Patent Application
20050252163
The Invention relates to a decorative structural member, which could be made of a different type of material, such as wood, plastic and metal, and utilized as a supporting element in a construction field, such as a baluster for a railing, as well as a supporting peace of an article of a furniture, such as a leg for a decorative chair or a table.
The decorative balusters are well known in the art. However, the balusters of existing types have a pattern which is limited to a slightly differentiated family of a geometric shapes. (See “Coffman Since 1874, Stair Parts Buer's Guide, HARDWOOD Profile Index, February 2001, pages 6 and 7). All of those known balusters are made from one piece of wood and, therefore, have the same and only one color over their surface.
The present invention allows to create a wide range of multi-grained multi-colored and differently shaped balusters having a unique and attractive visual appearance by using a combination of wood pieces having various grain structures and a variety of predetermined geometric shapes. The other type of material, such as plastic or metal, that are different in color can be utilized as well to create a favorable decorative pattern.
The present invention proposes a decorative structural member and a method of making same.
In accordance with the preferred embodiment of the invention, the decorative structural member includes a core and at least one surrounding sleeve made of a different type of material. For instance, the decorative structural member has the core, which is made of a wood having one type of a grain structure, and at least one surrounding sleeve made of a wood having another type of a grain structure or color and adhered on a top of the core.
The core and the surrounding sleeve are each designed to have of a predetermined dimensions and a geometric shape and constructed so that an inner size of a surrounding sleeve is substantially equal to an outer size of said core. In other words, the sleeve forms a cavity that is complementary in size and a shape to the core. So, the core snugly fits into the cavity.
At least one circumferential groove of a predetermined geometric shape and dimensions and defining a respective shoulder is formed along the length of the member. In its preferred embodiment the invention includes the groove, which has a preselected length and a depth of a maximum size that is substantially equal to or less than an outer size of the core to form a desirable decorative pattern by partially uncovering the surface of the core.
It is another object of the present invention to provide the groove, which has a size of a depth alternating along its length to form various geometric shapes or the combinations of the same.
As it was mentioned, the core and the surrounding sleeve may have a variety of the predetermined geometric shapes, which is chosen in accordance with the preselected decorative pattern to be form on a surface of the decorative member. As such, the core may have, for example, a rounded shape, a rectangular shape and a triangular shape.
The surrounding sleeve is formed of at least two pieces complimenting each other to define a cavity having a geometric shape corresponding to the geometric shape of said core.
It is further object of the present invention to provide an embodiment which includes a plurality of surrounding sleeves adhered on a top of each other in a consecutive order, so as an inner size of each consecutive sleeve is substantially equal to an outer size of a previous adjacent sleeve. It is understood that the innermost sleeve, which is adjacent to the core, has an inner surface of a size and a geometric shape corresponding to the outer surface of the core.
Preferably, each of said plurality of surrounding sleeves has a different type of the grain structure and/or color. As a result, the finished decorative pattern includes a plurality of multi-grained/multi-colored geometric figures displayed on a surface of the wood member.
It is still further object of the present invention to provide the surrounding sleeves which have their outer and inner surface of a different geometric shape.
Accordingly, the outer surface may have a square shape while the inner surface may have a rounded shape.
In a further embodiment, the outer surface has a square shape and the inner surface has a rectangular shape.
In yet further embodiment, the outer surface has a square shape and the inner surface has a triangle shape.
The axis of the core having, for example, a rectangular or a triangle shape is oriented in parallel or in perpendicular toward the surrounding sleeve, to achieve yet another variety of the decorative multi-grained patterns.
In yet another embodiment, the structural decorative member comprises a plurality of the axially spaced grooves and respective shoulders, which are formed along a length of said decorative member. Once again, both, the groove and the respective shoulder have a predetermined geometric shape and dimensions to design the preselected favorable decorative pattern.
It is still further object of the invention to provide a method for making the structural decorative member described above.
The foregoing objects and other objects as well as the particular features of the structural decorative member will become more apparent and understandable from the following detailed description thereof when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
Turning now to the drawings,
The surrounding sleeve 3 is formed of two or more pieces 4. The pieces may be joint by any method well known in the art of carpentry, that allow to achieve a firm and reliable connection of the same into the whole unit. For instance, the pieces can be adhered to each other by utilizing a glue, such as Weather Proof, TiteBond premium wood glue, and then subjected to a pressure of a particular parameters on a Midwest Hot Press, Model NPC 510-160. It is understood that the type of a glue and the parameters of the pressure are determine in view of the material selected for the core and the sleeve, respectively.
As it is further seen from the
The core 2 may have the outer surface 8a and 8b of various geometric shapes, such as a rounded, triangle or rectangular shape, as depicted in
The structural decorative member further includes one or more axially spaced circumferential grooves 9 and the respective shoulders 10 defined by those grooves. Each groove is designed to have a maximum size of the circumference equal to or preferably less than the size of the outer surface of the core 2, as shown on
The specific shape of the groove on the decorative member 1 is formed by cutting sections 10 of the different length and depth on the outer surface 8 of the surrounding sleeve 3 until the outer surface 7 of the core 2 is touched or partially curved out. As the result, the differently shaped spots or stripes of a color distinctive from the color of the surrounding sleeve are displayed to create the multi-grained and/or multi-colored decorative pattern on a finished baluster or a supporting leg of table or a chair.
Further, as it is shown on
The examples of forming various decorative patterns are presented in the following description.
In one of the embodiment illustrated in
In the other embodiment according to the present invention, illustrated in
It is understood, that by combining various geometric shapes of the core 2 and the surrounding sleeve 3 made of the different type of wood, plastic or metal, it is possible to obtain wide range of various decorative patterns having distinctive colors, grain structure and shapes.
In yet another embodiment of the present invention, shown in
As shown in
The present invention further proposes an embodiment in which the core 2 and the surrounding sleeve are axially offset. Such arrangement allow to define the decorative pattern at only one side of the baluster as shown in
Although the foregoing description was done in connection with the preferred embodiments of the present invention, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that some substitution of addition may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as defined in the amended claims.
