The present invention relates to an eyelet to be mounted to a mounting hole which has been formed in a material such as cloths for clothing, and more specifically, to an eyelet to be mounted to a mounting hole without a washer.
Conventionally, an eyelet has been used in a material such as cloths for clothing, cover sheets, shoes. The eyelet is mounted to a mounting hole which has previously been formed in the material by swaging the eyelet so as to hold a part of the material. There are two types in eyelet, namely, two-piece type with a combination of an eyelet and a washer, and one-piece type without a washer. An eyelet in the two-piece type includes a stud to be passed through the mounting hole and a flange extending continuously and radially outward from an end of the stud. When the two-piece eyelet is to be mounted to the material, after the stud is passed through the mounting hole and then the washer, the stud is swaged to the flange so as to hold a part of the material around the mounting hole and the washer.
As shown in
To realize facilitation in mounting of an eyelet and simplification of an eyelet construction, several one-piece eyelets comprising a eyelet alone without a washer have previously been proposed, representative examples of which are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,907,647 (see
A one-piece eyelet 200 as shown in
On the other hand, in a one-piece eyelet 400 as shown in
However, since those prior-art one-piece eyelets are constructed to hold a material part around a mounting hole between a flange or its inner surface and a flange-backing portion, they would be inferior to two-piece eyelets with a washer in terms of a mounting strength to a material. Further, the problem that one-piece eyelets come off of a mounting hole due to material cutting during swaging or in use or due to elastic stretch with a relatively thin material has not been sufficiently solved yet.
[Patent document 1] U.S. Pat. No. 6,907,647
[Patent document 2] EP Published Application No. 1,935,273
[Patent document 3] EP Patent No. 673611
An object of the invention is to provide a one-piece type eyelet in which a mounting strength to a material is equal to or higher than that in a two-piece type using a washer, and which can solve a problem of an eyelet coming off of a mounting hole of the material due to material cutting or expansion and contraction of the material during swaging or in use.
According to the invention, there is provided an eyelet to be mounted to a mounting hole which has been formed in a material comprising: a flange which is to be placed around the mounting hole; and a flange-backing portion integral with the flange, which is to be placed around the mounting hole at a position opposite to the flange to hold a part of the material around the mounting hole against the flange; wherein the flange has a plurality of claws arranged in the circumferential direction with a given space therebetween, the claws being cut and raised toward an inner surface of the flange-backing portion, each of the claws having one or more tips facing the inner surface of the flange-backing portion, wherein the flange-backing portion and the flange hold the part of the material therebetween, and the tips and the inner surface of the flange-backing portion hold the part of the material therebetween.
In the invention, the tips of the claws in the flange can pierce a relatively thin material and contact the inner surface of the flange-backing portion, and the tips would not pierce a material if the material is relatively thick. In the invention, the claws can be formed so that the tips point radially outward or radially inward, or each tip of adjacent two claws in the circumferential direction can point to each other. Alternatively, the claws can be provided in the flange in a random fashion. In the invention, each of the claws can have a plurality of tips, and the tips of the claws are made sharp or tapered.
In the invention with a one-piece type eyelet, a mounting strength to a material is equal to or higher than that in a two-piece type using a washer, and a unit price can be reduced due to decreased costs in material and production of the eyelet. Further, the weight of the mounted eyelet and the load of mounting the eyelet by a worker can be reduced. In addition to the effects, a problem of an eyelet coming off due to material cutting or expansion and contraction of a material during swaging or in use can be solved.
Hereinafter, a one-piece type eyelet according to the present invention will be described in detail with referring to
At the time of mounting the eyelet 10 to the mounting hole 14 as an annular one-piece eyelet 22 as shown in
Each of the claws 24, which has been raised from the flange 18 toward the material 12, generally tapers to a sharp-point forming an edge having an acute angle less than 90°. If the material is relatively thin, the tip 26 or the edge of each of the claws pierces the material and then presses the inner surface 32 engaging with the surface. If the material is relatively thick, each tip 26, presses the inner surface 32 via the material holding the material against the surface 32. Each claw 24 adjusts the amount of compression of a material between the outer end 28 of the flange-backing portion 30 and the outer end 34 of the flange 18 at the time of swaging by pressing the inner surface 32 of the flange-backing portion 30 as described above. Thereby, each claw 24 can prevent the outer end 28 of the flange-backing portion 30 from acting as a cutting edge to cut a material, while providing an additional position to hold a material which is different from the holding position by between the outer end 28 of the flange-backing portion 30 and the outer end 34 of the flange 18.
Hereinafter, a process to mount the one-piece eyelet 22 according to the present invention to the mounting hole 14 of the material 12 will be described in sequence. In this example, the claws 24 are arranged in the circumferential direction of the flange 18 and have been previously cut and raised prior to swaging. Firstly, the stud 16 of the eyelet 10 is passed through the mounting hole 14 of the material 12, and then the flange 18 is placed on a part of the material around the mounting hole 14. Secondly, the stud 16 is swaged to form the integral with the flange 18 by extending the end 28 of the stud 16 radially outward and toward the flange 18.
The flange-backing portion 30 is continuously swaged and the material part around the mounting hole 14 is put in a space between the flange 18 and the flange-backing portion 30 with material part pressed by each tip 26 of the claws. As shown in
By the swaging, the outer end 28 of the flange-backing portion 30 also comes to press the material 12 against the inner surface of the flange 18 near at the outer end 34 of the flange 18. However, with the claws 24 pressing the inner surface 32 of the flange-backing portion 30, the amount of compression of the material between the outer end 28 of the flange-backing portion 30 and the inner surface of the flange 18 near at the outer end 34 is restricted. Therefore, a cutting edge such as the end 107 of the flange against the washer 109 of the prior-art example in
Further, in the one-piece eyelet according to the invention, by holding the material between the flange-backing portion and the flange and between the tips of the claws and the inner surface of the flange-backing portion, the material part is not excessively held between the end of the flange-backing portion and the end of the flange as in prior art. In other words, it is unnecessary to concentrate a material-pressing force at one place, which can solve the problem of the eyelet coming off the material. In addition, when the tip of each of the claws is made sharp or tapered, the claws become easy to bite into the material increasing the mounting strength of the eyelet to the material. When the tip of each of the claws is to pierce the material, the piercing will be easy.
While the present invention has been described with reference to the examples, it should be appreciated that a variety of modifications can be made with in the scope of the invention. For instance, though the claws 24 have been explained, in the
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind | 371c Date |
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PCT/JP2009/062995 | 7/17/2009 | WO | 00 | 1/13/2012 |