Patent Application
20090045088
This invention relates to the field of hand held electric tools and related accessories.
Hand held tools including rotary tools are widely used by many people including professionals, craftspeople, homeowners, and artists. Rotary tools typically include an outer housing designed to be easily held within a human hand. The housing retains an electric motor which is operable to drive a rotatable chuck of the rotary tool. An accessory may be releasably secured to the chuck thereby enabling the rotary tool to rotatably drive the accessory.
Some of the hand held rotary tools are powered by removable batteries. When the charge on the battery has been used, the battery is removed from the tool and re-charged using a charging station. In the event the battery is not removable, the entire rotary tool may be placed in the charging station to re-charge the batteries. The charging station may also be used as a storage device.
The widespread use of hand held rotary tools is a result, in part, of the wide variety of accessory types that may be used with the tools. The accessory types include drill bits of various sizes, cut-off wheels, polishing wheels, grinding wheels, sanding discs, routing bits and other cutting bits. Some of the accessories used with rotary tools are provided to a consumer in simple packaging which is not intended to function as a permanent storage device. Thus, a consumer may simply keep the accessories in a drawer or storage bin with other accessories. For accessories which include cutting tips or blades, such storage can lead to dulling or even chipping of the cutting tip or blade. Accordingly, various accessory holders have been developed which provide for storage of the accessory by the consumer.
Accessory holders are useful in organizing various accessories. Nonetheless, an accessory holder may become separated from the rotary tool. Thus, a user may incur a delay in finding both the rotary tool and the accessory holder. Alternatively, if the accessory holder is mounted within a work space, the accessories must be individually carried to a worksite. Additionally, some accessory holders are enclosed. Thus, the consumer cannot see the actual accessory. Accordingly, the consumer cannot tell by looking at the accessory holder whether or not the accessory is within the holder.
What is needed is an accessory holder that may be stored with a rotary tool. What is further needed is an accessory holder which can be used to transport the accessories to a work site. It would be further beneficial if the accessory holder could be stored with a charging station which is configured to hold a rotary tool as a battery in the rotary tool is recharged.
The invention is a system incorporating an accessory pod. In one embodiment, a rotary tool charging station system includes an electric tool holder with a charging port and a first coupling portion, and an accessory holder pod configured to hold a plurality of accessories and including a second coupling portion, the second coupling portion configured to removably couple with the first coupling portion.
In a further embodiment, an accessory pod in a rotary tool holder system includes at least one accessory holder, a support member extending outwardly from the at least one accessory holder, a skirt extending downwardly from the support member, and a coupling portion adjacent the skirt and configured to removably couple the accessory pod to a rotary tool holder.
The present invention may take form in various system components and arrangement of system components. The drawings are only for purposes of illustrating exemplary embodiments and are not to be construed as limiting the invention.
Referring to
Returning to
The auxiliary tool holder 106 shown in
A resilient cantilevered arm 148 extends between the lips 144 and 146 and a protuberance 150 is located at the lower portion of the arm 148. The protuberance 150 extends somewhat outwardly of the plane defined by the lips 144 and 146. Moreover, the protuberance 150 is sized and located such that when the lips 144 and 146 are inserted between the opposing lips 122, 124, the protuberance 150 aligns with the recess 128.
The accessory holder pod 104 shown in
A resilient cantilevered arm 166 extends between the lips 162 and 164 and a protuberance 168 is located at the lower portion of the arm 166. The protuberance 168 extends somewhat outwardly of the plane defined by the lips 162 and 164 as shown in
The surface 154 supports a number of accessory holders 170. The accessory holders 170 include an outer wall 172 which defines a cavity 174 (see
In the embodiment of
When the lips 162 and 164 are fully inserted into the dovetail opening 130, the protuberance 168 aligns with the recess 128. The arm 166, which is no longer constrained by contact between the protuberance 168 and the inner wall 126, flexes toward the inner wall 126 moving the protuberance 168 into the recess 128.
To remove the accessory holder pod 104 from the rotary tool holder 102, pressure is applied to the accessory holder 104 in an upwardly direction. This forces the protuberance 168 against the inner wall 126 forcing the arm 166 in a direction away from the inner wall 126. The lips 162 and 164 are then lifted out of the dovetail opening 130. Thus, the accessory holder pod 104 may be decoupled from the rotary tool holder 102 and carried along with any accessories within the accessory holders 170 to a work site. Additionally, the lower portion of the support skirt 152 is essentially coplanar (see
An accessory holder pod 180 shown in
As shown in
In further rotary tool holder systems, a rotary tool holder, which may or may not incorporate a charging port, includes several coupling portions. This allows for a number of different accessory holder pods to be selectively coupled and decoupled to the rotary tool holder. Moreover, the accessory holder pods may be provided as part of a system and/or individually.
Additionally, while the coupling portions in the embodiments set forth above are identical, in alternative systems two or more coupling portions are provided with coupling portions which work with unique accessory holder pods. In yet further systems, the accessory holders within a particular pod may be configured differently so as to hold accessories of different types and/or which are differently shaped. By way of example, in an accessory holder pod for a drill bit set wherein each shank of the drill set is differently sized, the accessory holders may be sized similarly to the drill bit associated with the particular accessory holder.
While the present invention has been illustrated by the description of exemplary system components, and while the various components have been described in considerable detail, applicant does not intend to restrict or in any limit the scope of the appended claims to such detail. Additional advantages and modifications will also readily appear to those skilled in the art. The invention in its broadest aspects is therefore not limited to the specific details, implementations, or illustrative examples shown and described. Accordingly, departures may be made from such details without departing from the spirit or scope of applicant's general inventive concept.
