Leg-powered treadmill
OwnerAurel A. Astileaninventor
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A motor-less leg-powered curved treadmill produced that allows people to walk, jog, run, and sprint without making any adjustments to the treadmill other than shifting the user's center of gravity forward and backwards. A closed loop treadmill belt is formed with a low friction running surface of transverse wooden, plastic or rubber slats attached to each other in a resilient fashion. Since an essential feature of treadmill is the concave shape of the running surface of belt in its respective upper portion, curved and linear arrays of bearings are used to insure that this shape is maintained during actual use. These bearings prevent the lower portion of the treadmill belt from drooping down (i.e.—it must be held taut), to prevent the top portion to be pulled taut into a flat shape between the front and rear pulley rollers.
Claims17
A motor-less, leg-powered curved treadmill comprising:
- a treadmill frame;
- a set of respective front and rear pulley end rollers for rotation, said front and rear pulleys supporting a closed loop treadmill belt;
- said closed loop treadmill belt comprising a plurality of parallel slats oriented perpendicular to an axis of rotation of said belt, said parallel slats attached to each other in a resilient fashion;
- said closed loop treadmill belt being of such a length as compared to the distance between the end rollers to permit it to assume a required concave upper contour;
- a means for slackening an upper concave portion while simultaneously keeping a lower portion of the belt taut, preventing said lower portion from drooping down during rotation and exertion of walking or running force upon said upper concave portion of said closed loop treadmill belt;
- wherein each said slat is made of a material with sufficient resiliency and strength and weight to lie on and conform to a concave row of upper support peripheral ball bearings located at each peripheral side of said upper portion of said motor-less, leg-powered curved treadmill.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.