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Not Applicable.
The present invention relates to Kits for Buttons Fastening to Garment Cloths.
Traditionally buttons are attached to garments by sewing threads. However, sewing buttons is quite slow and laborious. Furthermore, threaded buttons tend to detach and fall frequently. Most garment owners don't know how to refasten and sew fallen buttons. Hence, a Kit for simpler, faster and more robust button re-attachment could be quite useful and can yield a notable improvement. In our search we have found several inventions of button assemblies that were configured for fast button attachment but all of them are not designed for button reattachment. In addition, they are dissimilar to our invention both in their structures and in their principles of operation. Most, if not all of these attachment assemblies rely on some sort of metallic pedestal crimping in order to attach the button to the garment cloth. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,033,012 (Jul. 5 1977) to Kramer et al. teaches a metallic button held by a metallic pedestal that is stapled to the garment cloth by a four legged metallic staple that is crimped to hold the pedestal. In U.S. Pat. No. 8,522,404 (Sep. 3, 2013) Matei teaches a button which can be tilted because it is attached to an elongated metallic shaft with ball attached at one end. The ball is housed in a ball bearing cavity included in the mounting base attached to the garment. In US 2005/0188510 (Sep. 1, 2005) Retamal teaches a button attached to an elongated serrated metal shaft which fits into a serrated metal nut attached to the garment. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,751,780 (Feb. 25 1986) Fukuroi teaches a metal button which is attached to a mounting base by a crimped metal nail. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,512,063 (Apr. 23, 1985) Fukuroi teaches a metal button attachment to a base by a metal rivet. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,575,043 (Nov. 19, 1996) Candotti also teaches a metal button attachment to a base by a metal rivet. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,928,362 (May 29, 1990) Collas proposes to mount a metallic button on a metallic shank which is connected to a disk beneath the garment cloth. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,940,940 (Aug. 24, 1999) Tanikoshi teaches a button mounting by crimping a metal tubular rivet. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,975,398 (Nov. 2, 1999) Evans proposed attaching buttons to clothing by H shaped plastic studs which are inserted through the button holes into the clothing. In U.S. Pat. No. 9,820,520 (Nov. 21, 2017) Bolen teaches an attachment system with two parts one part attaches to the clothing side and the other part attaches to the button side and both parts are then coupled by a magnetic twist-lock mechanism. In U.S. Ser. No. 10/004,299 (Jun. 26, 2018) Maussen Teaches a tapered trapezoidal shape buttons which are connected to fabrics using sewing. IN U.S. Pat. No. 3,982,013 (Jul. 1 1975) Gould teaches a button attachment using a rivet with long serrated shaft that protrudes from the clothing and is attached to a button with fitting aperture. In U.S. Pat. No. 8,938,861 (Jan. 27, 2015) McLendon teaches a removably attachable button using a pair of U-shaped flexible pins with small hooks at their ends, which are inserted through the clothing and through the buttonholes.
All the above inventions are entirely dissimilar to our invention.
I have several goals in inventing and developing the Button Assembly kit of which some feasible embodiments are illustrated in
In order to achieve the objectives listed above, our method for button fastening to the garment cloth adopts the operational principle of tying the button to a fastening structure which includes at least two poles which are attached at their bottom ends to terminal elements. The fastening of the button to the cloth is facilitated by trapping the terminal elements using trapping mechanisms housed at the anchoring structure which is placed beneath the cloth. The trapping mechanisms use resilient gating technique where the action of trapping is initiated by a forceful intrusion of a terminal element into the aperture which houses the trapping mechanism. The intrusion of the terminal element bends a multiplicity of resilient flaps (i.e. a multiplicity of resilient gates) which reside at the entrance of the aperture housed at the anchoring structure. Next, the bent resilient gating flaps are configured to be released when the terminal element is pushed further down and fully inserted into the aperture below the tips of the maximally bended flaps. Once the terminal element reaches below the tips of the maximally bended flaps, the flaps are released. Next, the released flaps unbend due to their elasticity and turn upwards until they end up resting on the pole above the terminal element by which they are trapping the terminal element inside the aperture inside the anchoring structure and preventing it from moving upwards. When the terminal elements attached to the fastening structure are pushed downwards into the anchoring structure apertures which house the trapping mechanisms, all the terminal elements attached to the poles of the fastening structure are simultaneously trapped. By which the button is fastened to the anchoring structure and to the cloth.
The resilient gating flaps of the trapping mechanism is initially bent by a forceful intrusion of a terminal element (i.e. a hemisphere or a cylinder which are attached at the bottom end of a pole connected to the button). Initially, the downwards intrusion of the terminal element into the anchoring structure's aperture pushes and bends downwards the resilient multiplicity of flaps that are attached at the upper opening of the trapping mechanism's aperture housed at the anchoring structure. Next, the trapping mechanism is triggered shut when the terminal element is pushed further downwards into the anchoring structure, beyond the tips of the maximally bent multiplicity of flaps. At that instant, the multiplicity of flaps are released and unbend turning upwards due to their resiliency and end up resting diagonally on the pole above the terminal element. At this situation, the pole prevents further upwards unbending motion of the released multiplicity of flaps since the flaps ends are leaning diagonally on the pole. At this point, the multiplicity of flaps trap the terminal element inside the aperture in the anchoring structure because they prevent the terminal element from retracting upwards. The button is also trapped since it is attached to the pole which is attached to the trapped terminal element. While the multiplicity of flaps are diagonally resting on the pole above the terminal element's upper side, the flaps are prevented from turning further upwards since their ends are diagonally resting on the pole. Hence, the multiplicity of resilient flaps are configured to prevent the terminal element from moving upwards thereby trapping the terminal element inside the anchoring structure.
The manual fastening of the button to the garment cloth is performed as follows: The button assembly is configured to be used for fast attachment of the button to the garment cloth by placing the anchoring structure below the garment cloth such that the anchoring structure's apertures are facing a lower side of the garment cloth while placing the fastening structure at an upper side of the garment cloth such that its attached terminal elements are situated opposite the anchoring structure's apertures. Next, manually pushing downwards the fastening structure from the upper side of the garment doth is configured to pierce the garment cloth by the terminal elements lower sides. Further pushing downwards insert the terminal elements into the anchoring structure's apertures which are situated beneath the lower side of the garment cloth. Inserting the terminal elements downwards through the anchoring structure apertures is configured to bend the multiplicity of flaps and to trap the terminal element inside the anchoring structure apertures when the flaps unbend. At the completion of the terminal element insertion, it is trapped inside the anchoring structure since it is situated beneath the multiplicity of flaps which are diagonally resting on the pole above the terminal element. At that point, the trapped terminal elements which are attached to the fastening structure, are configured to prevent detachment and separation of the fastening structure from the anchoring structure and from the garment cloth. Thereby, completing the attachment of the button to the garment cloth by permanently attaching the fastening structure to the garment cloth.
Top view of the button 11 is displayed horizontally on the right side of the Fastening structure 1. The buttoning apertures 9 are also depicted. The left and right spacing rings 10 are displayed at the right side of the button 11. A piece of cloth 12 which is necessary for the fastening demonstration is also included on the left.
Number | Name | Date | Kind |
---|---|---|---|
1277595 | Jaffe | Sep 1918 | A |
3623192 | Papazian | Nov 1971 | A |
3982013 | Katsuda | Sep 1976 | A |
4033012 | Kramer | Jul 1977 | A |
4194272 | Taffurelli | Mar 1980 | A |
4512063 | Fukuroi | Apr 1985 | A |
4662034 | Cunningham | May 1987 | A |
4751780 | Trolltsch et al. | Jun 1988 | A |
4928362 | Collas | May 1990 | A |
5107573 | Zhang | Apr 1992 | A |
5575043 | Candotti | Nov 1996 | A |
5584104 | Stuart | Dec 1996 | A |
5940940 | Tanikoshi | Aug 1999 | A |
5975398 | Evans | Nov 1999 | A |
6702162 | Hassid | Mar 2004 | B1 |
8241308 | Kortenbach | Aug 2012 | B2 |
8522404 | Matei | Sep 2013 | B2 |
8938861 | McLendon | Jan 2015 | B1 |
9820520 | Bolen | Nov 2017 | B2 |
9861167 | Shirai | Jan 2018 | B2 |
10004299 | Maussen | Jun 2018 | B2 |
10070697 | Melgoza | Sep 2018 | B1 |
D842165 | Marin | Mar 2019 | S |
10455901 | Marin | Oct 2019 | B2 |
20050188510 | Retamal | Sep 2005 | A1 |
20100236029 | Mattei | Sep 2010 | A1 |