Child-proof door jamb covers have been provided in the past for preventing pinching a child's fingers in door jambs as the doors open and close. Many village, city, and county ordinances in communities in the United States require such door jamb covers to ensure the safety of our children. Unfortunately, the existing door jamb products require drilling and screwing into existing doors and associated jambs. Landlords have lease provisions that prohibit damage to the leased property by the tenant and thus prevent invasive door add-on products that require drilled-in screws and/or damage-causing strong adhesives. To date, no child-safety finger guard mounting system has been introduced that is sturdy, easy to install, removable, and requires no screws (nor screwdrivers), nor damaging adhesives. The existence of a fast, simple and effective product that incorporates a removable, no-tools-required mounting approach will result in an increased number of installed finger guards, greatly improving the safety of many.
Hinge pin brackets have been provided in the past, such as shown in the Buckelew; U.S. Pat. No. 6,658,696.
There are five U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,134,839; 5,765,311; 5,778,601; 6,434,888, and 8,505,168 that show mounted brackets, and these require a screwdriver, screws and, in some cases, a drill, to be used in attaching an elongated protective plate designed to cover the dangerous gap between the door and the door jamb. Unfortunately, the need for a screwdriver and screws is a complexity that deters many people from using these solutions. For one, landlords have lease provisions that prohibit damage and alterations to leased property by tenants. Secondly, installing screws into the door and door jamb requires more physical strength and know-how than many people possess. Finally, screw sizes vary and often a correctly-sized screwdriver is not readily available. These obstacles collectively prevent the installation of products that would protect building owners' and tenants' children as well as their guests' children. An improved child-safety door guard design should enable mounting on elongated spring-biased child-safety protective plate to the door by using a mounting assembly that does not damage the door, and does not require tools for installation.
In accordance with the present invention, a hinge mounted assembly for existing door constructions for supporting articles between a door and a door jam in a door is provided that has upper and lower hinges; including a first “U” shaped bracket mounted above one of the hinges to prevent downward movement of the hinge mounted assembly, and a second “U” shaped bracket mounted below one of the hinges to prevent upward movement of the hinge mounted assembly, and a vertically running support rod connected to the two brackets, such that it abuts closely against the protruding portion of both hinges on the back side of the door, to prevent lateral movement of the hinge mounted assembly.
No tools are necessary because the vertically elongated mounting assembly does no damage to the multi-hinged door upon which it is installed. It makes use of the unique, available features of an existing hinge-mounted door to support the bracket assembly, reducing part complexity, eliminating the need for holes in the door, and requiring no installation tools (e.g., no screwdrivers, no drills), while providing higher load support over an extended vertical distance along the front-side and/or the back-side of the door. This assembly can support a variety of door products, including a child-safety door guard on both the front-side and back-side of the door, as well as a swinging arm towel rack on both the front-side and back-side of the door.
To overcome the indentified issues of existing products, the present invention provides a no-tools-required method for attaching add-on products to extended vertical mounting surfaces on the lower area of hinged-doors. The present invention involves a mounting assembly for a multi-hinged door, allowing finger guards, coat racks or towel rods to be affixed to the front-side or back-side of a door in a manner that requires no drilling of holes, no installation tools, do damaging paint-stripping adhesives, does not require specific door height, adapts by its design to varying door hinge vertical lengths, and adapts by its design to various door hinge locations. The mounting system is also notable for being easily removable, returning the door to its original condition when uninstalled.
It is a primary object of the present invention to provide a vertically elongated, door-mounted bracket assembly that is non-damaging, requires no tools to install, and connects all parts together in a firmly-fixed, immovable system uniquely adapted to exploit existing hardware in order to support itself securely along an elongated vertical surface of the door.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a mounting bracket system which spans the vertical distance between at least two door hinges, providing a non-door-damaging mountable surface over an extended length along the frontside and/or backside of the door.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a mounting bracket system which minimizes size and complexity in material production costs, thus minimizing the installation complexity to mount vertically extending add-ons to the frontside and/or backside of hinged doors (the described “U” brackets, while adapted specifically to work within the mounting system on a multi-hinged door, are deliberately simplified so that they can be individually cut from a single metal extrusion).
Another object of the present invention is to provide a mounting bracket system which employ brackets that sit fully above or below a given door hinge, removing the need for individual brackets to transverse varying vertically elongated hinge sizes, and also eliminating the need for a door hinge to have some minimal amount of vertical size in order for the mounting system to have complete stability, thus better ensuring universal adaptability to doors with very small and/or very large hinges, while using less costly, simplified parts.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a vertically-elongated mounting system which is adapted by design to span the varying vertical distances between two separate hinges on existing installed doors, in order to create a very lengthy vertical mounting surface.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a mounting system which cares not about the varying heights of doors, as no part of the mounting system needs to reach to the top of the door.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a mounting bracket system which installs easily on both left-hung and right-hung hinged doors.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a vertically-elongated mounting bracket system which remains securely fixed in its installed place, during all times of installed operation, through both open and closed door swing movement positions, even if a child applies force up or down on it.
According to the present invention, a hinged-door-mounted bracket system is provided that is securely attached to door. It is not destructive to the door and offers increased load-bearing values over an extended vertical area on the door, and is simple to install, requiring no tools. Toward these ends, a pair of generally “U” shaped brackets (with specific widths to fit snuggly upon the end of the door, with specific thinness so as not to interfere with door functioning, with specific height for stability and with specific fastener points, for connection to the other parts in the vertically-elongated mounting system are placed upon the hinged-side of the door, a first bracket placed just above a door hinge keeps the bracket, and thus the rest of the mounting assembly, from sliding down the door, while taking advantage of the hinge's load bearing capacity, and a second bracket placed just below a separate, nearby door hinge (this serves to restrict the mounting assembly from sliding upward on the door). A vertically running support rod is attached (having specific length at least as long as the vertical distance between the two separate door hinge plates) to both brackets via connector points, specifically on the back-side of the hinged door, with the support rod abutted closely against the protruding portion of both door hinges on the backside of the door. All mounting system parts, only when connected to each other in this manner and in these locations, are thus rendered fixed upon the door, each immovable, unable to slide in any direction, allowing a variety of door add-ons to be affixed at various continuous vertical locations along the front or the back of the door. The unique design allows all of this without requiring the use of installation tools.
Other objects and advantages of the present invention will appear more clearly from the following detailed description.
Referring to the drawings and particularly
The door construction 12 is seen to include a vertical jamb frame 15, a rectangular pivotal door 18, and an upper hinge assembly 20 and a lower hinge assembly 21.
As seen in
The hinge mount assembly 14 includes an upper U-shaped bracket 38 mounted to the door 18 and a lower U-shaped bracket 40 also mounted to the door 18.
As seen in
The upper and lower brackets 38 and 40 can be extruded and severed after extrusion to reduce the cost thereof.
The legs 44 and 45 are spaced apart to fit standard size doors.
Indoor doors are generally slightly narrower than exterior commercial doors, so that the brackets 38 and 40 may be commercially packaged into two sizes to accommodate those two different standard doors.
As seen in
Note that the upper bracket in
In this regard note in
As seen in
As seen in
As seen in
In
In
Number | Name | Date | Kind |
---|---|---|---|
2681479 | Dixon, Sr. | Jun 1954 | A |
2694234 | Roby | Nov 1954 | A |
2910741 | Dettman | Nov 1959 | A |
2995785 | Hallenbeck | Aug 1961 | A |
4845892 | Pinto | Jul 1989 | A |
4878267 | Roach | Nov 1989 | A |
5001862 | Albenda | Mar 1991 | A |
5765311 | Kapler | Jun 1998 | A |
6134839 | Johansson | Oct 2000 | A |
6477809 | Dorner | Nov 2002 | B1 |
8505168 | Chapman | Aug 2013 | B1 |
20040107647 | Salzman | Jun 2004 | A1 |
20080263962 | Wei | Oct 2008 | A1 |
20100162630 | Shim | Jul 2010 | A1 |
20100257788 | McRoskey | Oct 2010 | A1 |
20110302845 | McRoskey | Dec 2011 | A1 |
20120210648 | Yang | Aug 2012 | A1 |
20150152680 | Izod | Jun 2015 | A1 |