Longitudinal leaf spring device having bump stop unit
AssigneeFord Global Technologies, LLC
InventorFriedrich Peter Wolf-Monheim
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A longitudinal leaf spring device for the suspension of a body of a motor vehicle has a leaf spring unit in an elongated form, a coupling device for the mechanical coupling of the leaf spring unit to a motor vehicle axle and at least one bump stop unit having two separate elastic stop elements which can be connected, in a manner arranged vertically above one another, to a chassis or to the axle. According to the invention, perpendicular directions to a downwardly directed mean contact area of the upper stop element and to an upwardly directed mean contact area of the lower stop element each form an angle other than zero with the vertical.
Claims18
A longitudinal leaf spring device for a suspension of a body of a motor vehicle, comprising:
- a leaf spring unit in an elongated form;
- a coupling device to mechanically couple the leaf spring unit to an axle of a motor vehicle;
- and
- at least one bump stop unit having upper and lower elastic stop elements for connection, in a manner arranged vertically above one another, to a chassis or to the axle, wherein perpendicular directions to a downwardly directed mean contact area of the upper stop element and to an upwardly directed mean contact area of the lower stop element each form an angle other than zero with a vertical axis, wherein the bump stop unit is arranged inwardly spaced from the coupling device, at least in a lateral direction.
A bump stop assembly comprising:
- an upper elastic element to connect to a chassis, and having a downwardly directed mean contact area;
- and
- a lower elastic element to connect to an axle, and having an upwardly directed mean contact area;
- wherein a perpendicular direction to each of the downwardly and upwardly directed mean contact areas forms an acute angle with a vertical axis such that mutual contact therebetween results in a lateral force component;
- and
- wherein the downwardly directed mean contact area is laterally offset from and overlaps the upwardly directed mean contact area only partially in a vertical direction.
A bump stop assembly comprising:
- an upper elastic element to connect to a chassis, and having a downwardly directed mean contact area;
- and
- a lower elastic element to connect to an axle, and having an upwardly directed mean contact area;
- wherein a perpendicular direction to each of the downwardly and upwardly directed mean contact areas forms an acute angle with a vertical axis such that mutual contact therebetween results in a lateral force component;
- wherein the upper stop element comprises an oblique truncated cone;
- and
- wherein the lower stop element comprises a diagonally cut circular cylinder.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.