechanism 14 and forcibly eject the projectile 22 through and out of the forward end of the barrel 26. When the user releases the grip 30, the action of the safety mechanism 20 reverses, such that the safety actuator 60 returns to its disengaged position, which simultaneously shifts the trigger bar 32 back to its safe position and closes the valve 74.
Advantageously, if the user wishes to reload projectiles 22 into the magazine 38 before the compressed gas inside the gas canister 28 is completely discharged, the magazine 38 can be unlocked and removed from the magazine receiver 39, and the connection between the gas supply coupling 54 and the valve actuator 52 is broken, which results in the push valve 48 closing automatically and thereby retaining any unused compressed gas inside the gas canister 28 while the canister 28 remains within the magazine 38. After reloading projectiles 22 into the projectile feeder 42, the magazine 38 can be again locked into place in its operative position inside the grip 30, thereby reestablishing the connection between the gas supply coupling 54 and the valve actuator 52 to allow the remaining compressed gas inside the gas canister 28 to be used for further firing of the air gun 10.
As previously noted above, though the foregoing detailed description describes certain aspects of one or more particular embodiments of the invention, alternatives could be adopted by one skilled in the art. For example, the air gun and/or its components could differ in appearance and construction from the embodiments described herein and shown in the drawings, functions of certain components of the air gun could be performed by components of different construction but capable of a similar (though not necessarily equivalent) function, and various materials could be used in the fabrication of the air gun and/or its components. As such, and again as was previously noted, it should be understood that the invention is not necessarily limited to any particular embodiment described herein or illustrated in the drawings.
