US 9,302,697 B2Granted

Steering apparatus

AssigneeJtekt Corporation

InventorTatsuya Ohashi

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Abstract

A steering apparatus configured to inhibit a driver from feeling uncomfortable when an end bush impact occurs is provided. The steering apparatus includes a rack shaft that makes a linear motion in a rack housing in response to rotation of a steering shaft, and a ball joint fitted to an end portion of the rack shaft. The steering apparatus further includes an elastic body disposed between the rack housing and the ball joint, an end plate, and a projection of the rack housing. When the elastic body is compressively deformed due to collision of the ball joint with the elastic body, the end plate comes into contact with the projection to restrict compressive deformation of the elastic body by an amount exceeding a length. The length is set larger than a length of a compression deformation length with respect to an axial force due to a reverse input.

Claims10

Dependent claims

A steering apparatus comprising:

a steered shaft that changes an orientation of steered wheels by making a linear motion in a housing in response to rotation of a steering shaft;
an end member that is fitted to an end portion of the steered shaft, and that comes into contact with or moves away from the housing in response to movement of the steered shaft;
an elastic body disposed between the housing and the end member;
and
a restricting portion that restricts compressive deformation of the elastic body beyond a limit of a prescribed range, when the elastic body is compressively deformed in a direction of the linear motion of the steered shaft due to collision of the end member with the elastic body, wherein
the restricting portion restricts the compressive deformation beyond the limit of the prescribed range when a first input is applied to the steered shaft, and
the prescribed range is set larger than a range in which the elastic body is compressively deformed when a second input that is shorter in duration than the first input is applied to the steered shaft.

4 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.