Door device for furniture

In a furniture body that has a pair of opposite sides which are spaced apart laterally, a rear, and an open front at which there are a pair of laterally extending zones, each of which has one end adjacent to the other zone and an opposite end spaced laterally from said other zone, said furniture body having a pair of doors, one for each of said zones, which cooperate to close said front when each is in a closed position wherein it extends edgewise laterally across its zone and has a front surface substantially coplanar with a front surface of the other door, a device for guidingly controlling movement of each said door between its closed position and an open position wherein the door is superposed in front of the other door, said device comprising, for each door:

• A. stationary structure fixed on said furniture body near the front thereof and in said zone for the door, said stationary structure comprising
• (1) a pair of elongated fore-and-aft extending rail members, each having a front end and a rear end, one of said rail members being near said one end of said zone and the other being near said opposite end thereof,
• (2) a supporting rail having an upwardly facing elongated surface that extends laterally substantially the entire distance between said ends of said zone, and
• (3) a guide rail having a forwardly facing elongated surface which extends laterally substantially from said one end of said zone to a point which is spaced from said opposite end thereof and is adjacent to the front end of said other rail member;
• B. carrier structure movable for translating the door flatwise forward to a defined laterally extending door shifting path and rearward to its closed position, comprising
• (1) a pair of elongated carrier elements, one for each of said rail members, each substantially confined by its rail member to forward and rearward motion, and
• (2) a laterally elongated slider guide member having opposite end portions which are fixed to said carrier elements;
• C. means for guiding the door for motion edgewise along said door-shifting path between the zone for the door and its open position, said means comprising
• (1) a plurality of elongated laterally extending slider elements, each having a leading end adjacent to the zone for the other door and an opposite trailing end, said slider elements being confined by cooperation with one another and with said slider guide member to lengthwise sliding motion relative to the slider guide member whereby an outer one of said slider elements is carried between
• (a) a retracted position wherein said one slider element is wholly within said zone for the door and
• (b) an extended position wherein it is substantially wholly within the zone for the other door, and
• (2) means on said outer one of the slider elements for fixing the door thereto;
• D. a supporting roller on said outer one of the slider elements, near said leading end thereof, rotatable on a substantially fore-and-aft extending axis and positioned to be spaced a small distance above said surface on said supporting rail but to be engaged under the weight of the door against the supporting rail of the device for the other door when said outer one of the slider elements is in its extended position;
• E. an arm fixed to and projecting rearward from the trailing end portion of said outer one of the slider elements;
• and
• F. a guide roller on said arm, rotatable on a substantially vertical axis and arranged
• (1) to guidingly engage said other rail member during movement of the carrier structure and
• (2) to guidingly engage said forwardly facing surface on the guide rail during motion of said outer one of the slider elements between its retracted and extended positions, to confine the door to edgewise motion along said path.