The present disclosure relates generally to the field of mowers and more particularly to a battery-powered walk-behind mower with wide-angle illumination.
Maintaining a lawn is a responsibility shared by many homeowners, renters, landscapers, and others. Nevertheless, because of the common demands of life, many people struggle to find enough time to properly maintain a lawn, especially during daylight hours. Many walk-behind lawnmowers from the past are inadequately illuminated, resulting in unmaintained lawns that fall short of their natural potential because lawnmower operators are unable or unwilling to mow at night or during other low-light conditions. Past efforts at illuminating walk-behind mowers have failed to illuminate the area around the walk-behind lawnmower at a sufficiently wide angle, limiting the ability of the lawnmower operator to see the grass that has already been mowed and the grass yet to be mowed.
Accordingly, there is a need for improved techniques for illuminating the area surrounding walk-behind lawnmowers. A benefit of such illumination is that lawnmower operators will be able to see the grass surrounding the mower. This will enable efficient mowing by minimizing the leaving of unmowed strips of grass, as well as by minimizing the width of unnecessary overlaps between passes of the lawnmower. Therefore, the presently disclosed embodiments of a wide-angle illumination system save the lawnmower operator both time and money by saving fuel or power (for electric lawnmowers). A well-illuminated lawnmower is also safer to operate than a poorly illuminated lawnmower.
In addition, other desirable features and characteristics of the present disclosure will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and embodiments, taken in conjunction with the accompanying figures and the foregoing technical field and background.
The Background section of this document is provided to place embodiments of the present disclosure in technological and operational context and to assist those of skill in the art in understanding their scope and utility. Unless explicitly identified as such, no statement herein is admitted to be prior art merely by its inclusion in the Background section.
The following presents a simplified summary of the disclosure in order to provide a basic understanding to those of ordinary skill in the art. This summary is not an extensive overview of the disclosure and is not intended to identify key/critical elements of embodiments of the disclosure or to delineate the scope of the disclosure. The sole purpose of this summary is to present some concepts disclosed herein in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description that is presented later.
Briefly described, one aspect of the disclosure is a walk-behind mower with a mower deck, a plurality of wheels, a head, and a plurality of light sources. The wheels are rotatably coupled to the mower deck. The wheels move the walk-behind mower over a support surface in a forward direction and a rearward direction. The head is coupled to the mower deck. The head can store at least one battery pack. The light sources are coupled to at least one of the mower deck and the head. The light sources project light through a continuous illumination angle about the walk-behind mower. The illumination angle extends along an arc from the forward direction toward the rearward direction and is at least 90 degrees.
Another aspect of the disclosure is a walk-behind mower with a mower deck, a plurality of wheels, a handle, and a plurality of light sources. The wheels are rotatably coupled to the mower deck. The wheels include a pair of rear wheels that rotate about a rear axis. The handle is located rearward of the rear axis. The light sources are located forward of the rear axis. Each respective wheel has a corresponding light source nearer to the respective wheel than to any other wheel on the walk-behind mower.
Another aspect of the disclosure is a walk-behind mower with a mower deck, a plurality of wheels, and a plurality of light sources. The mower deck has at least one sidewall. The wheels are rotatably coupled to the mower deck. The light sources are coupled to the mower deck. At least one light source is coupled to at least one sidewall of the mower deck.
It is to be understood that the foregoing general description and the following detailed description of the embodiments or arrangements are exemplary and explanatory and are intended only to provide further explanation of the embodiments as claimed. Other aspects of the invention will become apparent by consideration of the detailed description and accompanying drawings.
Features and aspects of the disclosure will become apparent by consideration of the following detailed description and accompanying drawings. However, this disclosure should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein. Rather, these embodiments are provided so that this disclosure will be thorough and complete and will fully convey the scope of the disclosure to those skilled in the art. It will be readily apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art that the present disclosure may be practiced without limitation to any specific details set forth herein. Like numbers refer to like elements throughout.
Before any embodiments of the disclosure are explained in detail, it is to be understood that the disclosure is not limited in its application to the details of construction and the arrangement of components set forth in the following description or illustrated in the drawings. The disclosure is capable of other embodiments and of being practiced or of being carried out in various ways. Also, it is to be understood that the phraseology and terminology used herein is for the purpose of description and should not be regarded as limiting.
With reference to
The mower deck 102 supports one or more rotary cutting blades (not shown) that are rotatably coupled to an underside of the deck. The mower deck 102 also carries an electric motor (not shown) that drives the one or more rotary cutting blades. In the illustrated embodiment, the walk-behind mower 100 may be a self-propelled mower and the electric motor (or one or more additional electric motors) may power the wheels 106, 108. The mower deck 102 also acts as a frame in the illustrated embodiment.
The head 104 is coupled to the mower deck 102 and is disposed on an upper surface of the mower deck 102. The head 104 is configured to at least partially surround the motor. The head 104 may be further configured to carry one or more battery packs (such as the battery packs 607 of
The mower deck 102 is supported on the ground or support surface 128 by the plurality of wheels 106, 108. The plurality of wheels 106, 108 are rotatably coupled to the mower deck 102 for rolling on the ground. In the illustrated embodiment, the walk-behind mower 100 includes two front wheels 106 and two rear wheels 108. The front wheels 106 rotate about a front rotational axis 118 positioned proximate the front end of the mower deck 102. The rear wheels 108 rotate about a rear rotational axis 120 positioned proximate the rear end of the mower deck 102. The wheels 106, 108 allow the walk-behind mower 100 to move in a forward direction 122 when the user pushes against the control bar assembly 114 and to move in an opposite rearward direction 124 when the user pulls on the control bar assembly 114 or if the mower is self-propelled in either direction. As used herein, the terms “front” and “forward” are in a direction parallel to the direction from the rear wheels 108 to the front wheels 106, while the terms “rear” and “rearward” are in a direction parallel to the direction from the front wheels 106 to the rear wheels 108. The terms “right” and “left” are from the perspective of an operator standing behind the mower and facing in a forward direction.
The control bar assembly 114 is attached at the rear end of the mower deck 102 and extends rearwardly and upwardly therefrom. The control bar assembly 114 is held by a user as a handle and includes controls for controlling operation of the walk-behind mower 100, including, for example, a blade start button to engage the rotary cutting blades; a headlight button to operate light sources 110, 112 (described below); an operator presence bail to start and stop the mower; and one or more levers, triggers or paddles to cause the mower to move forward at different speeds.
The walk-behind mower 100 also includes a plurality of light sources 110, 112. In the illustrated embodiment, the walk-behind mower 100 includes a pair of front light sources 110 coupled to the head 104 and a pair of rear light sources 112 coupled to the mower deck 102. The light sources 110, 112 can be any appropriate light source, but the illustrated embodiment utilizes light-emitting diodes (LEDs). As shown best in
In some embodiments, the light sources 110, 112 may be coupled to the mower deck 102 or to the head 104. Further, one or more of the light sources 110, 112 may be configured to be incorporated into the mower deck 102 or the head 104. The light sources 110, 112 could be located at various places around the mower deck 102 or the head 104.
As shown in
With continued reference to
In the illustrated embodiment, the plurality of light sources 110, 112 illuminate a right-side continuous portion of the support surface 128 relative to the walk-behind mower 100 through a right-side illumination angle 130 about the walk-behind mower. More specifically, the right-side illumination angle 130 extends about the mower deck 102. The right-side illumination angle 130 is measured from the forward direction 122 toward the rearward direction 124. In the illustrated embodiment, the angle 130 is also measured about a vertical blade rotational axis 132 of a cutting blade (not shown), which is roughly aligned with the center of the head 104. Various embodiments of the walk-behind mower 100, depending on the shape of the light sources 110, 112, the angle of the light sources 110, 112, and other design factors, are capable of different right-side illumination angles 130. In one embodiment, the right-side illumination angle 130a is at least 90 degrees. In another embodiment, the right-side illumination angle 130b is at least 135 degrees. In yet another embodiment, the right-side illumination angle 130c is 180 degrees.
The illustrated embodiment further includes the plurality of light sources 110, 112 illuminating a left-side continuous portion of the support surface 128 relative to the walk-behind mower 100 through a left-side illumination angle 134 about the walk-behind mower. In the illustrated embodiment, the left-side illumination angle 134 is also measured from the forward direction 122 toward the rearward direction 124 and about the blade rotational axis 132. With a common axis about which the right-side illumination angle 130 and the left-side illumination angle 134 are measured, the two angles 130, 134 are continuous with each other to combine as a single continuous angle. If each of the right-side illumination angle 130a and the left-side illumination angle 134a is at least 90 degrees, then the single continuous angle is at least 180 degrees. If each of the right-side illumination angle 130b and the left-side illumination angle 134b is at least 135 degrees, then the single continuous angle is at least 270 degrees. If each of the right-side illumination angle 130c and the left-side illumination angle 134c is 180 degrees, then the single continuous angle is 360 degrees.
In other embodiments, however, the right-side illumination angle 130 and the left-side illumination angle 134 may not have a common axis and, therefore, may not cooperate to form a single continuous angle. In such embodiments, there may be a dark area immediately in front of the walk-behind mower 100. Further, it is noted herein that the right-side illumination angle 130 and the left-side illumination angle 134 need not be identical angular values.
Still other embodiments may provide one or more lights on other structures of the walk-behind mower, such as the control bar assembly. Such embodiments may be capable of more fully illuminating behind, for instance, the removable collection bag. In such embodiments, a light 500 (
While not illustrated in the prior embodiments, the walk-behind mower 600, as well as the prior embodiments, may be powered by a battery pack 607 as shown in
Still other non-illustrated embodiments are contemplated herein. For instance, a head and/or mower deck with a ring of spaced apart light sources could provide illumination of the support surface throughout the angles described above. Other embodiments may include a single continuous ring-shaped lens or light strip that appears as a halo having multiple light sources in the form of LEDs behind the single lens or continuous strip.
All of the light sources may be turned on or off with controls located on, for instance, the control bar assembly. Some or all of the lights may be dimmable. Some of the lights may remain illuminated while others may be toggled on or off depending on the need of the user or depending on ambient light conditions sensed by one or more optical sensors.
Various features of the disclosure are set forth in the following claims.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Prov. App. No. 63/074,554 filed Sep. 4, 2020, which is incorporated by reference in its entirety.
Number | Date | Country | |
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63074554 | Sep 2020 | US |