Arm powered treadmill
AssigneeTrue Fitness Technology, Inc.
InventorsFrank R. Trulaske, Daniel R. Moon
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A motorless treadmill for exercising the upper body and lower body of a user. Displacement of an upper-body exercise mechanism such as a pair of reciprocating arm members rotates a drive roller. The drive roller is coupled to an endless belt, and a transmission system links the drive roller to the upper body exercise mechanism such that arm movements are translated into belt rotation. In one embodiment, pulleys are used as the transmission system to transmit the energy from the movement of the arm members to the belt. A flywheel may be added to store energy to smooth the belt rotation.
Claims18
A treadmill for exercising the upper body and lower body of a user, comprising, a substantially stationary support frame, an endless belt longitudinally supported on the support frame, a pair of displaceable arm members disposed astride the endless belt, each of the arm members being displaceable forwardly and rearwardly relative to the frame by a reciprocating arm movement of the user, a drive roller coupled to the belt, and a transmission system linking the drive roller to the displaceable arm members such that displacement of the arm members drives the belt to rotate in one direction with respect to the support frame wherein the ratio of arm movement distance to belt movement distance is between 0.6 and 2.0.
A method of assisting the rotation of a treadmill belt, comprising the steps of:
- inclining the front end of the belt such that gravitational force on a user frictionally coupled to the belt urges the belt rearwardly;
- and
- transferring kinetic energy generated by arm movements of a user to rearward movement of the belt to assist the gravitationally induced rearward movement of the belt such that the rearward movement of the belt generated by the arm movements is substantially equivalent to the stride of the user.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.