Claims
- 1. A self-inflating pillow, for back support of a human user seated on a seating device, comprising:
- a main bag made from airtight material, configured and arranged to form a shape that is generally flat on a rear side of the main bag and generally convex on a front side thereof;
- a primary stuffing pad of compressible expanded open-cell material contained within said main bag, disposed internally against the rear side thereof and constituting a primary core layer;
- a non-airtight convex-lens-shaped auxiliary secondary bag, smaller than said main bag, disposed within said main bag and affixed to said primary stuffing pad in a central region thereof forward of said primary stuffing pad;
- a secondary stuffing pad of particulate material, contained within said secondary bag, constituting a secondary core layer that, while resilient, tends to conform to body shape; and
- an air valve, installed in a selected region of said main bag, made and arranged to enable the user to manually select either of two operating states: a closed state wherein the bag and the air valve form an airtight enclosure, and an open state wherein air can freely flow through the valve;
- whereby the user is enabled to vary the pillow in thickness within a range between a full natural expansion and a total compression of said primary stuffing pad and said secondary stuffing pad, as follows: (a) to decrease the thickness the valve is opened, pressure is applied externally so as to compress the pillow to a desired decreased thickness while exhausting a quantity of air from the pillow, then the valve is closed, thus retaining the desired thickness, and (b) to increase the thickness, the valve is opened, a quantity of air is allowed to enter the pillow, as the stuffing pads expand to the desired thickness, then the valve is closed, thus retaining the desired increased thickness.
- 2. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 1 further comprising:
- a pair of fastening straps made from elastic webbing and arranged to removably attach said pillow to a back rest portion of the seating device;
- attachment means for removably attaching a first end of each of said fastening straps to said pillow; and
- strap joining means for removably attaching a second end of each of said fastening straps to each other.
- 3. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 2 wherein:
- said attachment means for removably attaching a first end of said straps to said pillow comprises engagable loop fabric affixed to said pillow, including two appropriate attachment locations thereof, and engagable hook fabric affixed to each of said fastening straps in a region near the first end thereof; and
- said strap joining means comprises an area of engable hook fabric affixed to a first one of said attachment straps near the second end thereof, and an area of engagable loop fabric affixed to a second one of said attachment straps near the second end thereof;
- said removable straps, said engagable hook fabric and said engagable loop fabric being structured and arranged to fasten said pillow to a back region of the seating device.
- 4. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 3 further comprising an outer cover made from fabric material and having at least a major portion of one side made to expose a surface of engagable loop fabric.
- 5. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 4 wherein at least one of said pair of fastening straps is configured to have a short length of non-elastic webbing material at the second end thereof, so as to provide a finger grip region for attachment to and detachment from the other strap.
- 6. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 5 wherein said pair of fastening straps is configured to each have a tab of resilient material molded onto the non-elastic webbing material at the second end thereof, so as to provide a thickened finger grip region for attachment to and detachment from the other strap.
- 7. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 5 wherein said pair of fastening straps is configured to each have a short length of non-elastic webbing material and a molded resilient tab at the first end thereof, so as to facilitate attachment to and detachment from said pillow.
- 8. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 1 further comprising a thermal packet configured and arranged to attach removable to said pillow in a central region thereof.
- 9. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 4 further comprising;
- an area of engagable loop fabric affixed on a front side of said pillow in a central region thereof; and
- a thermal packet having a region of engagable hook material configured and arranged to provide mating removable attachment to said region of engagable loop fabric on the front side of said pillow.
- 10. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 4 wherein said primary stuffing pad is made from open cell polyurethane foam.
- 11. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 4 wherein said secondary stuffing pad is made from organic down material.
- 12. A self-inflating pillow, for back support of a human user seated on a seating device, comprising:
- a main bag made from airtight material, configured and arranged to form a shape that is generally flat on a rear side of the main bag and generally convex on a front side thereof;
- a primary stuffing pad of compressible expanded open-cell material contained within said main bag, disposed against the rear side thereof and constituting a primary core layer;
- a non-airtight convex-lens-shaped auxiliary bag, smaller than said main bag, disposed within said main bag and affixed to said primary stuffing pad in a central region thereof;
- a secondary stuffing pad of particulate material, contained within said auxiliary bag, constituting a secondary core layer that, while resilient, tends to conform to body shape;
- an outer cover made from fabric material made to expose an exterior surface of engagable loop fabric;
- a pair of fastening straps made from elastic webbing and made to have:
- at a first end thereof length of non-elastic webbing providing a surface region of engagable hook fabric material made arranged to removably engage the surface of engagable loop fabric of said cover of said pillow,
- at a second end of a first of said fastening straps, a region of non-elastic webbing providing a surface region of engagable hook fabric;
- at a second end of a second of said fastening straps, a region of non-elastic webbing providing a surface region of engagable loop fabric made and arranged to removably engage said region hook fabric of the first fastening strap, whereby said pillow can be removably fastened to a back region of said seating device; and
- an air valve, installed in a selected region of said main bag, made and arranged to enable the user to manually select either of two operating states: a closed state wherein the bag and the air valve form an airtight enclosure, and an open state wherein air can freely flow through the valve;
- whereby the user is enabled to vary the pillow in thickness within a range between a full natural expansion of the primary and secondary stuffing pads and a full compression thereof as follows: (a) to decrease the thickness the valve is opened, pressure is applied externally so as to compress the pillow to a desired decreased thickness while exhausting a quantity of air from the pillow, then the valve is closed, thus retaining the desired thickness, and (b) to increase the thickness, the valve is opened, a quantity of air is allowed to enter the pillow, as the stuffing pads expand to the desired thickness, then the valve is closed, thus retaining the desired increased thickness.
- 13. The self-inflating pillow as defined in claim 12 further comprising a thermal packet having a region of engagable hook material configured and arranged to provide mating removable attachment to engagable loop material on the front side of said pillow.
Parent Case Info
Benefit is claimed under 35 U.S.C, .sctn. 119(e) of pending provisional application #60/021,810 filed Jul. 16, 1996.
US Referenced Citations (11)