Patent Application
20100165798
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a watch winder, and more particularly to a watch winder which can reduce the manufacturing cost and satisfy the environmental protection requirements through reduction of the number of power supplies.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Watch is not only one of the important inventions in the history of human but one of the indispensable tools in the modern daily life. The existing watches include two types: the modern common quartz watches and the early mechanical watches. Due to the advantages such as high accuracy and low price, the quartz watches have become more common today. In addition, some mechanical watches in which the interior mechanical components can produce power are also cherished by many people. Such mechanical watches must be manually wound by rotation of a stem or can be automatically wound up through the motion of the user's arm, in order to keep mechanical watches running, so that if the mechanical watches are determined to be out of use for a long time, they must be stored in an automatic watch winder, which is provided for holding the mechanical watches and winding the mechanical watches automatically to make the mechanical watches keep running. As for watch collectors who own lots of watches or watch venders, they need purchasing lots of watch winders. Nevertheless, the conventional watch winders are all independent, or each provided with two assembling portions, so that the watch winders can be assembled together, but the power supplies on the watch winders are also independent, namely each watch winder has one power supply. Therefore, from the manufacturer angle, the manufacturing cost is relatively high, and from environmental angle, the conventional watch winders are not environmental-friendly, further from the consumer angle, the number of power supplies is large, thus not only increasing the purchase cost but possibly causing danger.
The present invention has arisen to mitigate and/or obviate the afore-described disadvantages.
The primary objective of the present invention is to provide a watch winder comprising plural watch winder units that can be assembled to one another and electrically connected, so that it is unnecessary to dispose one power supply on the respective watch winder units to supply the power to the respective watch winder units of the watch winder, thus reducing manufacturing cost and satisfying environmental protection requirements.
In order to achieve the above objectives, a watch winder in accordance with the present invention comprises plural watch winder units each including at least one first connector and at least one second connector. The first connectors and the second connectors are all made of electrically-conductive material, and the first connector of one of the winder units is assembled in the second connector of the other of the winder units to electrically connect the two winder units, so that the plural watch winder units can be assembled and electrically connected to one another. By such arrangements, the assembled watch winder units only need one power supply, thus not only reducing the manufacturing cost but satisfying the environmental protection requirements. In addition, the watch winder units can be assembled as desired.
The present invention will be clearer from the following description when viewed together with the accompanying drawings, which show, for purpose of illustrations only, the preferred embodiment in accordance with the present invention.
Referring to
A power supply 20 is assembled to one of the watch winder units 10 in such a manner that the power supply 20 can be pre-provided in one of the watch winder units 10, or it can be provided outside one of the watch winder units 10 or externally connected to one of the watch winder units 10, and the power supply 20 is electrically connected to the first and second connectors 11, 12 of the one of the power units 10, respectively. The power switches 13 control on/off of the respective watch winder units 10.
The first connectors 11 are assembled in the second connectors 12 to finish the assembly of the watch winder units 10, so that the watch winder units 10 can be stacked one upon another, as shown in
Referring to
A width of the respective watch winder units 10 is L, a distance between the two first connectors 11 which have the same outer diameter of the respective watch winder units 10 and the distance between the two second connectors 12 which have the same inner diameter of the respective watch winder units 10 are both L/2, and a distance from the first connectors 11 and the second connectors 12 to their respective neighboring side edges of the respective watch winder units 10 is L/4. The respective watch winder units 10 include a power switch 13, and the first connectors 11 are assembled in the second connectors 12 to assemble the watch winder units 10 in such a manner that the watch winder units 10 are electrically connected to one another.
The base 30 is provided with plural concave third connectors 31 for assembling with the raised first connectors 11. The power supply 20 is disposed inside the base 30 and electrically connected to the third connectors 31, or the power supply 20 can be disposed outside the base 30 or externally connected to the base 30. Alternatively, the third connectors 31 can be raised for assembling with the concave second connectors 12.
When the watch winder units 10 are assembled for use, the first connectors 11 of the watch winder units 10 will be assembled to the third connectors 31 of the base 30, so that the power supply 20 of the base 30 can supply power to the watch winder units 10. The plural third connectors 31 of the base 30 are used to install plural watch winder units 10 on the base 30, and then the watch winder units 10 can be assembled to other watch winder units 10. The watch winder units 10 which are assembled on the base are closely arranged, and the distance from the first connectors 11 and the second connectors 12 to the respective neighboring side edges of the respective watch winder units 10 is L/4, so that the distance between the two neighboring first connectors 11 or second connectors 12 of every two neighboring winder units 10 is L/2. With such arrangements, one watch winder unit 10 can be assembled on two winder units 10 in a straddling manner, so that the watch winder units 10 can be assembled as desired.
Additionally, the first connectors 11 and the second connectors 12 of the respective watch winder units 10 are not limited in number and position. As shown in
While we have shown and described various embodiments in accordance with the present invention, it is clear to those skilled in the art that further embodiments may be made without departing from the scope of the present invention.
