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US 10,377,278 B2Granted
Occupant support
AssigneeFaurecia Automotive Seating, LLC
InventorsCedric Ketels, Tristan J. Vanfossen
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A vehicle seat includes a seat bottom and a seat back. The seat back is coupled to the seat bottom to move relative to the vehicle seat. The vehicle further includes a support mechanism coupled to the vehicle and configured to vary support provided to an occupant sitting on the vehicle seat.
Claims15
An occupant-support comprising
- a vehicle seat including a seat bottom and a seat back coupled to the seat bottom and arranged to extend upwardly away from the seat bottom to provide an occupant-support region, and
- a back support coupled to the seat back to move relative to the seat back between a first design position and a second contour position,
- wherein the back support includes a plurality of wires that define a contour of the back support and are movable to cause the back support to assume one of the first position and the second position and a temperature controller coupled to the plurality of wires and configured to cause the wires to change in length as temperature changes such that the back support is in the first design position when the wires are at a first temperature and the back support is in the second contour position when the wires are at a second temperature greater than the first temperature to change the back support between the first design position and the second different contour position.
A vehicle seat comprising
- a seat back coupled to a seat bottom defining an occupant-support region,
- a plurality of wires located in the seat back and operable to change the back support between a design position and a transformation position, and
- a heating and cooling mechanism that adjusts and maintains temperatures of the plurality of wires to drive the change between the design contour position and the transformation contour position, and
- a suspension mat coupled to the seat back frame to support an occupant, wherein the plurality of wires are formed in sets of forward and rearward connectors extending between a seat back frame and the suspension mat.
1 more element
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.