The invention generally pertains to building elements for assembly toys and is particularly directed to an improved chassis building element for use in assembling a toy vehicle. Assembly toys are assembled by combining various building elements of a set of compatible toy building elements, such as a set of compatible LEGO® blocks, or a set of compatible SNAPO® blocks.
An assembly-toy chassis building element may or may not be adapted to be coupled to wheels in order to assemble a toy vehicle having wheels, such as a car, a train or a trailer. Examples of other types of toy vehicles that can be assembled using a chassis building element include, but are not limited to, toy boats and toy airplanes.
The invention provides an assembly-toy building element for a toy vehicle in combination with an intermediate building element, the assembly-toy building element, comprising: a chassis element having a top side, two side walls, two end walls and compatible coupling components disposed at opposite ends of the chassis element for enabling the chassis element to be rotatably coupled to another said chassis element; wherein at least one end wall of the chassis element is disposed and configured for connection to an intermediate building element that is adapted, either alone or in combination with at least one other intermediate building element, to effect a non-rotatable end-to-end connection with another said chassis element; wherein the at least one end wall of the chassis element is configured to be non-rotatably connected to the at least one end wall of the another said chassis element by a said intermediate building element that is adapted to be non-rotatably connected to the at least one end wall of said chassis element when said intermediate building element is disposed between the chassis element and said another chassis element with the at least one end wall of the chassis element abutting an end wall of said intermediate building element; and wherein said intermediate building element is configured to cover coupled coupling components of the chassis element and the another chassis element when the intermediate element is non-rotatably connected to the at least one end wall of each chassis element.
Additional features of the invention are described with reference to the detailed description of various exemplary embodiments.
Referring to
Each side wall 16 is configured for being releasably interconnected with a particular wall of another building element 24 of the toy vehicle 10, as shown in
The tongue 26 has an indented portion and a distal portion, with the distal portion having a predominant width that is greater than the width of the indented portion and greater than the given predominant width of the groove entry opening for interconnecting with a groove 28 in the particular wall of the other toy building element 24 that has an entry opening and a base region that have widths like those of the groove 28 in the side wall 16 of the chassis element 12, so that the distal portion of the tongue 26 of the side wall 16 can reside in the base region of the groove in the particular wall of the other toy building element 24.
The groove 28 can be interconnected with a tongue in the particular wall of another toy building element, such as the toy building element 24, when the tongue in the particular wall of the other toy building element has a distal-portion-predominant width like the predominant width of the tongue 26 in the side wall 16 of the chassis element 12.
The other toy building element 24 can be interconnected to another building element (not shown) of the toy or be configured other than as shown in
The first coupling component 18 includes a post at one end of the chassis element 12; and the compatible second coupling component 20 includes an opening in an extended portion at the other end of the chassis element 12 for receiving the post so that one end of the chassis element 12 can be rotatably coupled by a compatible coupling component to one end of a like chassis element 12′, as also shown in
Preferably, the compatible coupling components 18, 20 are so shaped and dimensioned that another toy building element (not shown) can be disposed over and thereby cover a coupled pair of coupling components 18, 20. In one exemplary embodiment, each of the respective end walls 29 of the chassis element 12 includes at least one groove 30 that is compatible with the tongues 26 in other building elements in a set of compatible toy building elements to enable a common square block (such as toy building element 24) to be so interconnected to the end wall 29 as to cover the coupling components 18, 20 and thereby hide them from view; which is desirable when wanting to build toy cars that do not look like trains or look like tow vehicles.
In another embodiment (not shown), the respective end walls 29 of the chassis element 12 includes both at least one tongue and at least one groove that is compatible with the tongues 26 and 28 in other building elements in a set of compatible toy building elements.
The protrusions 22 on the top side 14 of the chassis element 12 are configured for being releasably interconnected with one or more other building elements of the toy vehicle. Such other building elements of the toy vehicle are interconnected with the chassis element 12 by being stacked or snapped onto the protrusions 22. Preferably, the protrusions 22 are wide and have a tapered top portion to facilitate assembly of the other building elements onto the protrusions 22. In some embodiments, the protrusions 22 are integral to the top side 14 of the chassis element 12. When the chassis element 12 is made by injection molding, the protrusions 22 are formed simultaneously in the same mold as the basic chassis element 12. In some alternative embodiments (not shown), there are no protrusions on the top side of the chassis element.
In some embodiments, the chassis element 12 includes at least one axle 31 that is adapted for being coupled to wheels 32.
In order to assemble a wider assembly-toy vehicle-chassis element 36, one side wall 16 of the chassis element 12 is interconnected by an intermediate building element 33 with one side wall 16′ of another chassis element 12′, as shown in
For assembling a wider toy vehicle 36 in accordance with the embodiment shown in
Referring to
In another alternative embodiment (not shown), the features shown in and described with reference to
The chassis element 12 described above with reference to
Facing end walls of the building elements 52, 53, which have an approximately square lateral shape, are interconnected tongue-in-groove and disposed onto protrusions 22 of the chassis element 12, with the building element 52 being disposed on one end protrusions of the chassis element 12.
One end wall of the building element 54 is interconnected tongue-in-groove to the exposed end wall of the building element 52 and disposed to cover one coupling component 20 of the chassis element 12 by sliding the building element 54 downward within both a groove in the exposed end wall of the building element 52 and an aligned groove 30 in the end wall 29 of the chassis element 12. The approximately triangular lateral shape of the building element 54 provides a pointed feature at one end of the toy vehicle 50. For other toy vehicles, the building element has another lateral shape.
The higher end wall of one building element 56, which has a sloped-roof shape, is interconnected tongue-in-groove to the exposed end wall of the building element 53 and disposed onto the other end protrusion 22 of the chassis element 12.
The higher end wall of the building element 56′, which also has a sloped-roof shape, is interconnected tongue-in-groove with the lower end wall in the aforementioned building element 56 having a sloped-roof shape, and disposed to cover the post of the coupling component 18 of the chassis element 12 by sliding the other building element 56′ downward within a groove in the lower end wall of the one sloped-roof building element 56 having a sloped-roof shape. The sloped-roof shape of the building elements 56, 56′ provides a sloped-roof feature at one end of the toy vehicle 50. For other toy vehicles, the building elements 56, 56′ have other shapes.
Referring to
Referring to
In another alternative embodiment (not shown), the features shown in and described with reference to
The benefits specifically stated herein do not necessarily apply to every conceivable embodiment of the invention. Further, such stated benefits of the invention are only examples and should not be construed as the only benefits of the invention.
While the above description contains many specificities, these specificities are not to be construed as limitations on the scope of the invention, but rather as examples of the preferred embodiments described herein. Other variations are possible and the scope of the invention should be determined not by the embodiments described herein but rather by the claims and their legal equivalents. The claims require no implicit limitations. Each claim is to be construed explicitly as stated, or by its legal equivalent.
This is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/716,036 filed May 19, 2015.
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind |
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PCT/US2016/033193 | 5/19/2016 | WO | 00 |
Publishing Document | Publishing Date | Country | Kind |
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WO2016/187381 | 11/24/2016 | WO | A |
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2383441 | Beile | Aug 1945 | A |
2940211 | Kelley | Jun 1960 | A |
3224137 | Wright | Dec 1965 | A |
3713247 | Parrilla | Jan 1973 | A |
4375139 | Chatani | Mar 1983 | A |
D295642 | Olsen | May 1988 | S |
D370503 | Burns | Jun 1996 | S |
D394469 | Nielsen | May 1998 | S |
5813894 | Tohyama | Sep 1998 | A |
6050044 | McIntosh | Apr 2000 | A |
7553209 | Sorensen | Jun 2009 | B1 |
D699792 | Hwang | Feb 2014 | S |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20180147501 A1 | May 2018 | US |
Number | Date | Country | |
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Parent | 14716036 | May 2015 | US |
Child | 15575195 | US |