Retractable leash with improved locking and unlocking mechanism

A retractable leash with improved locking and unlocking mechanism comprising

• a housing;
• a spool disposed inside the housing and rotatable in either an unwinding direction or a winding direction and is biased towards the winding direction;
• a braking means provided on the spool;
• a locking means rotatable between a locking position where a first portion of the locking means engages with the spool and cooperates with the braking means to stop rotation of the spool towards the unwinding direction and an unlocking position where the locking means is disengaged from the spool and the spool is rotatable towards either the unwinding direction or the winding direction;
• a biasing means which biases the locking means towards the unlocking position;
• a press button with an upper portion thereof exposing outside the housing and pivotable between a pressed position and a released position;
• an actuating means rotatably engaged with the press button and the locking means between a default position and an actuating position;
• a first actuating portion of the actuating means abuts against a bottom portion of the press button at the default position to maintain the press button at the released position;
• pressing of the press button from the released position to the pressed position rotates the actuating means from the default position to the actuating position where the locking means is pushed by a second actuating portion of the actuating means to overcome biasing force of the biasing means to rotate to the locking position;
• a sliding button having an upper portion exposing on the upper portion of the press button and a lower portion extending downwards through the press button into the housing;
• the lower portion of the sliding button is configured to slide along an L-shaped sliding track having a vertical portion and a horizontal portion in the housing between a first position where the lower portion of the sliding button is disengaged from the actuating means and a second position where the lower portion of the sliding button abuts against the first actuating portion of the actuating means to prevent rotation of the actuating means and thereby maintaining the actuating means at the actuating position.