Patent Application
20250228312
The invention relates a heated glove system that incorporates a heated glove having ultrathin resistive heaters that extend on both the backside and palm side of the glove to enable higher tactility and use.
Cold weather gloves incorporate bulky insulation to keep a person's hands warm. This bulky, thick insulation reduces normal hand function and grip. Delicate or fine hand motor activities are very difficult if not impossible when wearing these bulky thick gloves.
In particular, athletes have to endure cold temperatures during outdoor sports as these thick gloves limit their performance and ability to catch and/or throw a ball. Their hands become cold and stiff without gloves and this also compromises their performance.
Also, not everyone is outdoors for fun and recreation. Millions of Americans have to work outdoors in cold temperatures, and perform manual, mechanical duties as part of that work. Unfortunately, the gloves they need to wear to protect their hands and fingers wind up substantially affecting their ability to perform their job.
Without gloves, performance and results are directly limited, of course. Cold temperature “decreases manual performance (of the hands and fingers) and decreases flexibility due to increased viscosity within the joints and soft tissues which interferes with smooth joint movements,” according to medical studies, and “decreases contraction velocity and maximal strength.” Simply put, low temperature restricts hand and finger motion and the speed of that motion, and also substantially reduces grip strength.
Standard gloves produce the same negative effects, however. Additional studies found “muscle force was lost in the hand-glove interface” and determined “wearing gloves may be another risk factor among those whose jobs require repetitive motions and large exertion forces.” Those studies on glove use in occupational environments concluded that these “thick, stiff gloves . . . could be trading one health risk for another.” In other words, the warmth provided by those standard gloves is needed for safety reasons but, in addition to negatively affecting work performance, the limitations applied by those same standard gloves create other safety risks. Therefore, this creates a Catch-22 circumstance. You need gloves to protect your hands from the elements, but those same gloves restrict you from doing needed tasks. Take them off, you're at risk. Leave them on, you create other risks due to the limitations imposed by those thick, bulky garments.
The invention relates a heated glove system that incorporates a heated glove with ultrathin resistive heaters that extend on both the backside and palm side of the glove to enable higher tactility and use. An exemplary resistive heater is ultrathin comprising a thin planar resistive layer that is no more than 3 mm thick and preferably no more than 2 mm or even 1 mm thick. The ultrathin resistive heater may extend along a backside portion of the glove and extend up along the finger portions of the backside portion and also along a palm portion and extend up along the finger portion of the palm portion. In this way, a hand is heated on both the backside and palm side substantially over the entire surfaces. The heated glove incorporates a battery, that may be a rechargeable battery and a controller interface having an on/off button and temperature indicator. A heated glove may also include a wireless signal transceiver for relaying information about glove temperatures to a remote electronic device, such as a mobile phone.
An exemplary heated glove has a resistive heater extending along the backside and also along a palm side of the glove. A resistive heater may be a heater grid of a resistive layer that is configured within both the palm portion and backside portion and may extend along the finger portions along both the palm side and backside. A heater grid may substantially cover the palm side area and backside area of the glove, such as about 50% or more of the area, 70% or more, 80% or more, 90% or more, or even 95% or more. A heater grid may extend over substantially all of the surface area of the heated glove to provide effective and uniform heating of a hand configured therein.
An exemplary heater grid includes a grid pattern of a resistive layer on a substrate material and may be an etched material or vapor deposited material, such as a metal or metal alloy. The resistive layer may be a metal or metal alloy foil. A resistive layer may be very thin, such as 2 mm or less, 1 mm or less, 0.5 mm or less or even 0.25 mm or less. The substrate layer of the resistive layer may be a polymeric material, such as an olefin, or material that has relatively high thermal stability such as a polyimide. Also, a resistive heater may have a cover layer, a material configured over the resistive layer and this may be thermally conductive but non-electrically conductive material. The substrate layer may be configured toward or adjacent the exterior material of the glove and may provide additional thermal insulation for the cold exterior temperatures.
The heated glove may include a cuff portion with a cuff opening into the interior of the glove. The heated glove has a hand portion that extends over the palm of the hand and finger portions extending around each of the fingers, including the thumb. The interior may have a fabric for contact with a person's hand. The heated glove has a backside portion, palm side portion and individual finger enclosures including a thumb enclosure, index finger enclosure, a middle finger enclosure, a ring finger enclosure and a little finger enclosure. The backside of the heated glove may include different materials than the palm side and the palm side may include a high friction material configured to provide better tactile grip on objects, such as tools or sports balls or equipment.
The interior and/or exterior material of the heated glove may be a thin material, such as a woven or non-woven blend of fibers, such as a blend of woven polyester and nylon. A waterproof coating may be applied to the exterior to ensure that the glove remains waterproof and this waterproof coating may comprise polyethylene. The interior material may be a thin, plush, material, such as a woven or non-woven and may include nylon, or other polymeric materials, such as fibers. As describe herein, the palm side may include a high friction material configured to provide better tactile grip on objects, such as tools or sports balls or equipment.
The resistive heater may differ from the backside to the palm side having different grid patterns, different grid widths of the resistive layer and/or different thicknesses. The resistive layer may have a coverage area, such as about 15% or more, about 25% or more, about 35% or more, about 50% or more and any range between and include the coverage areas provided. This coverage area, may vary from the backside to the palm side or from region to region within the glove. The fingers may have a higher coverage are than a hand portion of the heated glove as the fingers have more exposure and are prone to getting cold more quickly than the hand portion.
The hand portion of the heated glove may include different materials or different weight or composition of materials than the finger portions. The finger portions, or the palm side of the finger portions may have a lower weight of fabric, such as about 10% lower or more, about 25% lower, or even 50% lower in weight than a hand portion to enable effective dexterity and hand manipulation of tools, sports equipment, and other objects. The heater grid may have a higher coverage area in the finger portion than the hand portion to accommodate for less insulation on the finger portion.
The heated glove includes a controller interface to control the temperature of the glove and a battery to heat the resistive heater. The controller may include a low, medium, and high temperature setting or may allow specific temperature set points to be input. An on/off button may initiate the heating of the glove and provide a flow of electrical current from the battery to the heater grid. A temperature indicator may indicate a relative temperature set point or temperature of the heated glove, wherein a first color, such as green indicates a low temperature or low temperature set point, a second color such as yellow indicates a medium temperature or medium temperature set point and a third color such as red indicates a high temperature or high temperature set point. The on/off button may be used to cycle through different set points and the temperature indicator may be coupled with the on/off button, wherein pushing the on/off button one-time initiates heating as illuminates a first color light, pushing a second time initiates heating to a medium temperature set point and illuminates the second color and pushing a third time initiates a high temperature set point and illuminates the third color to indicate this high temperature set point.
An exemplary heated glove may include a controller interface including a charging port to charge the battery, an on/off button, a temperature indicator, a controller, and a wireless signal transceiver for sending and/or receiving wireless signals.
An exemplary heated glove system may be configured to communicate with a remote electronic device, such as a mobile phone. Data regarding the temperature of the glove may be transferred from the wireless signal transceiver of the heated glove to the wireless signal transceiver of the remote electronic device. The display screen of the remote electronic device may display functions and data from the heated glove, such as glove temperature, as measured by a temperature sensor. A heated glove may have a plurality of temperature sensors, such as one on a backside and one on a palm side of the glove and may include one or more temperature sensors along one or more of the fingers, such as near the tip or extended end of each of the fingers, including the thumb. Also, the remote electronic device may have an interface, such as a touch screen to produce a temperature input for increasing or decreasing a set glove temperature. The remote electronic device may also display battery level and other data regarding the temperature of the gloves or system parameters, such as time on, dates and times used, and the like. The remote electronic device may have a controller and operate an App for interfacing with the heated glove.
It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications, combinations, and variations can be made in the present invention without departing from the scope of the invention. Specific embodiments, features and elements described herein may be modified, and/or combined in any suitable manner. Thus, it is intended that the present invention cover the modifications, combinations and variations of this invention provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents.
The summary of the invention is provided as a general introduction to some of the embodiments of the invention, and is not intended to be limiting. Additional example embodiments including variations and alternative configurations of the invention are provided herein.
The accompanying drawings are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention, and together with the description serve to explain the principles of the invention.
Corresponding reference characters indicate corresponding parts throughout the several views of the figures. The figures represent an illustration of some of the embodiments of the present invention and are not to be construed as limiting the scope of the invention in any manner. Some of the figures may not show all of the features and components of the invention for ease of illustration, but it is to be understood that where possible, features and components from one figure may be an included in the other figures. Further, the figures are not necessarily to scale, some features may be exaggerated to show details of particular components. Therefore, specific structural and functional details disclosed herein are not to be interpreted as limiting, but merely as a representative basis for teaching one skilled in the art to variously employ the present invention.
As used herein, the terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “includes,” “including,” “has,” “having” or any other variation thereof, are intended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion. For example, a process, method, article, or apparatus that comprises a list of elements is not necessarily limited to only those elements but may include other elements not expressly listed or inherent to such process, method, article, or apparatus. Also, use of “a” or “an” are employed to describe elements and components described herein. This is done merely for convenience and to give a general sense of the scope of the invention. This description should be read to include one or at least one and the singular also includes the plural unless it is obvious that it is meant otherwise.
Certain exemplary embodiments of the present invention are described herein and are illustrated in the accompanying figures. The embodiments described are only for purposes of illustrating the present invention and should not be interpreted as limiting the scope of the invention. Other embodiments of the invention, and certain modifications, combinations, and improvements of the described embodiments, will occur to those skilled in the art and all such alternate embodiments, combinations, modifications, improvements are within the scope of the present invention.
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The heated glove 11 includes a cuff portion 20 with a cuff opening 21 into the interior 22 of the glove. The heated glove has a hand portion 26 and finger portions 25. The interior may have a fabric for contact with a person's hand. The heated glove 11 has a backside portion 24 including a backside hand portion 28 and finger portion 25 including individual finger enclosures including a thumb enclosure 50, index finger enclosure 51, a middle finger enclosure 52, a ring finger enclosure 53 and a little finger enclosure 54. The backside 23 of the heated glove 11 may include different materials and resistive heaters arrays than a palm side of the heated glove.
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It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications, combinations, and variations can be made in the present invention without departing from the scope of the invention. Specific embodiments, features and elements described herein may be modified, and/or combined in any suitable manner. Thus, it is intended that the present invention cover the modifications, combinations and variations of this invention provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents.
This application claims the benefit of priority to U.S. Provisional patent application No. 63/630,202, filed on Jan. 17, 2024; the entirety of which is hereby incorporated by reference herein.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 63630202 | Jan 2024 | US |
