Motor vehicle
AssigneeFord Global Technologies, LLC
InventorsAlan Richard Condon, John K Harding, Torsten Gerhardt
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A motor vehicle (5) has a roof structure including a front roof member (6) and a rear member (4) which together form a cover for a passenger compartment (I) of the motor vehicle (5) when both of the roof members (4, 6) are in respective raised positions. When both of the roof members (4, 6) are lowered into stowed positions to form a convertible vehicle, a flap (7, 107) is deployed on each side of the motor vehicle (5) to bridge a gap between the stowed front roof member (6) and an upper edge of an outer rear panel (9).
Claims12
A motor vehicle comprising:
- front and rear roof members moveable between raised positions in which the front and rear roof members form in combination a cover for a combined passenger and luggage compartment of the motor vehicle and stowed positions in which the front roof member lies substantially horizontally across the rear of the motor vehicle,
- a drop down side window moveable between a raised position in which it is co-operable with at least the rear roof member when the rear roof member is in its raised position and a stowed position in which it is stowed in a cavity between a rear outer panel and a rear inner panel and
- moveable flaps located on each side of the motor vehicle to selectively bridge a longitudinally extending gap between the front roof member and an upper edge of the rear outer panel when the front roof member is in its stowed position, wherein each flap is moveable from a stowed position in which it is positioned substantially vertically in a storage compartment when the front roof member is in its raised position, to a deployed position in which the flap is positioned substantially horizontally so as to bridge the gap when the front roof member is in its stowed position, wherein the motor vehicle has front and rear rows of seats and a front wall of the luggage compartment is formed by the rear row of seats and wherein the rear roof member is stowed between the front and rear rows of seats.
A method for stowing a roof of a motor vehicle having:
- a moveable front roof member,
- a moveable rear roof member,
- a drop down side window located on each side of the motor vehicle each of which is moveable between a raised position in which it co-operates with at least the rear roof member when the rear roof member is in its raised position and a stowed position in which it is stowed in a storage compartment and
- a moveable flap located on each side of the motor vehicle to selectively bridge a longitudinally extending gap between the front roof member and an upper edge of a rear outer panel when the front roof member is in a stowed position, the method comprising sliding each flap upwards from a stowed position in which it is positioned substantially vertically in the storage compartment when the front and rear roof members are in their respective raised positions and then rotating each flap into a deployed position in which the flaps are positioned substantially horizontally so as to bridge the gap when the front and rear roof members are moved from their respective raised positions to their respective stowed positions.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.