Roller assembly apparatus and method of use
AssigneeKeys Fitness Products, Inc.
InventorGary Fox
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present invention relates in general to roller assembly apparatuses, and specifically to roller assembly apparatuses used in treadmills. An embodiment of the invention includes a roller apparatus, comprising: a shaft with raised surfaces on each end, a rotatable tube disposed around a portion of the shaft, and bearing assemblies. The bearing assemblies are disposed between the raised surfaces of the shaft and the rotatable tube such that the inner surfaces of the bearing assemblies contact the raised surfaces which allows the inner surfaces of the bearing assemblies to rotate on the raised surfaces, thus eliminating forces on the inner surfaces of the bearing assemblies.
Claims23
A roller apparatus, comprising:
- a shaft having at least one raised circumferential surface located proximate to an end of the shaft,
- a rotatable tube disposed around a portion of the shaft,
- a bearing assembly with an inner circumferential surface and an outer circumferential surface, wherein the bearing assembly is disposed between the raised surface and an interior surface of the rotatable tube such that the inner circumferential surface of the bearing assembly contacts the raised surface of the shaft.
A treadmill, comprising:
- an upright assembly,
- a frame deck coupled to the upright assembly,
- a conveyor belt supported by the frame deck, and
- at least one roller apparatus coupled to the frame deck and supporting the conveyor belt, the roller apparatus comprising:
- a shaft having at least one raised circumferential surface located proximate to an end of the shaft,
- a rotatable tube disposed around a portion of the shaft,
- a bearing assembly with an inner circumferential surface and an outer circumferential surface, wherein the bearing assembly is disposed between the raised surface and an interior surface of the rotatable tube such that the inner circumferential surface of the bearing assembly contacts the raised surface of the shaft.
A method of distributing loads in a roller assembly, the method comprising:
- applying a bending force onto a shaft which causes the shaft to rotate about an axis perpendicular to a longitudinal axis of the shaft,
- transferring the bending force to an inner surface of a bearing assembly through a contact surface which as a smaller thickness than the thickness of the bearing assembly such that the shaft can rotate with respect to the bearing assembly without applying additional forces on the bearing assembly.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.