Back to results
US 8,540,222 B2Granted
Air spring for a heavy-duty vehicle with damping features
AssigneeHendrickson USA, L.L.C.
InventorsAndrew J. Westnedge, Michael J. Keeler
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An air spring for a heavy-duty vehicle axle/suspension system includes a bellows chamber operatively connected to a piston chamber. An opening is disposed between the bellows chamber and the piston chamber in order to allow fluid to communicate between the bellows chamber and the piston chamber. The cross-sectional area of the opening and the volumes of the bellows chamber and the piston chamber are tuned in order to optimize the damping characteristics of the air spring.
Claims15
An air spring comprising:
- a bellows chamber operatively connected to a piston chamber, at least one opening disposed between said bellows chamber and said piston chamber for fluid communication between the bellows chamber and the piston chamber, whereby a ratio of a cross-sectional area of said at least one opening in inches squared to a volume of said piston chamber in inches cubed to a volume of said bellows chamber in inches cubed, is from about 1:600:1200 to about 1:14100:23500, wherein said at least one opening includes a cross-sectional area of from about 0.039 in2 to about 0.13 in2.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.