Arm rest assembly for a motorcycle and methods therefor

An arm rest assembly for a motorcycle, comprising:

• a support including an elongated body sized to receive an arm of a passenger, and a shaft extending downwardly from the elongated body,
• a housing including a bore sized to receive the shaft,
• a first sleeve secured to the housing, the first sleeve having a first passageway extending along a longitudinal axis and sized to receive the elongated shaft,
• a second sleeve including a body that is pivotally coupled to the housing and a second passageway that is defined in the body and is sized to receive the elongated shaft,
• a locking mechanism operable to secure the second sleeve to the first sleeve to prevent relative movement between the first sleeve and the second sleeve,
• wherein the locking mechanism includes a plurality of grooves positioned circumferentially around the first passageway of the first sleeve and a plurality of pegs positioned circumferentially around the second passageway of the second sleeve, each peg being sized to be received in one of the plurality of grooves, and
• a biasing element positioned between the second sleeve and the housing to bias the second sleeve into engagement with the first sleeve such that the each peg is received in one of the plurality of grooves to prevent relative movement between the first sleeve and the second sleeve.

A method of operating an arm rest assembly, comprising:

• biasing a user-operated button positioned within a housing of the armrest assembly to first position in which the button is received in a first annular slot of a plurality of annular slots of a shaft extending through a bore in the housing to prevent vertical movement of the shaft relative to the housing and relative to a first sleeve secured to the housing and having a first passageway through which the shaft extends,
• advancing the user operated button to a second position in which the button is spaced apart from the first annular slot to permit vertical movement of the shaft relative to the housing and the first sleeve,
• expanding a biasing element to bias a second sleeve that is pivotally coupled to the housing and has a second passageway through which the shaft extends such that each of a peg of the second sleeve is received in a groove defined in the first sleeve to prevent relative movement between the first sleeve and the second sleeve, and
• contracting the biasing element to disengage the peg from the groove to allow relative movement between the first sleeve and the second sleeve, wherein shaft rotates with the second sleeve.