Patent Application
20190077642
The present invention relates to a power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device, and more particularly to display current setting value and current actual value of the power winch on a display panel disposed at the power winch, and an electrical control set of the power winch is also disposed with a second plug seat capable of being inserted by a current regulator and regulating the current setting value, thereby increasing use safety and convenience of the power winch.
A power winch is a mechanical hoisting device that is used to pull in or let out a cable in order to hoist or put down a heavy object or load, and the power winch is also known as a hoist or hoist winch. The conventional power winch is usually installed at a tall building for hoisting or vertically elevating heavy loads or goods or it is installed onto a jeep or buggy for towing other vehicles or for self-rescue (or escape). A side of the conventional power winch is disposed with a power source (such as a motor), and a power generated by the power source is transmitted by an internal axle to drive a deceleration device disposed on the other side, and the deceleration device includes plural levels of deceleration (such as a planetary gear set) and drives a cable pulley to rotate so that the steel cable wound on the cable pulley can perform motions of positive rotation discharging or reverse rotation retracting. In other words, the power winch controls the positive and reverse rotation direction of the cable pulley by power so as to further control the discharging or retracting of the cable pulley. It is a motion of retracting or discharging the cable pulley. The power winch further includes an electric control set which is generally in form of a box body (It is so called an electric control box) and electrically connected to the power source, and a power supply switch is installed on a surface of the winch body to control conducting (CLOSE) or disconnection (OPEN) between the power source and the external power source (such as a motor vehicle battery), and the electric control set may be connected with a wired handheld controller through a plug socket via a wired connection, or the electric control device may be connected to a wireless handheld controller via wireless connection so that when the wired handheld controller or the wireless handheld controller is linked to the electric control set, the effect of remotely turning on/off the power source can be achieved.
The conventional power winch is generally disposed on a motor vehicle and used for rescue and escape purposes. According to experience and response of the users, the conventional power winch still has the following safety issues:
1. When the power winch is used, the voltage of the motor vehicle battery (or storage battery) drops rapidly, and the correct way of using the power winch is to use it only when the users start the motor vehicle engine (in order to charge the battery) to prevent the battery voltage from dropping too low to cause situation that is unable to start the motor vehicle or even affects the safety. In practical applications, many operating persons ignore the importance of starting the vehicle engines since they sometimes may need to deal with emergency and start using the power winch for rescuing people or cars immediately after closing the switch and totally forget the necessity of starting the motor vehicle. When disaster handling is done, injured people may need to be sent for emergency treatment or hospitalization, and however, the vehicle is unable to be started. This shortcoming occurs frequently, since it is a normal habit to turn off the power switch before we get off the vehicle. This habit repeats everyday, and rescue does not happen everyday so that it is easy for us to use the power winch without starting the vehicle. Most importantly, the conventional power winch body or its disposition position does not have a device for showing the power level of battery. Consequently, it is difficult to remind users to pay attention to the voltage level of the vehicle.
2. Since the power winch must pulls a heavy object by forces, the power source (such as a motor) must bear extremely large torque during its operation, and temperature may easily rises inside the power source, resulting in overheat situation. Particularly, when the power winch is used at non-emergency applications of hoisting overweight loads or towing vehicles in dangerous situation, the current of the power source rises rapidly, and high temperature or overheat of the power source occurs relatively. However, when the conventional power winch is used, users have no idea about the temperature inside the power source and cannot determine when to pause or stop using the power winch. Consequently, the power source may be overheated to cause malfunction, and the components/parts may be burned or damaged, or even worse the heavy load falls down accidentally to cause a safety issue.
3. When the power winch is used, the operating person should be the one who knows the cable direction (discharging or retracting) most clearly, but even the operating person may not know the cable direction exactly during an emergency use or in darkness condition. As a result, the operating person may be suddenly confused about cable direction to cause wrong action in operating, and thus the rescue time may be delayed, or even worse the safety of the rescued person may be further harmed.
4. The conventional power winch generally comes with a power source switch installed at the body of the power winch to control CLOSE or OPEN between the power source and the external power source (such as a battery of a vehicle). In emergency use or a darkness condition, the operating person may not know whether the electric connection between the power source and the external power supply is at CLOSE or OPEN status, and the operating person may confuse operation or wrong action may be taken.
5. When the conventional power winch uses a wireless handheld controller to perform connection and operation, none of indication is shown. Consequently, helpers or bystanders sometimes may take improper actions (bypass without caution or turning on the power source accidentally) since they do not know whether the power winch is turned on or off, thus injuring people or damaging equipments.
With respect to many safety concerns for using the power winch, the front surface of the main body of the power winch is designed to dispose a product of a “display panel”. The display panel is electrically connected to the electrical control set of the power winch. The display panel normally comprises: a power activation display zone displaying that the power winch is at useable state of conducting the power source through a light emitting signal; a vehicle power quantity display zone, at several blocks, displaying power quantity state of the vehicle mounted with the power winch by adopting the light emitting signal; and a temperature warning display zone displaying the warning of stopping operation of the power source through the light emitting signal when temperature of the power source reaches a setting value. Preferably, the display panel of the power winch further comprises: a steel cable direction display zone adopting gradual jumping light-up through the light emitting signal to display traveling direction of the steel cable; and a wireless operating display zone displaying that the power winch has been transformed into wireless remote control mode through the light emitting signal.
By disposing a “display panel” on the main body of the power winch to clearly display operation state and related messages during operation of the power winch, the operating person can clearly handle the situation to exactly and greatly improve use safety of the power winch. However, based upon the inventor's design of the power winch and decades of years of practical experiences in manufacturing the power winch, not only operation state and related messages of the power winch must be clearly displayed on the display panel during actual use but also “torque value” of the power winch, during operation, is an important message that should be displayed real-time. The reason is that the purpose of the power winch is to bear heavy burdens. A “torque restriction mechanism” for overload protection is normally disposed inside the power winch so that when overloading occurs, during usage, on the power winch, the transmission mechanism disconnects power connection to protect the transmission mechanism (such as the motor or the deceleration mechanism) in the power winch so as to prevent malfunction and damage due to excessive overloads. At the same time, a “powerless brake mechanism” is disposed in the conventional power winch to immediately brake the transmission mechanism of the power winch when the power (Perhaps the operating person self-pushes down the stop key to cause stopping or it is stopped due to effect of the “torque restriction mechanism”) is instantly disconnected. Moreover, the heavy burden stays at the height to avoid occurring of inadvertent descending, resulting in danger. The “torque restriction mechanism” is a very important safety mechanism in the process of actually using the power winch. In the current practice, the power winch adopts existing “current overload protector” as the torque restriction mechanism. The foregoing principle is that when load torque is increased, current of the power source is also increased, and the torque value and the current value are a linear corresponding relationship. Therefore, setting a current setting value for the power winch is equivalent to the setting of torque setting value. When current of the power winch reaches the current setting value, torque also reaches a threshold. The power winch is controlled without overload by detecting current value. However, disposing the “torque restriction mechanism” inside the conventional power winch is merely a passive safety configuration, and normally, a factory provides a current setting value (corresponding to the torque setting value) based upon power magnitude of the power winch. Each type of the power winch has the same current setting value (corresponding to the torque setting value). Moreover, to ensure safety, the factory would enhance safety coefficient for the setting value. While actually operating the power winch, the “torque restriction mechanism” is triggered due to current reaching the current setting value to generate shut-down effect, and a current value (a torque value) can be actually used. However, since the power of the power winch has been stopped, the heavy burden can be only suspended in midair or stays at halfway place of towing the burden. The foregoing situation does not only cause more inconvenient for the operating person but also affects safety. Thus, immobilizing the current setting value of the conventional power winch may result in inconvenient use and should be overcome.
In view of the foregoing drawbacks of the prior art, the inventor or the present invention designed and developed a power winch capable of displaying a current setting value and a current actual value in accordance with the present invention to overcome the drawbacks of the prior art.
Therefore, it is a primary objective of the present invention to provide a power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device capable of displaying the current setting value and the current actual value and capable of regulating the current setting value, thereby increasing use safety and convenience.
To achieve the above mentioned objective, the present invention provides with a power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device, a side of the power winch disposed with a power source, power generated by the power source transmitted by an internal shaft core to drive a deceleration device, the deceleration device driving a cable pulley to rotate after experiencing deceleration effect so that a steel cable wound on the cable pulley performs motions of positive rotation discharging or counter rotation retracting: the power winch disposed with an electrical control set electrically connected to the power source to control on or off of the power source; a front surface of the power winch disposed with a display panel electrically connected to the electrical control set to display operation state and related messages of the power winch; characterized in that: items of the display panel comprises an overcurrent (overload) warning display zone setting an upper limit current setting value, which is in connection with use amperage of the power winch, displayed on the display panel and setting a current actual value, which is in connection with an actual amperage of the power winch, displayed on the display panel.
The above mentioned power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device, wherein an external surface of the electrical control set of the power winch is disposed with a first plug socket plugged by a plug head of a controller to perform operating of the power winch.
The above mentioned power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device, wherein an external surface of the electrical control set of the power winch is disposed with a second plug socket plugged by a plug head of a current regulator to regulate the current setting value.
The above mentioned power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device, wherein items displayed by the display panel further comprises: a power activation display zone displaying that the power winch is at useable state as power CLOSE through a light emitting signal; a vehicle power quantity display zone, at several blocks, displaying power quantity state of the vehicle mounted with the power winch by adopting light emitting signal, when power quantity is as low as a setting value, beep sound is generated at the same time to reinforce warning; a temperature warning display zone, when temperature of the power source reaches a setting value, displaying at a light emitting signal and beep sound to warn that operation of the power source must be stopped; a steel cable direction display zone adopting gradual jumping light-up through the light emitting signal to display traveling direction of the steel cable; and a wireless operating display zone displaying that the power winch has been transformed into wireless remote control mode through the light emitting signal.
The technical characteristics, contents, advantages and effects of the present invention will be apparent with the detailed description of a preferred embodiment accompanied with related drawings as follows.
With reference to
With reference
With reference to
The power winch 1 is disposed with a display panel 19 on a front surface of the electrical control set 17. The display panel 19 is electrically connected to the electrical control set 17 and receives control of the electrical control set 17 to display operation state and related messages of the power winch 1 on the display screen so that an operator can clearly handle situation. As shown in
In addition, items displayed by the display panel 19 further comprise an overcurrent (overload) warning display zone 196 setting an upper limit current setting value A in connection with used amperage of the power winch 1 and setting a current actual value B in connection with actual amperage of the power winch 1 and displaying the upper limit current setting value A and the current actual value B on the display panel 19 to allow a user to clearly handle that how much current (how much torque is used) can be applied in the power winch 1 and how much current has been used (how much torque has been used). The overcurrent (overload) warning display zone 196 is linked to a light emitting signal and beep sound. While normally using the power winch 1 without overloading, the displayed current actual value B should be lower than the current setting value A. The light emitting signal and the beep sound are stopped. When a towing load is overloaded, the current actual value B continuously rises during towing process. When the current actual value B reaches the current setting value A, the light emitting signal and the beep sound are delivered to warn shutting down instantly. When the current actual value B reaches the current setting value A, a “torque restriction mechanism” disposed inside the power winch 1 is activated to turn off power link after experiencing a short “delay time”. At the same time, the power source is turned off to stop machine. After waiting “downtime” for a while, power supply is restored, and a user decides to whether or not operation continues or handles the situation.
For example, a factory sets current setting value A as 350 amperage when one type of the power winch 1 goes out, sets delay time as three second and downtime as thirty second. Therefore, a position of the display panel 19 of the power winch 1 regarding current setting value A shows written words of “350 amperage” while a position of current actual value B on the display panel 19 simultaneously displays current actual value B of actually operating the power winch 1. While using the power winch 1, the operating person can know that the upper limit current setting value A of the power winch 1 is “350 amperage” from the position of the current setting value A on the display panel 19. While actually operating the power winch 1 to tow, the operating person can know current actual value B of the power winch 1 from the position of current actual value B on the display panel 19. If the current actual value B is always lower than “350 amperage”, the power winch 1 is not overload and can be used for towing. If the current actual value B, during operation, is really close to “350 amperage”, the power winch 1 almost reaches overload and must be carefully used. When the current actual value B rises to reach “350 amperage”, the light emitting signal and the beep sound linked to the overcurrent (overload) warning display zone 196 immediately issue warning. After experiencing three second (delay time), the “torque restriction mechanism” disposed inside the power winch 1 is activated to turn off power linkage, and the power is turned off to shut down. Power supply is restored after experiencing thirty second (downtime). However, this load is stopped, and the operating person can decide whether or not operation continues or handle situation.
The current setting value A is set by factories. To ensure safety, factories would enhance safety coefficient for the current setting value A. when the current actual value B reaches the current setting value A to trigger the “torque restriction mechanism” to generate downtime, a torque value can be used. Therefore, the current setting value A can be regulated by a current regulator 174. As shown in
It should be noted that the power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device disclosed by the invention is mainly that the display panel disposed at the power winch further comprises an overcurrent (overload) warning display zone setting an upper limit current setting value for used amperage of the power winch and setting a current actual value for actual amperage of the power winch at the same time and displaying the current setting value and the current actual value on the display panel. Simultaneously, the electrical control set of the power winch is further disposed with a second plug socket. The second plug socket and the electrical control set are connected to the circuit for setting the current setting value. A current regulator, when necessary, is plugged in the second plug socket, and the current setting value is regulated by the current regulator. With the power winch overcurrent (overload) safety device disclosed by the invention, the operating person can clearly know that whether or not towed load is close to overload. Moreover, in case of overload shutdown, it can be resolved by regulating the current setting value.
Accordingly, the power winch disclosed by the invention does not only have innovation and novelty but also clearly displays operation state and related messages of the power winch during operation to enhance practical effect of use safety and convenience for the whole power winch.
In summation of the description above, the present invention complies with the patent application requirements, and thus is duly filed for patent application. While the invention has been described by means of specific embodiments, numerous modifications and variations could be made thereto by those skilled in the art without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention set forth in the claims.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 106213648 | Sep 2017 | TW | national |
