Patent Application
20060103279
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a drawer, and more particularly to a drawer assembly that includes a stop mechanism, which can prevent unintentional removal of the drawer.
2. Description of the Related Art
Referring to
When the drawer 14 moves forwardly on the sliding rails 12, the stop plate 15 comes into contact with the stop pins 13. This can prevent further forward movement of the drawer 14. As such, unintentional removal of the drawer 14 can be avoided. When it is desired to remove the drawer 14 for cleaning or putting the articles contained therein in order, the drawer 14 is fully opened, the front of the drawer 14 is declined, and the rear of the drawer 14 is moved upwardly to separate the stop plate 15 from the stop pins 13. However, since the drawer 14 is typically heavy, difficulties are encountered during drawer removal.
The object of this invention is to provide a drawer assembly that is capable of overcoming the above-mentioned disadvantage associated with the prior art.
According to this invention, a drawer includes two vertical side plates with fixed sliding rails, a drawer slidable on the rails, and two stop units. Each of the stop units is disposed on the drawer and a respective one of the sliding rails, and includes a stop member fixed on the corresponding rail, and a positioning member fixed on the drawer. Each of the positioning members includes a cantilever portion having a U-shaped front lever portion and an inclined rear lever portion. The drawer is movable forwardly to a first extended position, where the front lever portions are obstructed by the stop members from further forward movement and where the drawer is movable forcibly and forwardly so that the positioning members pass respectively over the stop members, thereby allowing for removal of the drawer.
These and other features and advantages of this invention will become apparent in the following detailed description of a preferred embodiment of this invention, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:
Referring to
The side plates 21 have inner side surfaces 211 that face each other. The sliding rails 22 are fixed respectively on the inner side surfaces 211 of the side plates 21, are aligned with each other along a transverse direction (A) perpendicular to the inner side surfaces 211 of the side plates 21, and have inner side surfaces 221 that face each other. Each of the sliding rails 22 further has opposite front and rear ends 222, 223.
The drawer 23 is disposed slidably on the sliding rails 22 between the side plates 21 in a known manner, and has a vertical rear surface 231 and a horizontal bottom surface 232.
The stop mechanism includes two stop units, each of which is disposed on the drawer 23 and the inner side surface 221 of a respective one of the sliding rails 22. Each of the stop units includes a stop member 3 and a positioning member 4.
Because the stop units are similar in construction to each other, only one of the stop units will be described in the succeeding paragraphs.
The stop member 3 is disposed fixedly on the inner side surface 221 of the sliding rail 22, is located in proximity to the front end 222 of the sliding rail 22, and includes a fixed triangular prism 30 (see
The positioning member 4 is made of plastic steel or metal, and is disposed behind the stop member 3, as shown in
The cantilever portion 42 has a U-shaped front lever portion 421 extending integrally and outwardly from the mounting portion 41 toward the sliding rail 22, a rearwardly and inwardly inclined rear lever portion or free end 422 disposed behind the front lever portion 421, and a concaved middle lever portion 423. The middle lever portion 423 is concaved toward the mounting portion 41, and has front and rear ends that are formed respectively and integrally with the front and rear lever portions 421, 422 so as to define a tip-receiving space 424.
In use, the drawer 23 can be moved forwardly from a fully closed position (not shown) to the first extended position shown in
When it is desired to remove the drawer 23, a forward pulling force is applied to the drawer 23 so as to move the drawer 23 forwardly on the sliding rail 22. Hence, the cantilever portion 42 is deformed so as to allow for movement of the drawer 23 from the first extended position to a second extended position shown in
When it is desired to remount the drawer 23, a rearward pushing force is applied to the drawer 23 so as to result in rearward movement of the positioning member 4 relative to the side plates 22 from the position shown in
Because the rear stop surface 32 is steeper than the front guiding surface 31, the rearward pushing force needed to move the rear lever portion 422 of the positioning member 4 on the front guiding surface 31 of the stop member 3 is smaller than the forward pulling force needed to move the front lever portion 421 of the positioning member 4 on the rear stop surface 32 of the stop member 3.
The drawer assembly of this invention has the following advantages:
(1) The stop members 3 and the positioning members 4 can cooperate with each other to dispose the drawer 23 at the first and second extended positions. Thus, unintentional removal of the drawer 23 can be prevented.
(2) To remove the drawer 23, it is only necessary to move the drawer 23 on the sliding rails 22 (i.e. no tilting and upward movement of the drawer 23 are required).
As such, removal of the drawer 23 can be easily performed.
With this invention thus explained, it is apparent that numerous modifications and variations can be made without departing from the scope and spirit of this invention. It is therefore intended that this invention be limited only as indicated by the appended claims.
