Patent Application
20160356082
This invention concerns shades or “blinds” that include a plurality of parallel slats that can be tilted to open and allow light to be transmitted from one side to the other side of the blinds, or tilted to close and block the transmission of light from one side to the other side of the blinds. Typically these blinds are referred to as Venetian blinds and are used at windows and doors to control the passage of light there through.
The prior art Venetian blinds include a series of parallel slats that can be tilted to either open or close visual passage of light from one side to the other side of the blinds. Venetian blinds typically include an upper stationary support rail for mounting to the upper frame of a window and a lower movable support rail, with the slats suspended between the support rails, and pull cords that extend upwardly from the reach of the person operating the blinds to the upper rail then downwardly from the upper rail through openings in the parallel slats to the lower rail. When the person pulls the cords, the bottom rail moves upwardly and progressively collects the slats to lift them higher to raise the blinds.
While Venetian blinds have been known in the prior art for many decades, most of them have included the lifting cords described above, which is a concern in the industry because there have been several deaths or near deaths of children that have inadvertently become entangled in the lift cords and have been choked. Further, when the lift cords are pulled downwardly, a significant force is applied by the pull cords to the supporting upper rail and its components, which tends to pull the upper rail away from the supportive wall structure. This requires that the upper rail be very securely constructed and securely attached to the window frame and allows the person operating the Venetian blinds to apply significant downward force to lift the lower slats toward the top of the window frame.
Also, once the pull cord has been pulled to lift the lower rail and its adjacent slats, the operator must manipulate the pull cord while the pull cord holds the slats at the desired position and to engage a catch in the upper rail that prevents the pull cord from allowing the slats and lower rail to move uncontrollably down. But the higher the blinds are raised the more the pull cord is moved downwardly within the reach of children, increasing the hazard of access and injury to children.
Even with the blinds in this fully lowered position with the pull cords out of reach of children, the portion of the pull cords that extend through the slats can still be reached by children. This is known as an accessible inner cord.
“Cordless” Venetian blinds have been developed that have no outer cord but they do include inner cords that extend from the upper rail to the bottom rail so the inner cords are still available to children and pose a risk to child strangulation.
Other means have been developed that have attempted to solve the above described problems, but there still remains a need to have affordable cordless Venetian blinds to avoid the hazards, inconvenience and non-durability of the structure that comprises the blinds, and the need to provide cordless blinds and to reduce the amount of force that is required to raise the blinds.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide improved Venetian blinds that can be manually lifted for raising the blinds and manually moved downwardly to lower the blinds without the use of a pull cord or an inner cord, and with the effort for lifting and lowering the blinds being less than the weight of the blinds as they are accumulated or released.
And it is another object of this invention to provide Venetian blinds that include substantially rigid lift and guide tapes that act as a track to guide the slats and to collect the slats as the slats are lifted and lowered.
Further, there is a need for providing a reliable and easily applied “brake” in Venetian blinds that positively maintains the lower rail at a desired height.
Other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent upon reading the following specification, when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
Referring now in more detail to the drawings, in which like numerals indicate like parts throughout the several views,
The vertical support lines 16a and 16b of the ladder strings 16 extend upwardly into the upper stationary support rail about a rotatable drum 18 and the drum can be rotated as indicated by arrows 20 in
When a person rotates the control rod 21, the drum 18 also rotates and the ladder strings 16a and 16b move up on one side and down on the other side. The support legs 17 of the ladder strings that extend under each slat maintain the elongated parallel slats 14 oriented parallel to each other, thereby reorienting the angles of the elongated parallel slats 14. This is conventional in the art.
As best shown in
Lift and guide tapes 27 and 28 extend from the lower movable support rail 13 up through the support tape openings 22 in the slats 14, up to the upper rail 12 and into the upper rail and are attached to the upper rail by screws or other conventional connector means 30.
The tape collectors 32 and 33 are mounted in the lower rail 13 as shown in
As shown in
As shown in
When the tape locks 38 are moved away from engagement with the tape 27, the tape 27 is free to move into or out of the housing 34 of the tape collector and the coil spring urges the tape to enter the housing 34.
The Venetian blinds 10 will be mounted at a window with the upper stationary support rail 12 supported by a bracket or other suitable supportive structure at the desired height, installed in static relationship with respect to the supportive structure. The elongated parallel slats 14 are suspended by the pair of ladder strings 16 beneath the upper stationary support rail as shown in
When the assembly is being mounted to the window, the tape locks 38 of the tape collectors 32, 33 typically will be in engagement with the lift and guide tapes 27 and 28 so that the lower rail 13 is maintained up away from the usual lowered position. However, once the upper rail 12 is properly mounted at a window, the tape locks 38 may be opened by moving them away from engagement with the lift and guide tapes 27 and 28.
When the tape locks are opened, the lower rail 13 may be raised or lowered by a person using his or her hands to lift or lower the lower rail. In the meantime, the coil springs 35 are movable with respect to the lower rail and tend to retract the lift and guide tapes 27 and 28 into the lower rail. The pull by the springs in each tape collector 32, 33 against the lift and guide tapes tends to relieve the amount of weight that the person has to lift when raising or lowering and/or otherwise adjusting the height of the lower rail 13.
More specifically, the tape collectors 32, 33 operate independently of one another so that the person lifting or lowering the lower rail 13 by hand can tilt the lower rail to make sure that the lower rail is at the desired attitude. Further, the force applied by the coil springs 35 to the lift and guide tapes 27, 28 tends to pull the lift and guide tapes into the housing, as indicated at 36 in
When the lower rail is lifted by hand and the tape collectors 32 are unlocked, the lift and guide tapes 27 and 28 are drawn into the tape collectors 32, 33 by their springs 35 and the lower ones of the slats 14 adjacent the lower rail 13 tend to stack and accumulate on top of the lower rail. The tape collectors 32, 33 are configured for collecting or releasing the lower portions of the slat lift and guide tapes in response to raising and lowering the lower rail, respectively. The tape collectors tend to form the tapes 27 in a coil that wraps around the coil spring 35 in the tape collector. The upper ends of the retractable lift and guide tapes are immovably fastened to the upper rail 12. Once the lower rail is at the desired height and is level, the person handling the blinds will move the tape locks 38 as illustrated at 39 of
As shown in
The curved cross sections 41 of the extended portions of the lift and guide tapes 27 and 28 tend to provide rigidity to the tapes and maintain the tapes in their straight configuration. The curved shape of the cross section of the tapes 27 and 28 that pass through the oblong shaped support tape openings 22 of the slats 14 tends to cause the opposed edges of the lift and guide tapes to engage the facing edge of the support tape openings 22 of the slats and the central portion of the curved shape of the support tapes tends to engage the opposite side of the edge of the support tape openings 22. This tends to provide lateral support to the slats so that the slats tend to retain their aligned relationship.
Since the lift and guide tapes are mounted in the lower rail 13, the tape collectors 32 and their locks 38 usually are positioned at a height that is convenient to the person that is raising or lowering the lower rail and the adjacent slats 14.
Although preferred embodiments of the invention have been disclosed in detail herein, it will be obvious to those skilled in the art that variations and modifications of the disclosed embodiments can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as set forth in the following claims.
