Applicant claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119 of Austrian Application No. A50607/2014 filed Sep. 3, 2014, the disclosure of which is incorporated by reference.
1. Field of the Invention
The invention is for an apparatus for rowing in the direction the rower is facing with a base frame, where the main bearing for a lever with hand grip and for a lever with oar and a linkage that connect the lever with hand grip and linkage with oar to form a counteracting four-bar linkage system with actuated bearing body as the driven arm of the four-bar linkage and linked to a rotary drive with a main axle and virtually coaxial actuator.
2. Description of the Prior Art
To row in the direction the rower is facing, a lever with oar with the oar blade is implemented separately from the lever with grip in a way that the lever with oar makes the opposite movement so that when the rower makes a recovery stroke in the direction of travel with the lever with grip, the lever with oar makes a recovery stroke forwards. For this purpose, the prior art is to connect the lever with oar to the lever with grip using a linkage that creates a counter-acting four-bar linkage. The lever with grip and the lever with oar are mounted on a base frame with the axes of movement in the direction of travel to ensure that the oar blades enter the water and are drawn out again when the lever with grip is raised for the drive stroke and lowered again for the recovery stroke. To feather the oar blades at the end of the drive stroke so that they can pass close to the surface of the water for the recovery stroke and then square them again for the drive stroke, the prior art (WO 2013/126938 A1) is to mount the lever with oar so that it is able to rotate about its axis and link it to an actuator that can be moved coaxially to the bearing body and rest on one of the pivot axes for the base frame so that it does not follow the pivot movement of the base frame in the direction of travel and instead converts the movement of the actuator into feathering the lever with oar. However, this automatic feathering and squaring of the oar blades as a function of the pivot movement of the lever with grip along an axis running in the direction of travel does not allow the rower to have any influence on the position of the oar blades, independently of the position of the base frame.
The invention forms the basis for an apparatus that allows rowing in the direction the rower is facing while allowing the rower to feather the oar blades in the normal way by rotating the lever with grip.
Based on an apparatus of the prior art described above, this invention solves the issue in that the hand grip rotates about its axis so that within the four-bar linkage, the lever with grip is able to rotate and actuate an actuator rod that is virtually coaxial to the main axle on the bearing body, that engages with a rocker arm mounted on the base frame to shift the actuator rod on the rotary drive for the lever with oar.
The rotary mounting of the lever with grip in the bearing body that forms the crank of the four-bar linkage enables the rower to use the grip to manipulate the oar blade in way that is normal for rowers because the lever with grip can not only pivot the base frame over an axis in the direction of travel during the drive stroke and recovery stroke, but also rotate about its own axis. The rotating action about its axis of the lever with grip therefore needs to be transferred into a rotating action for the lever with oar. For this purpose, the rotating movement of the lever with grip is transferred to the actuator rod inside its bearing body—which is virtually coaxial to the main axle of the bearing body in the base frame—and which actuates a rocker arm on top of the base frame. The rocker arm then transfers the rotating movement of the lever with grip to the actuator for rotating the lever with oar so that the oar blade is feathered and squared according to the rotating movement of the grip lever. The movement of the actuator virtually coaxial to the axis of rotation of each bearing body inside the base frame ensures that the bearing bodies can rotate about their axes without affecting the transmission of the lever with grip position via the actuator rod and rocker arm to the lever with oar.
The rotating drive system for the oar lever could be implemented as a toothed rack with a toothed rack for the actuator. However, the preferred design is if the rotating drive system for the oar lever has a toggle joint between the bearing body and the oar lever where the toggle joint is directly linked to the actuator. The rotating movement of the lever with grip is then transferred to the rocker arm by the actuator that is linked directly to the crank on the lever with grip.
The actuators then act directly on the rocker arm at one end and the toggle joint at the other end to transfer the rotating movement to the lever with oar and the crank at the lever with grip. Due to the slight shift in position during the actuation movement in relation to the position of the bearing body axes, the actuators have to be mounted on ball joints to connect to the rocker arm and the toggle lever and crank.
A precise coaxial movement of the actuators in relation to the axes of the bearing bodies is desired, so the actuators have to be linked to the rocker arm with the necessary freedom of movement as well as at the bearing bodies to ensure coaxial movement as they are connected to a linkage at the toggle joint for rotating the lever with oar and the crank for transmitting the rotating movement of the lever with grip.
In order to facilitate the feathering and squaring of the lever with the oar blade as a result of the movement of the lever with grip, the lever with grip features a spring configuration that applies torque to the lever. Because opposing torques are required during feathering and squaring of the levers with oar blades, a spring system is configured between the lever with grip and the bearing body so that the line of action of the spring configuration intersects the axis of rotation of the lever with grip when it is positioned half way between the two limit positions. As a consequence, when the lever with grip is rotated so that its position of rotation crosses the line of action of the spring configuration, the direction of torque acting on the lever with grip changes so that the spring configuration assists rotation into the desired limit position for feathering or squaring the oar blade.
The subject matter of the invention is shown in the drawing by way of example, wherein:
The apparatus to row in the direction the rower is facing requires an oar blade (1) mounted on an oar lever (2) with separate lever with grip (3) that is linked to the oar lever (2) by a reversing unit in the form of a counteracting four-bar linkage (4), as shown in particular in
To submerge the oar blade (1) in the water and lift it clear of the water again, the base frame (5) is mounted as in the prior art on a pivoting axle that runs parallel to the direction of travel, which is not shown here for reasons of clarity. If the lever with grip (3) is pivoted upwards, the oar (1) is submerged in the water due to the pivoting movement of base frame (5). Moving the lever with grip (3) in the opposite direction lifts the oar (1) out of the water again.
When the oar blades (1) enter the water, they are to be squared as shown in
So that the feathering and squaring of the oar blade (1) can be controlled by rotating the lever with grip (3) in its bearing body (10), lever with grip (3) forms a crank that actuates linkage (20) which is linked to actuator rod (21). In the same way that actuator rod (16) acts on rotation drive (15), this actuator rod (21) is mounted coaxially to the axis of rotation of axle (13) on bearing body (10) for lever with grip (39) so that actuator rod (21) can be shifted up and down in its guideway. To transmit the movement of actuator rod (21) to actuator rod (16) for rotating drive (15), there is a rocker arm (22) mounted on top of base frame (5). Actuator rods (16) and (21) are free to move in accordance with the movements of rocker arm (22), which pivots about its axis (23) and transmits the linear movements of actuator rod (16) to the linear movements of actuator rod (21). Depending on the direction of rotation of lever with grip (3), the lever with oar (2) can be rotated to feather and square the oar blade (1).
Compared to
To support the rotational movement needed to feather and square the oar blades (1), the lever with grip (3) can be fitted with a spring configuration (26) as shown in
In
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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A50607/2014 | Sep 2014 | AT | national |