Patent Grant
10684086
The present invention relates generally to firearms, and more particularly to firearm accessories for capturing spent ammunition.
Ammunition for most firearms has a conventional construction. Generally, firearm ammunition consists of a cartridge which includes components that are consumed and components that must be ejected from the firearm. Conventional cartridges include a jacket or casing, a bullet seated in the casing, propellant contained within the casing behind the bullet, and a primer which ignites the propellant.
The casing is a cylindrical shell with an open front end and a closed rear end. The bullet may have many arrangements, but is often spherical, hemi-spherical, or somewhat conical in shape. The base of the bullet is seated into the front end of the casing, and the casing is crimped or otherwise sealed thereabout, thereby forming an interior of the cartridge. The propellant is carried within this interior. The propellant is a highly incendiary and combustive material; when it is ignited, very hot combustion gases are quickly formed and expand outwardly, causing the casing to expand outward and causing the bullet to burst forward. The primer controls the ignition of the propellant; the primer may be a pressure- or impact-sensitive chemical upon which a firing pin acts.
When a firing pin impacts the primer, the propellant combusts, and the bullet is sent hurtling out of the casing within the barrel of the firearm. The bullet exits the muzzle toward a target. The propellant and the primer are consumed during combustion. The casing, however, is not consumed and not jettisoned from the firearm. Rather, the casing is left expanded within the firing chamber. It must be cleared before a fresh cartridge can be fired.
The casing cools, and as it does, it contracts slightly. Cycling of the firearm will eject the casing. In some firearms, this is done manually by retracting the bolt so that the casing pops out of the ejection port. In other firearms, ejection occurs automatically as a feature of the operating system. With either method, the casing is cleared from the firing chamber so that a new cartridge may be introduced and shot.
Casings are conventionally made from brass, and as such, the community often refers to ejected casings as “spent brass.” Spent brass can be a hazard. First, it can get quite hot. As it is ejected, spent brass may drop in place or it may be launched a few inches to feet away, and bystanders hit by hot spent brass can be burned. Second, in an increasingly environmentally-minded world, it is irresponsible to allow spent brass to remain on the ground. A shooter may have quite a bit of spent brass, perhaps several hundred rounds. Leaving hundreds of used casings on the ground is not only unlawful littering, but damages the environment. However, it can be burdensome to pick up casings from the ground after ejection, and it certainly is no way to end an enjoyable shooting trip. One wants to simply set up, shoot, and then leave.
Brass catchers were developed to tackle the problem of spent brass. Conventional brass catchers are mesh nets or bags that can be attached to the top or side of the firearm. As a casing is ejected from the firearm, it enters the bag and is collected. However, a major problem with such brass catchers is the frequency with which they have to be emptied, and the interruption in shooting caused by the emptying. A shooter cannot fire hundreds of rounds nearly continuously; after twenty or thirty rounds, he has to pause, remove the brass catcher from the firearm, and dump its contents into a receptacle. This interrupts the shooting experience. Again, the shooter would most like to simply set up, shoot, and leave. An improved brass catcher which allows the shooter to shoot without interruption is needed.
The trap uniquely allows the shooter to capture, collect, and dump spent casings without attending to the trap at all. In other words, the shooter need not do anything other than operate the firearm as he normally would to capture, collect, and dump spent casings.
A receptacle for collecting casings ejected from a firearm applied with a magazine includes a housing having an upper opening, a lower opening, and an interior defined within the housing between and in communication with the upper and lower openings. The upper opening is opened and can be mounted to be spaced apart from the ejection port of a firearm. A gate in the lower opening pivots between open and closed positions; the lower opening is closed when the magazine is received in the firearm and is opened when the magazine is removed from the firearm. A clip couples the receptacle to the firearm.
The above provides the reader with a very brief summary of some embodiments discussed below. Simplifications and omissions are made, and the summary is not intended to limit or define in any way the scope of the invention or key aspects thereof. Rather, this brief summary merely introduces the reader to some aspects of the invention in preparation for the detailed description that follows.
Referring to the drawings:
Reference now is made to the drawings, in which the same reference characters are used throughout the different figures to designate the same elements.
The trap 10 is mounted to the side of the firearm 11 and affixed with a strap 15 about the lower receiver 14. The firearm 11 carries a magazine 16 fitted to the lower receiver 14, just to the side of the trap 10. When so positioned, as shown in
Turning now to
Referring to
The front side 24 of the trap 10 is formed from a single front panel 40, shown in
Referring still primarily to
The finger recess 45 extends into the trap 10 at the inner and rear sides 22 and 25 and provides a space for the shooter's trigger finger to move off of and away from the trigger of the firearm 11, such as into a safety position.
The deflection panel 52 transitions into an L-shaped lower panel 53 which is forward of and also just below the finger recess 45. As such, the lower panel 53 defines the finger recess 45 as well. The finger recess 45 is parallel to the deflection panel 52 and the lower panel 53. The lower panel 53 is vertical. The lower panel has an angled lower edge, from which a short, angled, stub panel 54 extends. The stub panel 54 is vertical but has an angled top and bottom, such that it slopes rearward and downward from the front side 24 to the rear side 25. The stub panel 54 terminates above an opening 60 through the inner side 22.
The opening 60 is covered by a gate 61, which is hinged at the bottom of the stub panel 54. The opening 60 is defined by a horizontal bottom 62, vertical front and rear sides 63 and 64, and an angled top 65, all formed in the inner side 22 of the trap 10. The gate 61 is a generally flat, planar, rigid member having a top 70, bottom 71, and opposed front and rear edges 72 and 73. A cylindrical rod 74 is integrally and monolithically formed to the top 70 of the gate 61. The rod 74 projects just beyond the front and rear edges 72 and 73 of the gate 61, and is mounted for rotation in notches 75 formed in the front panel 40 and lower panel 43 at the front and rear sides 24 and 25, respectively. The notches 75 provide a plain bearing fit for the rod 74 and the rod 74 rotates therein, with the gate 61 pivoting in corresponding fashion below the rod 74. The gate 61 pivots between a first, closed position as shown in
The gate 61 includes opposed inside and outside faces 66 and 67. The inside face 66 is directed into the trap 10 while the outside face 67 is directed out of the trap 10. The inside face 66 is flat, but the outside face 67 is formed with a projection 68 rising outwardly from the outside face 67. The projection 68 includes a sloped lower face 76 and a contact face 77 just above it. The lower face 76 angles upwardly from the surface of the outside face 67 to the contact face 77, which is a small, flat face parallel to the outside face 67. The projection 68 rises off of the outside face 67 a distance so that the contact face 77 is roughly flush with the lower face 53, when the gate 61 is in the closed position thereof. The projection 68 is useful to maintain the proper position of the gate 61 depending on the operational condition of the trap 10, as will be explained.
The panels described above form the four sides of the trap 10. The trap 10 is a substantially enclosed receptacle, and within it is an interior 80 having an upper reservoir 81 and a lower reservoir 82. The interior 80 contains spent casings 91 ejected from the firearm 11. The interior 80 is in communication with the mouth 44 proximate the top 20 of the trap 10 and the opening 60 proximate the bottom of the trap 10, and only openings into the interior 80 are the mouth 44 and the opening 60. As such, spent casings 91 which are ejected into the trap 10 can only exit the trap 10 through two potential outlets: the mouth 44 at the top 20 and the opening 60 at the bottom 21.
When the trap 10 is mounted to the firearm 11 in the preferred position shown throughout the drawings, the mouth 44 is the top of the trap 10. Thus, unless the firearm 11 is turned upside down, which is unlikely, casings 91 collected in the interior 80 will not exit the interior 80 through the mouth 44. Casings will enter the trap 10 through the mouth 44, then drop down into the interior 80. Thus, the only potential outlet from the trap 10 for the casings 91 is through the opening 60 at the bottom 21 of the trap 21.
However, the gate 61 closes the opening 60, and the gate 61 is held in the closed position by the magazine 16. The contact face 77 of the projection 68 is in abutment with the magazine 16, and the gate 61 is thus prevented from swinging open to the opened position. So long as the magazine 16 is received in the firearm 11, the gate 61 cannot and will not swing to the opened position thereof. As such, the gate 61 occludes or closes the opening 60 and casings 91 cannot exit the interior 80. Only when the magazine 16 is removed can casings 91 exit the interior 80.
In operation, the shooter uses the trap 10 to collect spent casings 91. As the drawings show, the trap 10 is coupled to the firearm 11 with a strap 15 wrapped about the lower receiver 14. The trap 10 is removable, as the strap 15 can be disconnected, but in practice, the trap 10 does not need to be removed from the firearm 11, and indeed, the shooter typically prefers not to remove it from the firearm 11. The trap 10 uniquely allows the shooter to capture, collect, and dump spent casings 91 without attending to the trap 10 at all; the shooter only has to fire and reload. In other words, the shooter need not do anything other than operate the firearm 11 as he normally would to capture, collect, and dump spent casings 91.
When the trap 10 is properly mounted on the firearm 11, the mouth 44 is registered with and spaced slightly apart from the ejection port 12. The mouth 44 does extend over the deflector 17, such that the deflector projects into the mouth 44 slightly at the rear side 25 of the trap 10. The magazine 16 is applied to the firearm 11, and so cartridges 90 are available to be loaded into the firing chamber of the firearm 11. Each cartridge 90 is successively and automatically loaded into the firing chamber, the firearm 11 is fired, and the spent casing 91 is ejected through the ejection port 14. It travels directly into the mouth 44. The spent casing 91 ricochets off either or both of the top panel 30 and the deflection panel 31. Either way, the casing 91 is directed downward into the lower reservoir 82. The upper reservoir 81 is one large portion of the interior 80, and the lower reservoir 82 is another. The upper and lower reservoirs 81 and 82 are separated generally by an area shown by the broken line A in
The upper reservoir 81 is useful for holding a volume of air. Because the mouth 44 is not closed and is permanently open or opened, the upper reservoir 82 exchanges ambient air with the environment. Further, because the mouth 44 is spaced apart from the firearm 11, the upper reservoir 82 exchanges ambient air with the environment. As such, casings 91 that are ejected into the interior 80 cool as they move through the mouth 44, through the upper reservoir 81, and into the lower reservoir 82. Once collected in the lower reservoir 82, the heat from them rises to the upper reservoir 81 and then exits through the mouth 44. In this way, the collected casings 91 cool down.
The shooter fires the firearm 11 until the magazine of cartridges 90 is depleted. Each spent casing 91 is captured by the trap 10 and collected in the lower reservoir 82 where it is maintained until the shooter has depleted the magazine 16. When the magazine 16 has been depleted and all the casings 91 have been ejected, the magazine 16 is removed.
The shooter releases the magazine 16 and then draws it outward from the lower receiver 14 along the line B in
The casings 91 empty from the trap 10 in response to the magazine 16 being removed. The weight of the casings 91 collected in the lower reservoir 82 will cause the gate 61 to open. Because the base panel 35 is oriented transversely with respect to the line Z, extending obliquely downward and inward away from the lower panel 34, toward the inner side 22, the casings 91 which are collected in the lower reservoir 82 are urged by gravity downward and toward the opening 60. Should a very high-capacity magazine 16 have been used and the spent casings 91 have collected to above the line A into the upper reservoir 81, then the transversely-oriented constriction panel 33 urges casings 91 downward and inward from the upper panel 32, toward the inner side 22, and thus ultimately toward the opening 60. To assist in the emptying of the trap 10, the shooter may tilt the firearm 11 slightly to the right along the line C as shown in
Once the magazine 16 has been removed, and the trap 10 is empty, a fresh magazine 16 can be applied to the firearm 11. A new magazine is applied to the firearm 11 by registering the top of the magazine with a magazine slot in the lower receiver 82. The magazine is then directed upward into the slot. As the shooter moves the magazine upward, the outer wall of the magazine contacts the sloped lower face 76 of the projection 68. Because the projection 68 projects outwardly from the outside face 67 of the gate 61, and because the magazine is inserted in a defined manner vertically upward and cannot deviate laterally, the magazine causes the gate 61 to move. As the fresh magazine moves upward, it slides up the sloped lower face 76, urging the gate 61 back to closed position thereof. Once the magazine is fully installed in the lower receiver 14, the magazine is against the contact face 77, and the gate 61 is fully pivoted back to the closed position. The opening 60 is thus closed and any casings 91 caught by the trap 10 will be collected therein. As such, the firearm 11 and the trap 10 are ready for use.
The foregoing description shows that no new or additional action is necessary to collect and then dump spent casings 91. The shooter performs all the actions he conventionally does when firing the firearm 11: he aims and fires until the magazine 16 runs empty, then reloads with a fresh magazine. Merely removing the magazine 16 from the firearm 11 allows the casings 91 to empty automatically from the trap 10. Then, the shooter inserts a new magazine with new cartridges. Doing so moves the gate 61 back to the closed position so that the trap 10 is reset and ready to again collect casings 91.
Turning now to
The back 113 is a thin, elongate, curved portion of the clip 110. It has opposed first and second ends 120 and 121. The back 113 has a middle 122 between the first and second ends 120 and 121. The middle 122 projects forward slightly from the first and second ends 120 and 121, because the back 113 is curved. Indeed, as shown in
The first and second arms 111 and 112 are formed integrally and monolithically to the back 113 at the first and second ends 120 and 121, respectively. The first and second arms 111 and 112 are mirror opposites, and as such, the ensuing description and corresponding drawings will refer to both the first and second arms 111 and 112 as is convenient, will use the same reference characters for the same structural elements and features, but will identify those elements and features of the second arm 112 with a prime symbol (“′”) to distinguish them from those of the first arm 111. Nevertheless, the reader should understand that the description below applies equally to both the first and second arms 111 and 112.
The first arm 111 is a thin, elongate projection, including an upper arm 130, a lower arm 131, and a hook 132. The upper arm 130 is formed integrally to the first end 120 of the back 113, and extends forwardly slightly transverse thereto. In the arrangement shown in
The lower arm 131 terminates at the hook 132. The hook 132 includes an endwall 134 and a finger 135. The endwall 134 is an extension of the lower arm 131 and projects directly into the receiving space 118. The finger 135 extends from the endwall 134 but is directed back toward the back 113 of the clip 110. The finger 135 is a short projection from the endwall 134. The hook 132 itself is thus directed toward the back 113 of the clip 110, in opposition to the back 113.
The clip 110 is constructed from a single body made of a material or combination of materials having spring characteristics such as resiliency, elasticity, shape memory, and durability. This allows the clip 110 to be stressed and return to a neutral condition, and when stressed, to impart a bias on the first and second arms 111 and 112 and the back 113 to return to a neutral condition. The convex shape of the back 113 and the concave shapes of the first and second arms 111 and 112 compound this spring characteristic.
Turning now to
The broken-line drawing of
Initially, before coupling the clip 110 to the trap 10, the clip 110 is in the neutral condition. The back 113 is in its neutral position with its convex, curvilinear shape, and the first and second arms 111 and 112 are each in their neutral portions with their concave, rectilinear shapes. The hooks 132 and 132′ do not yet extend over the lower panel 34 of the trap 10. Then, the user pushes the first and second ends 120 and 121 toward the trap 10. This moves the clip 110 into the stressed condition: the first and second arms 111 and 112 straighten and elongate, the back 113 flattens against the lower receiver 14, and the hooks 132 and 132′ slip over the side edges of the lower panel 34 of the trap 10. The side edges are slightly raised, and the hooks 132 and 132′ move just inside of these. As such, the hooks 132 and 132′ become latched onto the lower panel 34 and will not inadvertently come loose. In this manner, the clip 110 becomes secured in the stressed condition thereof.
The flattened back 113 of the clip 110 is biased to return to its neutral position with its convex curvilinear shape, and as such effects a pulling force on the hooks 132 and 132′ toward the back 113. This pulls the trap 10 toward or into the firearm 11 and thus secures it thereon. In this way, the clip 110 securely holds the trap 10 on the firearm 11. To remove the trap 10, the user merely grasps either of the hooks 132 or 132′ and pulls them free from the raised side edges of the lower panel 134, thereby pulling either of the first and second arms 111 and 112 free and withdrawing the clip 110 from the trap 10. The trap 10 will then be loose of the firearm 11.
A preferred embodiment is fully and clearly described above so as to enable one having skill in the art to understand, make, and use the same. Those skilled in the art will recognize that modifications may be made to the description above without departing from the spirit of the invention, and that some embodiments include only those elements and features described, or a subset thereof. To the extent that such modifications do not depart from the spirit of the invention, they are intended to be included within the scope thereof.
This application is a continuation-in-part of and claims the benefit of prior U.S. patent application Ser. No. 15/917,595, filed Mar. 10, 2018, which is a continuation of and claims the benefit of prior U.S. patent application Ser. No. 15/654,189, filed Jul. 19, 2017, all of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| D30403 | Sherwood | Mar 1899 | S |
| 1152492 | Deming | Sep 1915 | A |
| 1806601 | Alexander | May 1931 | A |
| 2266266 | Ritter | Dec 1941 | A |
| 2467604 | Tinnerman | Apr 1949 | A |
| 2795834 | Szoke | Jun 1957 | A |
| 4169642 | Mouissie | Oct 1979 | A |
| 5371652 | Clemens | Dec 1994 | A |
| 5521439 | Casati | May 1996 | A |
| 5734556 | Saneinejad | Mar 1998 | A |
| 5806147 | Sato | Sep 1998 | A |
| D457931 | Kalat | May 2002 | S |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20190154371 A1 | May 2019 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 15654189 | Jul 2017 | US |
| Child | 15917595 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 15917595 | Mar 2018 | US |
| Child | 16250537 | US |
