Patent Application
20250198162
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The disclosure relates to soffit mounting apparatuses and more particularly pertains to a new soffit mounting apparatus for mounting a soffit to a structure via holding the soffit in the cavity of a channel.
Various channels for mounting soffits to structures are known the prior art. However, such channels pose challenges to installation of the soffits because the channels do not open in a manner to facilitate insertion of the soffits into cavities formed by the channels. A soffit mounting channel which is provided in separate pieces that are joinable around the soffit is not disclosed by the prior art. Such an apparatus would facilitate insertion of a soffit into a cavity formed by the channel by enabling an installer to form the full channel around the soffit during installation rather than inserting the soffit into the already formed, narrow cavities of existing channels. A snap fastener designed to limit rotation of the channel components with respect to each other may be used to enable such a new soffit mounting channel.
An embodiment of the disclosure meets the needs presented above by generally comprising a base with a front edge and a rear edge. A support is mountable to the base such that the support is spaced away from a bottom side of the base at a distance configured to receive a soffit therebetween. A snap joint is coupled to the base and the support and is operable to mount the support to the base.
Another embodiment of the present disclosure includes a method of mounting a soffit to a structure. The method includes mounting a base of a soffit mounting apparatus to an underside of a horizontal member of the structure, positioning a soffit under the base, and mounting a support to the base via a snap joint to position the support under and act to support the soffit. A pair of soffit mounting apparatuses may be used to hold opposite ends of the soffit. Typically, one of the soffit mounting apparatuses is positioned adjacent to a vertical member of the structure, while another soffit mounting apparatus is positioned remotely from the vertical member.
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
A support 26 is mountable to the base 12 such that the support 26 is spaced away from the bottom side 20 of the base 12 at a distance configured to receive a soffit 60 between the base 12 and the support 26. The support 26 also has a planar shape and lies parallel to the base 12 when the support 26 is mounted to the base 12. A front end 28 of the support 26 forms a rolled hem 34. The front end 28 may form other types of hems or the like in other embodiments. The support 26 is also elongated between a pair of lateral sides 32 of the support 26.
A snap joint 36 is coupled to the base 12 and the support 26 and is operable to mount the support 26 to the base 12. The snap joint 36 comprises an insert 38 and a receiver 44. The insert 38 is coupled to the support 26 and the receiver 44 is coupled to the base 12. In other embodiments, however, the insert 38 may be coupled to the base 12 and the receiver 44 may be coupled to the support 26. The insert 38 has an elongated portion 40 coupled to and extending away from the support 26 adjacent to a rear end 30 thereof. The insert 38 also has a pair of outwardly protruding portions 42 coupled to the elongated portion 40. The outwardly protruding portions 42 are spaced from each other in a direction parallel to a longitudinal axis of the elongated portion 40. The receiver 44 has a pair of arms 46 which are coupled to and extend away from the base 12 adjacent to the rear edge 16. The arms 46 are spaced from each other to define a cavity 50 therebetween for receiving the insert 38.
Each arm 46 has a pair of inwardly protruding portions 48 which engage the outwardly protruding portions 42 of the insert 38 to retain the insert 38 in the cavity 50 of the receiver 44 when the insert 38 is inserted into the cavity 50. The insert 38 of some embodiments may have only one outwardly protruding portion 42 which engages a single inwardly protruding portion 48 of each arm 46 of the receiver 44. However, it is appreciated that the pair of outwardly protruding portions 42 act to prevent rotation of the support 26 with respect to the base 12 by nature of being spaced apart from each other. The insert 38 is integrally formed with the support 26, and the receiver 44 is integrally formed with the base 12.
In use, the base 12 is mounted via nails, threaded fasteners, or other means to an underside 56 of a horizontal member 54 of the structure 52 adjacent to a vertical member 58 of the structure 52. The soffit 60 is positioned below the base 12 adjacent to the receiver 44 of the snap joint 36. The insert 38 is inserted into the receiver 44 to mount the support 26 to the base 12 and below the soffit 60. In this manner, the soffit mounting apparatus 10 supports the soffit 60 under the horizontal member 54 of the structure 52 such that the soffit 60 extends away from the vertical member 58. The soffit mounting apparatus 10 support the soffit 60 at one of a pair of ends 62 of the soffit 60, and another end 62 of the pair of ends 62 of the soffit 60 will likely need to be supported as well, such as with a second soffit mounting apparatus 10.
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.
