Vehicle door lock actuator

Abstract

Motorized actuator for vehicle door locks e.g. as part of a central locking system has a powered drive input element (20), a drive output element (24) movement of which locks and unlocks the lock, and a clutch element (34) operating to transmit drive to the output element but having a disengaged condition permitting independent (e.g. manual) actuation of the lock. A camming formation (28) of the input element has a formation (34) of the clutch element coacting therewith and the clutch element has another camming formation (36) engaging another coacting formation (38) of the output element. The formations are provided with acting faces (32,44,46) angles so that drive force applied from the input element through the clutch element to move the output element against reaction loading of the latter acts to urge the clutch and output elements into positive drive transmitting engagement but reaction foces translated from the output element with no drive force from the input element releases the clutch engagement by camming the latter formations out of drive transmitting engagement automatically to put the mechanism into the disengaged condition. Preferably powered movement of the input element with the mechanism in the latter condition further shifts the clutch element into a superlocked condition in which the output element is positively retained in that condition.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.