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US 4,971,356 AGranted
Puzzle weight for ballast in motor vehicles
OwnerGary D. Cookinventor
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
This invention is puzzle shaped units that preferably are filled with concrete or sand and interlocked in such a way as to form one ballast unit that will lay flat on the floor of a vehicle's normal cargo carrying area. These puzzle shaped units can be arranged in many ways to best fit the cargo space and ballast weight requirements of any vehicle. They are made in such a way and of such a weight that they are easy to take in and out as the need arises.
Claims4
Ballast used in combination with a pickup truck having a horizontal open, load carrying bed, said ballast including:
- (a) plurality of jigsaw puzzle shaped weighted pieces, each said piece having an outer casing of polymeric material and which casing has a generally flat bottom and is filled with a weighty material, and each said piece having a generally dovetail shaped tenon in one side and a complementary shaped mortise in another side of said piece, and said tenon of each said piece adapted to make locking engagement with a mortise of an adjoining one of said pieces, and said pieces adapted to lay flat on said load carrying bed and to be joined together to form a closed array of a plurality of interlocking pieces wherein the tenon of each of said pieces engages a mortise of an adjoining one of said pieces so as to hold said interlocking pieces against relative lateral movement.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.