Method of manufacturing hollow rack shaft
AssigneeNsk Ltd.
InventorsAkira Tsubouchi, Kiyoshi Okubo, Yasushi Watanabe
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A workpiece for a hollow rack shaft is a substantially rectangular plate. The opposite two sides of this workpiece are respectively provided with a complementary profile composed of the continuation of a convex portion and a concave portion and when the workpiece is cylindrically formed, the profiles are mutually engaged. As the width of a part the width of which is the largest in the convex portion is larger than that of a part the width of which is the smallest in the concave portion, the two sides are prevented from being detached after engagement. Further, the opposite convex portion and concave portion are mutually caulked and hereby, mutual gap is removed.
Claims15
A method of manufacturing a hollow rack shaft comprising:
- providing a substantially rectangular plate;
- forming complementary profiles composed of the continuation of a convex portion and a concave portion along opposing long sides of said plate so that a first portion of said plate is narrower than a second portion of said plate;
- forming said plate into a channel;
- forming a rack in said first portion;
- and
- forming said channel into a hollow shaft so that the complementary profiles on said long sides engage each other.
A method of manufacturing a hollow rack shaft comprising:
- providing a rectangular plate;
- forming a row of rack teeth in a part of said substantially rectangular plate;
- and
- cylindrically deforming said rectangular plate by bending it so that the parallel two sides are joined,
- wherein said rectangular plate comprises a first plate joined to a second plate and said rack teeth are formed in at least a portion of said first plate.
A method of manufacturing a hollow rack shaft, comprising:
- providing a plate with a first area having a narrower width than a second area;
- forming in said first area, a row of rack teeth;
- deforming said plate to form a hollow shaft having a semi-cylindrical cross section in said first area and a cylindrical cross section in said second area so that said second area has a diameter that is different from the diameter of the semi-cylindrical part in said first area.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.