Patent Application
20200324153
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The invention is in the field of heat retention devices and such as those used by hunters who are positioned in tree stands or are supported by safety harness devices.
The disclosure and prior art relates to personal insulating devices and more particularly pertains to a new personal insulating device for preventing heat loss in a person's buttocks area while they are using a safety harness.
An embodiment of the disclosure meets the needs presented above by generally comprising a panel that is flexible and has a front side, a back side and a perimeter edge. The perimeter edge includes an upper edge, a lower edge, a first lateral edge and a second lateral edge. A coupler attaches the panel to a safety harness so that panel extends downwardly to cover buttocks of a person using the safety harness. This positioning retains heat between the panel and the buttocks.
There has thus been outlined, rather broadly, the more important features of the disclosure in order that the detailed description thereof that follows may be better understood, and in order that the present contribution to the art may be better appreciated. There are additional features of the disclosure that will be described hereinafter and which will form the subject matter of the claims appended hereto.
The objects of the disclosure, along with the various features of novelty which characterize the disclosure, are pointed out with particularity in the claims annexed to and forming a part of this disclosure.
The disclosure will be better understood and objects other than those set forth above will become apparent when consideration is given to the following detailed description thereof. Such description makes reference to the annexed drawings wherein:
With reference now to the drawings, and in particular to
As best illustrated in
The assembly 10 is used to cover this exposed area and form a pocket of air between the assembly 10 and the person's clothes. The assembly 10 includes a panel 20 that is flexible and has a front side 22, a back side 24 and a perimeter edge 26. The panel 20 edge includes an upper edge 28, a lower edge 30, a first lateral edge 32 and a second lateral edge 34. The lower edge 30 is convexly arcuate and as can be seen in
The panel 20 comprises an inner wall 38 and an outer wall 40 attached together along respective outer edges thereof. The inner wall 38 includes the front side 22 and the outer wall 40 includes the back side 24. Each of the inner 38 and outer 40 walls is comprised of a cloth material. The cloth material may comprise any conventional material used for hunting such as cotton, synthetic materials and the like. Other materials such as leather may be utilized though woven materials would generally be preferred for cost, ease of care and flexibility. An interior space 42 is defined between the inner 38 and outer 40 walls.
The panel 20 includes an insulating material 44 that is positioned in the interior space 42. The insulating material 44 inhibits thermal conductivity between the front 22 and back 24 sides, thereby trapping heat against the front side 22 as discussed below. Any conventional material used for insulating may be used including natural and synthetic insulators. One suitable material is Climashield available from Climashield, 641 Northpark Drive, Clinton, Tenn.
A coupler 46 attaches the panel 20 to the safety harness 12, and in particular the upper cradle 18, so that the panel 20 hangs downwardly from the upper cradle 18 to cover the buttocks which are exposed between the upper 18 and lower 16 cradles. The coupler 46 is releasable from the safety harness 12 to allow the user to determine if the assembly 10 will or will not be used with the safety harness 12. The coupler 46 may include one or more straps 48 that are attached to the panel 20 and extend upwardly from the upper edge 28. One or more connectors 50 are provided and attached to the straps 48 so that each of the straps 48 includes a connector 50. The connectors 50 may comprise typical MOLLE type connectors that are insertable into MOLLE type strapping 14. MOLLE, which may also be referred to as PALS, stands for, respectively, modular lightweight load-carrying equipment and pouch attachment ladder system. These labels are often interchangeable and define a ubiquitous coupling arrangement whereby a strap is attached to an article at approximately 1.5 inch increments to form closed loops between the attachment points. The closed loops are then used for receiving clips, other straps, or connectors such as shown in
A plurality of sleeves 52 is attached to the perimeter edge. Term “attached” herein with respect to the sleeves 52 may include the sleeves being formed in the cloth material of the panel 20. The sleeves 52 are positioned at least on the lower edge 30 but may also be on the first 32 and second 34 lateral edges. A tether 54, of any conventional flexible cording, extends through the sleeves 52. The tether 54 has a first free end 56 and a second free end 58. The tether 54 may be pulled tight to cinch the perimeter edge 26, particularly along the lower edge 30, so that the panel 20 is tightened against the safety harness 12 and a user thereof. As can be seen in
A pair of clips 62 may be provided to further secure the tether 54 to the safety harness 12 to assist in its ability to trap air between the panel 20 and the safety harness 12. Each of the clips 62 is positioned on the tether 54 wherein one of the clips 62 is positioned adjacent to one of the stops 60 and one of the clips 62 is positioned adjacent to another one of the stops 60. The clips 62 are then used to engage strapping of or attached to the safety harness 12 to again allow for tightening of the panel 20 against the safety harness 12.
In use, when a hunter is cold, the hunter may secure the panel 20 to the safety harness 12 so that the harness 12 extends down over the buttocks area of the hunter to prevent air from freely moving across the buttocks. This traps the air between the panel 20 and the safety harness 12 to prevent heat loss. The panel 20 may be secured to the safety harness 12 by the coupler 46 as well as along multiple points of the tether 54. The tether 54 can thereafter be used to cinch the panel 20 tighter against the safety harness 12 to increase heat retention or can be loosened to facilitate heat release.
With respect to the above description then, it is to be realized that the optimum dimensional relationships for the parts of an embodiment enabled by the disclosure, to include variations in size, materials, shape, form, function and manner of operation, assembly and use, are deemed readily apparent and obvious to one skilled in the art, and all equivalent relationships to those illustrated in the drawings and described in the specification are intended to be encompassed by an embodiment of the disclosure.
Therefore, the foregoing is considered as illustrative only of the principles of the disclosure. Further, since numerous modifications and changes will readily occur to those skilled in the art, it is not desired to limit the disclosure to the exact construction and operation shown and described, and accordingly, all suitable modifications and equivalents may be resorted to, falling within the scope of the disclosure. In this patent document, the word “comprising” is used in its non-limiting sense to mean that items following the word are included, but items not specifically mentioned are not excluded. A reference to an element by the indefinite article “a” does not exclude the possibility that more than one of the element is present, unless the context clearly requires that there be only one of the elements.
