Chain link rack pretensioner
AssigneeAlliedSignal Inc.
InventorsNiels Dybro, Roseanna Zia, H. John Miller, III, Jason Raines
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An apparatus (20, 100) comprising: a driven gear (102) operatively linked to a spool of a retractor (20) to rotate the spool (24) in a direction of retraction to cause a seat belt (31) wound thereabout to retract; an arcuate tube (108) having a flat exit end (302) proximate the gear; a flexible chain (130), moveable within the tube, having a front end (134a) initially maintained out of engagement with the first gear and pushed into engagement with the first gear to cause same to rotate; a piston (600) for pushing the chain (130) into engagement with the gear thereby causing the gear to rotate and catching mechanism for retaining the chain after it has exited the exit end of the tube.
Claims17
An apparatus (20, 100) comprising:
- driven means (102) comprising a length of joined links (134) operatively linked to a spool of a retractor (20) to rotate the spool (24) in a direction of retraction to cause a seat belt (31) wound thereabout to retract to eliminate belt slack about an occupant;
- an arcuate tube (300);
- drive means (130), movable within the tube, having a front end (134a) initially maintained out of engagement with the driven means and pushed into engagement with the driven means to cause same to rotate;
- first means (120) for pushing the drive means into engagement with the driven means thereby causing the driven means to rotate;
- and
- catch means for retaining all of the drive means after it has exited the exit end of the tube.
An apparatus (20, 100) comprising:
- driven means (102) operatively linked to a spool of a retractor (20) to rotate the spool (24) in a direction of retraction to cause a seat belt (31) wound thereabout to retract to eliminate belt slack about an occupant;
- an arcuate passage (300);
- drive means (130), moveable within the passage, having a front end (134a) pushed into engagement with the driven means to cause the same to rotate;
- first means (120) for pushing the drive means into engagement with the driven means thereby causing the driven means to rotate;
- and
- wherein the driven means includes a gear wheel having two sprockets (400a,b), each sprocket having a plurality of gear teeth (104) which are engaged by and driven the drive means.
A pretensioner comprising:
- driven means having two parallel sprockets, operatively linked to a spool of a retractor to rotate the spool in a direction of belt retraction to cause a seat belt wound thereabout to retract;
- an arcuate chamber forming a guide passage having a flat exit end proximate the driven means;
- and
- a flexible drive means movable within the guide passage, having a front end initially maintained out of engagement with the sprockets of the driven means and pushed into engagement with the driven means to cause same to rotate;
- means for pushing the flexible drive means into engagement with the driven means thereby causing the driven means to rotate;
- catch means, formed as an integral part of a housing to retain at least a portion of the flexible drive means after the flexible drive means has been pushed out of the exit end of the guide passage.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.