CA1237895A - Toy construction - Google Patents

Abstract

TITLE: CONSTRUCTION TOY

ABSTRACT

A construction toy utilizes a plurality of tubular elements which are connectable to each other or are connectable to one or more hollow members. Each of the tubular elements has a first skirt on one end and a second skirt on its opposite end which are of the same size and are utilized to attach the elements to the hollow members. Further, attaching to one of the skirts on one of the ends is a smaller skirt which allows the smaller skirt to be attached to one of the skirts on a further of the tubular elements so as to connect two tubular elements together. The tubular elements have a plurality of convolutions which allow them to be expanded or contracted so as to lengthen or foreshorten the tubu-lar elements as well as allowing the tubular elements to bend during the construction of structures with the com-ponents of the invention.

Description

~,{J ~' lZ37~39~

TI~LE: CONSTRUCTION TOY

BACRGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Thi~ inve~tion i6 directed to a construction toy which utilizes hollow tubular element~ which are attach-able to hollow members. The tubular elements have ~kirts on their ends which are connectable to one another or are connectable to the hollow members.

A variety of construction toys have fascinated end-less numbers of children throughout the years. One of the more popular construction toys utilized wooden blocks o havin~ hole9 therein which were connected to wooden dowel~ by insertion of the dowels in the holes. Thi~
type of toy, while very utilitarian and havin~ an ex-ceedingly high play value, also had an inherent safety problem because it reguired the child to play with dowels of approximately quarter inch diameter, which unfortun-ately, could be stuck into eyes, ears and the like, cauing physical harm.

Another very popular construction type toy utilized small metal girder-like members which were connected 20 together using bolts and nuts. While this toy was very entertaining for the older child, because it required certain physical dexterity to connect the gieder~ utili-zing the bolts and nuts, the toy wa~ not ~ultable for the smaller child who lacked the phy51cal dexterlty to make the proper attachment. This type of toy al~o had a safety disadvantage in that small children have an in herent desire to put small objects in their ~outh, which could be swallowed or the like.

Other construction toys have included building 30 blocks and the like whlch could be made into houses and other structures for the older style ~ooden blocks, and ~37895 in all kinds of ~ophi~ticated structures for the modern Lego TM blocks. In playing with these block~ howevert the child i~ limited with reqard to the ~patial conforma-tions of the structures built because the block~ are inflexible and must inevitably be attached one to the other to con~truct the structure.

Wi~h the exception of the construction toy noted which utilized metal girders, the materials of the prior known construction toys were essentially inflexible, and o a~ such, the child could not utilize his imaginat~on to make all ~orts of weird shapes and the like which are extremely fascinating to the child, and thus provide him with hours of entertainment. While the above noted met-allic girders could be bent, thi~ in fact was detrimental to the parts of this type of toy in that upon repeated flexing at a bend, the metal girder~ conceivably could snap. Furthermore, once the girder was bent, it was seemingly impossible for the child to straighten $t out to itB prior shape, and thus any bending of the girders 20 was detrimental to the toy.

~ecently, certain figure toys have been introduced whicb utllize corrugated plastic tubing which can be bent to assume different 6hape6. ThiC same type of plastic !~
tubing has found its way into other structure~, such as drinking ~traw~ and the like. Unfortun~tely, in the~e toys, the deslgn and engineering of the the flexible tubing wa8 such that there wa~ llttle ~lexibility with t regard to attachment of the flexible tubing to other components and the child as such was somewhat limited 30 with regard to the structures he could make, these essen-tially mimicking predetermined structures provided for by the manufacturer.

In vlew of the above, it is considered that there eYit~ a need for new and improved construction toys ,. i~

~J ~) ~3t78~S f 1, which are both safe to u~e by young and old children alike, yet are also fa~cinating and entertaining to young and old children. Further, it is considered that there exists a need for new and improved construction toys which can be provided with a variety of interchangeable parts that allow the child to be very creative with regard to the type~ of ~tructures which the child can assemble, and further it is considered that there exists a need for new and improved construction toys which o utilize specific elements therein which verge into areas not previously incorporated into prior construction toys, such as musical enjoyment and the like.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

In view of the above, it is a broad ob~ect of this invention to provide for a new and improved construction toy. It is a ~urther object of this invention to include in the6e new and improved construction toys a first type of element and a second type of element with the first type of element~being a tubular element capable of being 20 joined to the ~econd type of element or to another tubu-lar element, and the second type of element capable of forming a plurality of different structures used in con-junction with the first type of element. It is a further ob~ect of thls invention to provide new and lmproved constructlon toys, which becau~e of thelr dQsign and englneering principles, Are economical to m~n~facture and tbus are avallable to a wide ~egment of the consuming public yet are safe in their use such that they can be used by small children without ~upervi~ion.

These and other ob~ect~, as will become evldent from the remainder of this specification are achieved ln a toy which compri~es at least one one piece in~ergally formed tubular element and at lea~t one hollow member~ said tubular element formed of a plastic material and having ~23~8~5 fir~t and ~econd ends connected by an element bodyS s~id tubular element body including a plurality of connected corrugations. said corrugations formed by alternating fir~t and ~econd truncated conical walls joined together base to base about circumferentially extending convex .-hinges and apex to apex abou~ circumferentially extending concave hin~es, said first conical walls shorter than L
said second conlcal walls such that they are nestable within said second conical walls; said first end of 6aid o tubular element including an axially estending $ir~t 6kirt having an outside surface of a first fixed diameter ~ , and an inside surface of a second flxed smaller diameter and including locking means on both said first skirt outside surface and said inside surface; said second end L~
of said tubular element including an axially extending second skirt, a shoulder and an axially extending third skirt, said second skirt interspaced between said tubular t element body and said third skirt and said shoulder interspaced between said second skirt and said third 20 skirt, said second ~kirt having an outside ~urface of a fixed diameter equal to the diameter of said outside surface of said first skirt and including lock means on s~
said outside surface of said second skirt, said third ~:
skirt having an out~ide surface sized 80 as to just fit t~
within said inside surface of said first skirt and inclu-ding lock means on said outside surface of ~aid third skirt which engage said lock mean~ on said in~ide ~ur- !
face of said flrst ~kirt to frictionally maintain ~aid third skirt within said first skirtJ at least one hollow 30 member having at least on upstanding hollow bos~ located thereon and openlng into the interior of said hollow member, said hollow boss of a slze and a shape such ~hat said first or said second skirts of said tubular element 1.
~ust fit within the inside diameter of said hollow boss with said lock means on ~aid flrst or said second skirt frictionally engaging the interior of 6aid hollow boss to frictionally maintain said element connected to said 4 ~

~ ILZ3'78 member.

Normally, at least two tubular elements would be utilized; however, preferredly, a plurality of tubular elements would be utilized ~uch that the elements could be connected to one another in long chain~, or could be connected to the hollow member~. Further, it is prefer-able to include a plurality of hollow member~ with at lest some of the hollow members having a multiplicity of hollow bo~ses located thereon. A~ such, one of the o tubular members could extend from one boss to a 6econd boss on a single hollow member or one of the tubular member~ could connect two hollow member~ together.

Preferredlyr the lock means on each of the sklrts comprises a circumferentially extending protrusion which protrudes from the outside of the surface of the skirt.
Additionally, the lock means on the fir~t skirt can include a circumferentially extending groove, whlch pro-~ects concavel~ into the inside surface of the first skirt. As such, the pro~ection on the outside surface of 20 the third skirt of a first tubular element can lock with the groove on the inside skirt of a second tubular ele-ment to attach these two elements together.

Addltionally preferredly, e~ch of the hollow bofi~e~
on the hollow member~ would also have a circumerentially extendlng groove located within the boss with the protru-sions on the first or second skirts locking with this groove to attach the tubular element~ to the hollow members BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

In order to better under~tand thls invention, ref-erence i~ made to the drawings herein wherein:
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~Z3~895 Fig. 1 is an elevational view of one of the compo-nents of the invention;
Fig. 2 i~ a fragmentary elevational view ~howing two of the components of Fig. 1 joined together;
Fig. 3 $~ an elevational view in partial ~ection of a further component of the invention;
Fig.4 is an elevational view ~howing a component of Fig. 1 being utilized in conjunction with additlonal component~; and Fig. 5 is an i~ometric view of the component~ of Fig. 1 in use with further additional components of the invention.

This invention utilize~ certain principles and/or concepts as are set for~h in the claims appended to this specification. Those ~killed in the toy arts will rea-lize that these principle~ and/or concepts are capable of belng utilized in a variety of embodiments differing from the illu~trative embodiments herein. For thi~ reason, this invention is not to be cons~rued as being limited to 20 the illustrative embodiments only, but is only to be construed as being limited by the claims.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF T~E INVENTION

In the Figs., ln ~ig. 1 there i~ shown a tubular element 10 and in Flg. 3 a hollow member 12~ Purther, in FIg. 4 other hollow member~ 16/ 18 ~nd 20 are shown. and in Fig~ 5, further hollow members 22, 24, 26, 28 and 30 are ~hown~

One or more of the tubular elements 10 i~ utilized ln con~unction with one of the hollow members, such a~
30 members 14 through 30, or other hollow members. to con-6truct a variety of toys limited only by the imagination of a child. The tubular elements 10 are so constructed ~uch that they can be connected together or they can be ~f 3 ~ 237895 connected to any of the hollow members.

The tubular element 10 has a fir~t skirt 32 on one end thereof. The firRt ~kirt 32 has an out~ide surface 34 of a fixed diameter which includes two circumferen-tially extending protruding ridge~ 36 and 38 located thereon. As is evident from viewing Fig. 2, the skirt 32 also includes an in~ide surface 40 which has grooves 42 and 44 located therein. The groove~ 42 and 44 underlie the ridges 36 and 38 respectively, and in fact are formed ro during a ~ingle mo!ding operation.

On the other end of the tubular element 10 i6 a second ~kirt 46 which al~o has an out~ide surface 48 with rldges 50 and 52 located thereon. The ~econd ~kirt 46 in fact is a mimic of fir~t skirt 32 with regard ~o ~$ze and shape. with either of the skirts 32 or 46 utilized to connect the tubular element 10 to one of the multiple hollow member3.

On the same end of the tubular element 10 whereln the ~econd ~kirt 46 is located, there i~ also located a third skirt 54. The third skirt 54 is separated from the second skirt 46 by a shoulder 56. This steps the tubular element 10 down from the out~ide 6urface 48 of the second skirt 46 to an outside surface 58 of the third ~kirt 54.
The diameter of the outside surface 58 is ~ized lncremen-tally ~maller than the diameter of the lnside ~urface 40 of the first skirt 321 allowlng for ln~ertion o~ the third skirt 54 lnto the interlor of the flrst skirt 32.

The third sklrt 54 lnclude~ a protruding ridge 60 located thereon which locks with groove 42 when a third 6kirt 54 of a first of the tubular element~ 10 is at-tached to the first skirt 32 of a second tubular element 10. This is illustrated in Fig. 2 whereln the tubular element lOa on the right has its third ~kirt 54 inserted Q
.

~237895 into the first ~kirt 32 on the tubular elementlOb on the left.

The third skirt 54 also include~ an end wall 62 which is connected to the third skirt 54 via a radius 64 such that the end of the tubular element lO wherein third skirt 54 is located i~ rounded and is easily insertable into a first ~kirt 32 of a different tubular element 10.
This assist~ a small child in aligning these members together to connect two tubular elements 10 together.

o The tubular element 10 further includes a central body section 66. The body is composed of a plurality of convolutions which are made up of a first truncated conical wall 68 and a second truncated conical wall 70.
The conical walls 68 and 70 are joined together apex to apex and base to base to form the convolutions. Wherein the base of a wall 68 join~ the base of a wall 70 there i8 a convex circumferentlally extending hinge 72. The hlnge 72 allows the walls 68 and 70 to flex with re~pect to one another. Further, wherein the walls 68 and 70 join apex to apex, there is a circumferentially extending concave hinge 74. This also allows the walls 68 and 70 to flex with respect to one another.

The body 66 of the element 10 i8 formed of a plastic material as a one piece lntegrally formed unit. The walls 68 and 70 are capable of nesting one withln the other in a manner shown ln the left hand ~ide of Fig. l, or are capable of being extended by flexure about the hinges 72 and 74 such that they assume the shape as seen in the right hand side of Fig. 1. This allows the tubu-lar element 10 to go from a very fir~t, small axlal dimenslon to a second. longer axial dimen~ion, which i8 approximately two times the length of the first dimen-sion. It is realized that the element 10 can have its body 66 only partially flexed, as seen in Fig. l, or ~23~395 there can be a multiple of flexed areas interspaced by unflexed areas. A similar type tube structure is shown in U.S. 3,645,038.
By making the wall 70 slightly shorter than the wall 6B, the body 66 of the tubular element 10 is nestable as is seen in Fig. 1.
The hollow members 14 through 30 all include at least one boss which is illustrated in Fig. 3 in detail. Insofar as all of the bosses utilized for any of the hollow members 14 through 30 would be identical, a single numeral 76 i6 utilized to identify these bosses. The boss 76 projects from the body 78 of the hollow member 12, as is seen in Fig. 3. It has an internal diameter which is just slightly larger than the diameter of the outside surface 34 of the first skirt 32 or the outside surface 48 of the second skirt 46. This allows insection of either the first skirt 32 or the second skirt 46 of one of the tubular elements 10 into the bosses 76 to connect the tubular elements 10 to one of the hollow members, i.e., hollow member 12.
In the interior of the boss 76 is a circumferentially extending groove 80 which is sized and shaped 60 as to accept either the cidge 36 on the first skict 32 or the ridge 50 on the second skirt 96. Thi6 locks either the first or second skirts 32 or 46 of a tubular element 10 to the boss 76 to attach one of the tubular elements 10 to one of the hollow members.
~s can be seen in Fig. 3, ~here are a plurality of the bosses 76 on the body 12. Further as can be seen in Fig. 4, for the hollow member 16, which is shaped as the control portion of a trumpet, there are al60 a plurality of the bos6e6 76. This is also true of the hollow member 22 utilized in Fig. 5 for construction of the figure seen 123'789S

therein.

Certain of the hollow members, such as member~ 18 and 20, which mimic the bell and mouthpiece of a trumpet, a seen in Fig. 4, have but a single boss 76. Addition-ally, other hollow member~ such as the foot units 24 or the hand units 26 or the eye units 30 of the figure seen in Fig. S, also have a 61ngular bo~ 76.

~ t is evident that a plurality of different hollow members could be utilized with a plurality of tubular o elements lO to con~truct in~truments such as that seen in Fig. 4, or figures, such as 6een in Fig. 5. Further, long chains of the tubular elements 10 can be utilized to con~truct other types of figuren and the~e chains, or a ~ingle tubular member lO can be curved as is ~een in both Figs. 4 and 5, in order to lend different degrees of freedom to the child in making ~tructure~ with the con-~truction components of thi~ invention.

Because the tubular elements 10 have both a first and ~econd skir on opposite ends, they can be attached 20 in ~ coiled manner to a same hollow member, such as is seen in Fig. 6, wherein one of the tubular elements 10 is attached to different bosses 76 on the ~ame hollow member 16. The unique con~truction of the tubular elements 10 whereln they have ldentical skirts, i.e., 8klrts 32 and 46 on opposlte ends, a~ well as a connectlng ~kirt, l~e., 6klrt 54, on one of the ends, allows for versatility in constructing dlfferent structures utilizlng the element~
of the invention.

Claims (9)

THE EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION IN WHICH AN EXCLUSIVE PROPERTY OR
PRIVILEGE IS CLAIMED ARE DEFINED AS FOLLOWS:

1. A toy which comprises:
at least one one piece intergally formed tubu-lar element and at least one hollow member;
said tubular element formed of a plastic mat-erial and having first and second ends connected by an element body;
said tubular element body including a plurality of connected corrugations, said corrugations formed by alternating first and second truncated conical walls joined together base to base about circumferentially extending convex hinges and apex to apex about circum-ferentially extending concave hinges, said first conical walls shorter than said second conical walls such that they are nestable within said second conical walls;
said first end of said tubular element inclu-ding an axially extending first skirt having an outside surface of a first fixed diameter and an inside surface of a second fixed smaller diameter and including locking means on both said first skirt outside surface and said inside surface;
said second end of said tubular element inclu-ding an axially extending second skirt, a shoulder and an axially extending third skirt, said second skirt inter-spaced between said tubular element body and said third skirt and said shoulder interspaced between said second skirt and said third skirt, said second skirt having an outside surface of a fixed diameter equal to the diameter of said outside surface of said first skirt and including lock means on said outside surface of said second skirt, said third skirt having an outside surface sized so as to just fit within said inside surface of said first skirt and including lock means on said outside surface of said third skirt which engage said lock means on said inside surface of said first skirt to frictionally maintain said third skirt within said first skirt;
at least one hollow member having at least on upstanding hollow boss located thereon and opening into the interior of said hollow member, said hollow boss of a size and a shape such that said first or said second skirts of said tubular element just fit within the inside diameter of said hollow boss with said lock means on said first or said second skirt frictionally engaging the interior of said hollow boss to frictionally maintain said element connected to said member.

2. The toy of claim 1 including:
at least two of said tubular elements, the first skirt of said tubular elements connectable to said hollow boss or to the third skirt of a further of said tubular elements, the second skirt of said tubular ele-ments connectable to said hollow boss and the third skirt of each of said tubular elements connectable to the first skirt on a further of said tubular elements.

3. The toy of claim 2 wherein:
said lock means includes at least one circum-ferentially extending protrusion convexly projecting from the outside surface of the respective first, second or third skirt.

4. The toy of claim 3 wherein:
said lock means further includes at least one circumferentially extending groove concavely projecting into the inside surface of at least said first skirt, said groove sized and shaped so as to except and mate with the circumferentially extending protrusion of said third skirt.

5. The toy of claim 4 including:
said hollow boss including at least one circum-ferentiallly extending boss groove concavely projecting into the inside surface of said hollow boss, said boss groove sized and shaped so as to except and mate with the circumferentially extending protrusion on said first and said second skirts.

6. The toy of claim 5 including:
said hollow member having a plurality of said hollow bosses located thereon.

6. The toy of claim 5 including:
a plurality of said tubular elements, the first skirt of each of said tubular elements connectable to one of one of said hollow bosses or to the third skirt of a further of said tubular elements, the second skirt of each of said tubular elements connectable to one of said hollow bosses and the third skirt of each of said tubular elements connectable to the first skirt on a further of said tubular elements.

7. The toy of claim 6 including:
an end wall located on said third skirt and joining said third skirt at a radius of curvature such that said third skirt curves smoothly into said end wall.

8. The toy of claim 7 including:
a plurality of hollow members each having at least one hollow boss located thereon.

9. The toy of claim 8 wherein:
at least one of said hollow member has only one of said hollow bosses located thereon and includes char-acterized surface features located thereon.