Slide operation apparatus
AssigneeYamaha Corporation
InventorKojiro Kato
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A slide operation apparatus capable of preventing damages to a movement guide for slidably supporting a movable member, without increasing the weight and length thereof. The movable member (70) is disposed for sliding motion relative to guide bars (78, 79). Usually, a protrusion (70a) of the movable member is apart from a bottom portion (11) of a casing (10) with a spacing, and engaging protrusions (76, 77) of the movable member is apart from a rail portion (18) of the casing with a spacing. When the movable member is displaced by being applied with a force in a direction different from a direction in which the guide bars extend, an excessive displacement of the movable member is restricted by the contact between the protrusion and the bottom plate portion or between the rail portion and the engaging protrusions.
Claims12
A slide operation apparatus comprising:
- a box;
- a movable member holding device having at least one elongated movement guide provided in said box in a longitudinal direction of the box and guide supporting portions that support opposite ends of the movement guide;
- a movable member disposed in said box and slidably held by the movement guide of said movable member holding device;
- a position detecting device that detects a position of said movable member along the movement guide of said movable member holding device in said box;
- an operation knob member having an operation knob and fixed to said movable member;
- and
- at least one stopper fixed to said box and disposed close to at least one predetermined portion of the movable member with a predetermined spacing when said operation knob is not operated,
- wherein when a force is applied to said operation knob in a direction different from a direction in which the movement guide extends, the predetermined portion of the movable member is displaced so as to be in contact with said stopper,
- when the predetermined portion of the movable member is in contact with said stopper, displacement of the predetermined portion is restricted, and
- when the force applied to said operation knob in the direction different from the direction in which the movement guide extends is released, a spacing between the predetermined portion and said stopper is restored to the predetermined spacing produced when said operation knob is not operated.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.