Note: Descriptions are shown in the official language in which they were submitted.
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INFI,ATABLE STRUCTURE FOR COVERING SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES, BOATS
AND THE LIKE
Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of inflatable structures including tents,
and in
particular to an inflatable structure useful as an event venue, portable
temporary shelter, or for
covering from the elements mid-to-large sized vehicles including sport utility
vehicles, boats, cars
and the like.
Back~rc)und of the Invention
Inflatable tents for use in camping are known in the prior art and are sold
commercially by for example Airzone Recreation Products of Kelowna, British
Columbia,
Canada. Such tents typically replicate camping tents available commercially
which rely on bent
fibreglass poles for their support structure and instead substitute inflatable
poles which, when bent,
provide the supporting framework for the exterior fabric skin or canopy of the
tent over which a
so-called fly sheet may be mounted. In the other extreme, large tents are
known in the prior art for
use such as by the military for providing field barracks, field hospitals and
various depot facilities,
such tents often being made of canvas and supported on tubular metal-pole
supporting structures.
Applicant believes that a commercial need exists for relatively large
pneumatically
inflatable tent-like structures which are larger than conventional
recreational camping tents and
smaller than military-style field tents. It is believed that such structures
will find commercial
acceptaince and use by the owners of large for example sport utility vehicles,
boats, trailers, and
other wl:ieeled vehicles or towables which ordinarily would require a large
garage or shed for their
safe storage and which are often not housed in, for example, conventional
residential homes as not
having extended garage facilities. Also applicant believes that commercial
acceptance and use of
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such larger pneumatically inflatable tent-like structures may include those in
the field of portable
corporate sponsorship pavilions for example for use in trade-shows, portable
pneumatically
inflatable recreational and professional sports shelters for sheltering
equipment, non-engaged
players, or sickly or wounded players on for example the side-lines of a
sports field.
What is required, and is an object of the present invention to provide, is a
relatively
larger pneumatically inflatable structure which may be readily transportable
in that, when
collapsed, the structure is not exceedingly heavy or overly bulky so the
structure may be
transported in for example the aforementioned sport utility vehicles, in mini-
vans, or in the beds of
pickup trucks and the like, and for example may be camed by two adult males to
a convenient
location for their use, and wherein the structure may be erected using for
example a high volume,
low pressure air compressor running for example from the twelve volt power
source of the vehicle
used to transport the collapsed structure.
In the prior art applicant is aware of the following issued patents
illustrating aspects
of the state of the art in pneumatically erectable structures including tents:
United States Patent No. 2591829 which issued April 1952 to Katzenmeyer et
al.;
United States Patent No. 2830606 which issued April 1958 to Daugherty; United
States Patent
No. 31 -45719 which issued August 1964 to Johnson; United States Patent No.
3899853 which
issued August 1975 to Wertman; United States Patent No. 3999333 which issued
December 1976
to Amarantos; United States Patent No. 4068418 which issued January 1978 to
Masse; United
States Patent No. 4197681 which issued April 1980 to Holcombe; United States
Patent No.
427164:2 which issued June 1981 to Karr; United States Patent No. 4709718
which issued
December 1987 to Nichols; United States Patent No. 4766918 which issued August
1988 to
Odekirk; United States Patent No. 4819389 which issued April 1989 to Kihn;
United States
Patent No. 4825892 which issued May 1989 to Norman; United States Patent No.
4876829 which
issued October 1989 to Mattick; United States Patent No. 4901481 which issued
February 1990 to
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Seeleyõ Jr.; United States Patent No. 4918877 which issued April 1990 to
Dutka; United States
Patent No. 5005322 which issued April 1991 to Mattick et al.; United States
Patent No. 5007212
which iissued April 1991 to Fritts et al.; United States Patent No. 5122400
which issued June 1992
to Steviart; United States Patent No. 5205086 which issued April 1993 to Heim;
United States
Patent No. 5247768 which issued September 1993 to Russo; United States Patent
No. 5421128
which issued June 1995 to Shapless et al.; United States Patent No. 5570544
which issued
November 1996 to Hale et al.; United States Patent No. 5636478 which issued
June 1997 to
Chen;lJnited States Patent No. 5987822 which issued November 1999 to McNiff et
al.; United
States Patent No. 6014982 which issued January 2000 to Strevey; and United
States Patent No.
6,263,617 which issued July 2001 to Turcot.
Summary of the Invention
In keeping with the above-stated object, and in keeping with the various other
objects of the present invention, in one aspect, the inflatable structure
according to the present
invention provides for not only efficiency in transportation and efficiency in
pneumatically
inflating of the supporting frame work, but also efficiency in manufacturing
in that the inflatable
structure according to the present invention may be modularly constructed as
better described
below.
In summary, the pneumatically inflatable structure according to the present
invention may be characterized in one aspect as including two adjacent pairs
of bowed and criss-
crossed pneumatic tubes mounted at their ends to a base wherein each of the
two pairs of tubes
form a frame defining a downwardly concave substantially domed enclosure, and
a further vault-
forming bowed pneumatic tube mounted to the base so as to be substantially
vertical and
sandwiched between adjacent ends of the two adjacent pairs of tubes. The two
adjacent pairs of
tubes and the vault-forming tube define an elongate open enclosure including
the substantially
domed enclosures and an inter-connected vaulted passage-way.
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In one embodiment, at least one end of the elongate open enclosure defines a
doorwary whereby an elongate wheeled vehicle or elongate towable wheeled
device may be driven
or otherwise translated into and parked along the interior of the open
enclosure.
A pair of substantially domed canopies are mountable or mounted to the two
adja.cenit pairs of tubes so as to substantially cover the pair of
substantially domed enclosures, and
a passageway canopy is mounted to the pair of substantially domed canopies so
as to substantially
cover the vaulted passageway. The combined canopy including the domed canopies
and
passageway canopy cover the elongate open enclosure.
A canopy doorway may be formed in the combined canopy to provide access into
the elongate open enclosure. A door may be mounted to the canopy adjacent the
doorway for
selectively releasably closing the doorway.
The base may be a substantially planar sheet, for example rigid for a more
permanent structure, or flexible for a more temporary and portable structure,
or may merely be
sections or segments, rigid or flexible, each individually affixed or
mountable to the ground to
secure the ends of the tubes by the hinged flaps 27. As illustrated, the sheet
is continuous so as to
cover substantially entirely all of a floor of the elongate open enclosure.
Brief Description of the Drawings
Figure 1 is, in a right hand front corner elevation view, the pneumatically
inflatable
structure according to one embodiment of the present invention with the canopy
removed and
housing a boat on a trailer.
Figure 2 is, in front-right perspective view, the inflatable structure of
Figure 1.
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Figure 3 is, in front-left perspective view, the inflatable structure of
Figure 1.
Figure 4 is the view of the inflatable structure of Figure 1 with the boat and
trailer
removed.
Figure 5 is the view of the inflatable structure of Figure 3 with the
structure shown
in dotted outline and a canopy mounted on the structure.
Figure 6 is the view of Figure 5 showing the canopy alone.
Detailed Description of Embodiments of the Invention
As seen in the accompanying Figures 1-4 wherein similar characters of
reference
denote corresponding parts in each view, the pneumatically inflatable
structure according to one
aspect of the present invention includes two adjacent pairs of bowed and criss-
crossed pneumatic
tubes 1:2 and 14 mounted to a base 16 so as to sandwich a vertically
upstanding bowed vault-
forming pneumatic tube 18 therebetween. In one embodiment of the invention,
pairs of tubes 12
and 14 are substantially identical and are mounted adjacent one another
separated only by the
diameter of the ends 18a and 18b of tube 18.
In particular, a pair of tubes 12 may include tubes 20 and 22 criss-crossed at
a
vertex 24. They are mounted at vertex 24 in fluid communication with one
another by a
cooperating hollow flexible conduit 26. The ends 20a and 22a of tubes 20 and
22 respectively are
mounted on a common side 16a of base 16 for example by the use of flexible
folded tabs 27
formed at the end of each of the tubes. The opposite ends of tubes 20 and 22,
namely ends 20b
and 22b respectively are mounted by tabs 27 to a common edge 16b of base 16
opposite to edge
16a. T'he opposite ends 18a and 18b of tube 18 are mounted adjacent ends 20a
and 22b
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respectively on a first side of tube 18, and are mounted adjacent ends 28a and
30b respectively on
the opposite immediately adjacent side of tube 18. Thus ends 28a and 30b of
tubes 28 and 30
respectively which form the criss-crossed pair of tubes of pair 14, are also
mounted to edges 16a
and 161) of base 16 respectively. The opposite ends of tubes 28 and 30 namely
ends 28b and 30a
are moiunted to the corners of base 16, on the corners adjacent end edge 16d.
Ends 22a and 20b
are mo unted on the corners of base 16 adjacent end edge 16c.
Each of the pairs of tubes 12 and 14 are bowed and criss-crossed so as to form
a
frame defining a downwardly concave substantially domed enclosure 32 and 34
respectively.
Vault-fbrming bowed pneumatic tube 18 is bowed so as to be also downwardly
concave defining
an opening underneath tube 18 which is at least as big in its lateral and
height dimensions as the
corresponding dimensions of domed enclosures 32 and 34. Thus taken in
combination the two
adjacent pairs of tubes 12 and 14 and the vault-forming tube 18 define an
elongate open enclosure
elongate along longitudinal axis A. That is, the elongate open enclosure
includes the two domed
enclosures 32 and 34 and an inter-connected vaulted passageway 36 extending
therebetween.
For an efficient and modular use of more conventional components such as the
tents taught in my United States Patent No. 6,263,617 and incorporated herein
by reference, in one
aspect of the present invention two such inflatable tents are used to form
pairs of tubes 12 and 14,
each being mounted on common base 16. Base 16 may be a rectangular flexible
sheet. Where
pairs of tubes 12 and 14 are employed modularly and each already has a floor
mounted to the ends
of the pairs of tubes, in a further embodiment of the present invention, a
separate spanning, joining
or linking section of base 16 is employed to join the adjacent sides of the
conventional tent floors
and so as to sandwich therebetween vault-forming tube 18 mounted with its ends
on the
connecting piece of base 16. As may be understood then, it is not necessary
that the inflatable
structure according to the present invention merely and only is limited to two
pairs of tubes 12 and
14 and a single vault-forming tube 18 as it will be understood that a further
elongated enclosure
may be constructed using three or more pairs of criss-crossed bowed inflatable
tubes similar to
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CA 02581476 2007-03-12
pairs 12 or 14, and wherein adjacent pairs of tubes each have bowed vault-
forming tubes such as
tube 18 interleaved therebetween.
In a preferred embodiment, each of the tubes of the criss-crossed pairs of
tubes 12
and 14 and vault-forming tube 18 is of a design such as taught in my United
States Patent No.
6,263,617 such that a resilient or at least flexible inner tube is mounted
within an outer flexible
relatively non-resilient sleeve, and wherein such a sleeve has a folded seam
along its interior
circumference folded over so that the sleeve and inner tube may be constructed
as a linear pole
which rnay then be bent to accommodate the required bowed shaped to form the
domed structures.
It has been found that such inflatable tubes for example having approximately
a five inch diameter
which is constant along the length of each tube may be inflated to
approximately ten pounds per
square inch (psi) and thereby provide sufficient rigidity for an inflatable
structure which may then
house vvheeled vehicles or towable trailers such as the trailer and boat
combination illustrated in
Figure 1 which is not intended to be limiting.
Thus in one embodiment, the height from base 16 to the vertex of vault-forming
pole 18 may be approximately eight feet and the distance between the opposite
ends of the pole are
approximately thirteen feet, vault-forming tube thus being approximately
twenty-four-twenty-six
feet long depending on the desired curvature and amount of bow.
The vault-forming pneumatic tube 18 in one embodiment not intended to be
limiting is approximately twenty-four feet long and has a substantially
constant circumference
along its length of approximately twenty-two inches. In that embodiment the
distance between
opposite ends 18a and 18b of vault-forming pneumatic tube 18 measured across
base 16, that is
from edge 16a to edge 16b, is approximately thirteen feet. Advantageously, the
elongate open
enclosure may be approximately twenty feet long using tubes 20, 22, 28 and 30
each having a
length of also approximately twenty-four feet and a circumference of
approximately twenty-two
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inches. In this embodiment of the structure the height of the elongate open
enclosure under the
vault-forming pneumatic tube may be approximately eight feet.
An array of interconnected tubes 3 8 stemming from a common manifold 40 maybe
used to simultaneously inflate all of the tubes, where for example separate
air lines 38 are mounted
in fluid communication with adjacent ends of tubes 18, 20 and 28, and a single
source (note
shown) of pressurized air is mounted to manifold 40.
As will be apparent to those skilled in the art in the light of the foregoing
disclosure, many alterations and modifications are possible in the practice of
this invention
without: departing from the spirit or scope thereof. Accordingly, the scope of
the invention is to be
construed in accordance with the substance defined by the following claims.
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