초록 ▼

Flush mountable latches and locks for industrial cabinets, tool carts, electrical equipment enclosures and the like utilize versatile housings together with a variety of types of handles that are movable relative to the housings to effect unlatching movements of spring-biased, pivotally mounted latc

Flush mountable latches and locks for industrial cabinets, tool carts, electrical equipment enclosures and the like utilize versatile housings together with a variety of types of handles that are movable relative to the housings to effect unlatching movements of spring-biased, pivotally mounted latch bolts, with pivotally mounted operating arms serving to drivingly interconnect the handles with the latch bolts. Lockable embodiments have locking mechanisms that prevent operating movements of the operating arms, but do not prevent pivotal movement of the latch bolts out of their latched positions, whereby even the lockable embodiments have latch bolts that can be “slammed”into latching engagement with suitably configured strike formations. Other improvement features reside in the provision of coaxially-pivoted overlying sets of latch bolt and operating arm components that cooperate in a plurality of ways, and in the provision of stop formations, torsion-spring-receiving formations, and co-acting drive formations, with such features enabling the resulting latch and lock assemblies to employ a small number of relatively movable parts that can be assembled, installed and serviced with ease.

대표청구항 ▼

A flush-mountable latch, comprising: a) housing means including a pan-shaped housing having a front wall, and having recess-defining wall formations that define a forwardly facing recess, with portions of the front wall forming a mounting flange that surrounds the recess; b) the housing being formed

A flush-mountable latch, comprising: a) housing means including a pan-shaped housing having a front wall, and having recess-defining wall formations that define a forwardly facing recess, with portions of the front wall forming a mounting flange that surrounds the recess; b) the housing being formed as a rigid, one-piece molded structure, with the recess-defining wall formations including a substantially continuous sidewall that extends perimetrically about a back wall that is located at the rear of the recess, and with the back wall defining a rearwardly facing mounting surface that extends between first and second opposed portions of the sidewall; c) fastener means rigidly connected to the back wall, including first and second post-like fasteners that are rigidly, connected to the back wall at first and second spaced locations near the first and second opposed portions of the sidewall, with the first and second post-like fasteners extending rearwardly from the mounting surface along a first axis and a second axis, respectively; d) handle means including a handle that resides in the recess, that is connected to the housing, and that is movable relative to the housing between a normal, non-operated position and an operated position; e) opening means formed through the recess-defining wall formations of the housing to establish a path of communication between the forwardly facing recess and a region that is located behind the back wall; f) handle-connected means extending through the opening means and along said path of communication for connecting to the handle to a part of the handle-connected means that resides in said region located behind the back wall and that moves within said region along a first path of travel in response to movement of the handle between its non-operated and operated positions; g) latch bolt means including an elongate latch bolt having a central region that extends between a first end region and a second end region, with the first end region being pivotally connected to the first post-like fastener for mounting the latch bolt on the housing for pivotal movement about said first axis, with the central region extending in a side-to-side direction across a portion of the back wall and having first portions thereof that extend beyond said first opposed portion of the sidewall for joining with the second end region, and with the second end region defining a hook-shaped formation for releasably latchingly engaging a suitably configured striker formation, whereby the latch bolt is pivotally movable relative to the housing as by pivoting the latch bolt about said first axis to move selected portions of the central region along a second path of travel as the latch bolt is moved between a latched position and an unlatched position; h) operating means including: i) an operating arm that has an elongate portion, with mounting formation means provided thereon for pivotally connecting the operating arm to said first post-like fastener for mounting the operating arm on the housing for pivotal movement about said first axis, and with drive formation means provided thereon at a location that is spaced from the location of the mounting formation means, whereby the drive formation means is caused to move about said first axis as the operating arm is pivoted about said first axis; ii) said drive formation means including structure that is positioned along both of the first and second paths of travel for: A) being interposed between the handle-connected means and the latch bolt means so as to transmit driving force directly from the handle-connected means through said structure to the latch bolt means so as to effect movement of the latch bolt means from its latched position to its unlatched position in response to movement of the handle from its non-operated position to its operated position; and, B) being positioned by the operating arm at one end of said second path of travel when the operating arm is in its normal position so as to normally not obstruct said second path of travel and to thereby permit pivotal movement of the latch bolt means about said first axis as may be needed to enable the hook-shaped end region of the latch bolt to be “slammed”into latching engagement with said suitably configured striker formation but without causing movement of the operating arm that would, in turn, cause the handle means to move out of its non-operated position as the hook-shaped end region is “slammed”into latching engagement with said striker formation; and, i) biasing means interposed between the latch bolt and the housing for biasing the latch bolt about the first axis in a direction extending away from the unlatched position toward the latched position.