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US 4,333,580 AGranted
Mechanism for locking two halves of an underground vault
AssigneeAssociated Plastics, Inc.
InventorRobert L. Sweigart, Jr.
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An underground vault formed of two housing sections, each section having an open end bordered by an outwardly projecting annular flange, the flanges being of like diameter to permit their mutual abutment when the two sections are placed together to form an enclosure, each flange having a plurality of circumferentially located, equally spaced hooks and slot configurations to lock the sections together when the sections are positioned so that alternating hooks and slots of one section are aligned with slots and hooks of the other section is disclosed.
Claims5
An underground vault comprising:
- a first housing having an open end;
- a second housing having an open end and an annular flange which projects outwardly from the exterior of said second housing;
- said first housing having a resiliently deformable hook depending from said open end;
- said flange having an opening extending therethrough, said opening being of a size sufficient to permit said hook to pass through it;
- said flange having a recess located proximal to said opening, and a camming surface, between said recess and said opening;
- said hook having means for engaging said recess, said engaging means, upon mutual rotation of said housings, traversing said camming surface to engage said recess and lock said housings together;
- and
- said camming surface resiliently deforming said hook in a plane parallel to the direction of motion of said hook as it traverses said camming surface.
5 more elements
An underground vault comprising:
- a first section having an open end which is bordered by an outwardly projecting annular flange;
- a second section having an open end which is bordered by an outwardly projecting annular flange;
- said first and second section flanges being sized and located to permit their mutual confrontation to form an enclosure;
- said first section flange having a projecting hook;
- said second section flange having an opening therethrough, a recess spaced from said opening and a camming surface located between said opening and said recess, said surface inclining upwardly in the direction of said recess;
- said hook comprising a bight, an axially offset segment projecting from said first section flange, and a circumferentially offset segment connecting said axially offset segment and said bight;
- said opening being sized to permit said hook to pass therethrough;
- said recess being spaced from said opening no further than said bight is circumferentially offset from said axial offset;
- said recess having a wall for abutting said bight after said bight is located within said recess to prevent said bight from disengaging from the recess;
- and
- said first and second sections being mutually rotatable to permit said bight, after having passed through said opening, to traverse said camming surface and be directed into said recess and abut said wall, said circumferential offset segment bridging said camming surface when said bight is in said recess.
8 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.