INSULATING ELEMENT

Abstract

An insulating element for sealing off a structural element in a motor vehicle includes a carrier and an expandable material that is arranged on the carrier. The insulating element has a top side and a bottom side, wherein at least three contact points are arranged on each of the top side and the bottom side, which are designed in such a way that, when a plurality of identical insulating elements are stacked, adjacent insulating elements respectively lie on one another via these contact points and are thus arranged parallel to one another.

Claims

1. An insulating element for sealing off a structural element in a motor vehicle, the insulating element comprising: a carrier; and an expandable material that is arranged on the carrier; wherein the insulating element has a top side and a bottom side which, in a state of use, are substantially aligned in a plane of a cross section of the structural element that is to be sealed off, wherein the insulating element has at least three contact points on each of the top side and the bottom side, wherein these contact points are designed in such a way that, when a plurality of identical insulating elements are stacked, adjacent insulating elements respectively lie on one another via these contact points and are thus arranged parallel to one another.

2. The insulating element as claimed in claim 1, wherein the insulating element has at least one securing element which is formed in such a way that, when insulating elements are stacked on top of one another, an insulating element is secured by the securing element of an adjacent insulating element against displacement transversely to the stacking direction and/or against rotation of the insulating element about the stacking direction.

3. The insulating element as claimed in claim 2, wherein at least one spacer element and/or at least one step and/or at least one region of a fixing element is configured as a securing element.

4. The insulating element as claimed in claim 1, wherein at least one contact point lies in a region of a fixing element, and/or wherein the region of the fixing element is in the form of a securing element.

5. The insulating element as claimed in claim 1, wherein a height at the base of the fixing element in the stacking direction that includes both a base of the fixing element and expandable material at the base of the fixing element that is required to seal off an opening in the structural element in which the fixing element can be inserted is at most 130% of a height of the fixing element in the stacking direction.

6. The insulating element as claimed in claim 2, wherein at least one securing element is in the form of a spacer element, wherein the spacer element serves to support the insulating element on the structural in a state of use of the insulating element in the structural element.

7. The insulating element as claimed in claim 6, wherein the spacer element is configured to be stackable per se, wherein two spacer elements stacked one inside the other have a total height in the stacking direction of at most 170% of an individual spacer element.

8. The insulating element as claimed in claim 1, wherein steps of the insulating element form an angle to the stacking direction of at least 35°.

9. The insulating element as claimed in claim 1, wherein at least one contact point is in the form of a support element which protrudes from a general surface of the top side or the bottom side of the insulating element in the stacking direction.

10. A system having a plurality of insulating elements as claimed in claim 1, wherein the insulating elements are stacked on top of one another.

11. The system as claimed in claim 10, wherein the system comprises at least 10 stacked insulating elements, and/or wherein a lowermost insulating element of the system lies on a base element.

12. The system as claimed in claim 10, wherein each additional insulating element increases the height of the stack in the stacking direction by at most 20 mm.

13. The system as claimed in claim 10, wherein a stack height of an individual insulating element is at most 50% of a total height of an individual insulating element in the stacking direction.

14. A method for attaching insulating elements to structural elements in motor vehicles, the method comprising the steps of: providing a system having stacked insulating elements as claimed in claim 10; loading the system into an application robot; removing an individual insulating element from the system; transporting the individual insulating element by way of a robot arm; and attaching the insulating element to the structural element of the motor vehicle.

15. The method as claimed in claim 14, wherein the application robot is loaded with a plurality of systems at the same time and/or wherein the individual insulating elements are removed by the robot arm.

Description

[0083] Details and advantages of the invention will be described below on the basis of exemplary embodiments and with reference to schematic drawings. In the drawings:

[0084] FIG. 1 shows an exemplary illustration of a vehicle body;

[0085] FIGS. 2a to 2c show a schematic illustration of an exemplary insulating element and/or a system having a plurality of such insulating elements;

[0086] FIG. 3 shows a schematic illustration of an exemplary temporary fixing between two adjacent insulating elements; and

[0087] FIG. 4 shows a schematic illustration of an exemplary system having a plurality of stacked insulating elements.

[0088] Firstly, FIG. 2a illustrates an individual insulating element 16. This insulating element 16 has a carrier 11 and an expandable material 13 arranged on this carrier 11. The insulating element 16 has a substantially flat form in order to be able to efficiently seal off a cross section of a structural element in a state of use. In this case, however, the insulating element 16 does not have a completely flat form, but rather has various elevations and step-shaped shoulders, in particular one steep step 5.

[0089] The insulating element 16 has a top side 17 and a bottom side 18 here. Moreover, the insulating element 16 in this exemplary embodiment has two fixing elements 3, which are each in the form of a clip, and two spacer elements 4, which are each aligned on different sides.

[0090] Moreover, the insulating element 16 has a support element 6 which in this exemplary embodiment is arranged on the top side 17 of the insulating element 16.

[0091] In this exemplary embodiment, the insulating element 16 has three contact points arranged on the top side 17, and three respective assigned contact points on the bottom side 18. Here, two respective contact points are arranged in the regions of the fixing elements 3, and a further contact point is in the form of a support element 6 or a support point on the bottom side 18 of the insulating element 16.

[0092] FIG. 2b now illustrates a system 1 having a plurality of insulating elements 16 according to FIG. 2a. The insulating elements 16 are stacked on top of one another in a stacking direction 19 here. In this case, the stacked insulating elements 16 are arranged parallel to one another and in each case lie on one another at the contact points on their top side and bottom side.

[0093] FIG. 2c in turn illustrates a stack and/or a system 1 having stacked insulating elements 16, the lowermost insulating element 16 of the stack being fixed on a base element 2 in this exemplary embodiment.

[0094] FIG. 3 schematically illustrates an exemplary mechanical locking 7 between two adjacent insulating elements. In this case, a first coupling element 8 of a lower insulating element engages into a second coupling element 9 of an upper insulating element. This makes it possible, for example, to secure the stacked insulating elements against horizontal displacement and partially also against displacement in other directions.

[0095] FIG. 4 illustrates a further exemplary system 1 having stacked insulating elements 16. In this illustration it can be seen that each additional insulating element 16 increases the height of the stack by a respective stack height 15 of an insulating element 16.

[0096] FIG. 5 illustrates a detail of two stacked exemplary insulating elements. In this embodiment, a region of the fixing element 3, specifically the expandable material 13 which is arranged around a base of the fixing element 3, forms a contact point. The fixing elements 3, arranged one above the other, do not touch one another here. This detail furthermore shows two spacer elements 4 per insulating element 16. In this exemplary embodiment, the spacer elements 4 are each in the form of a securing element, since they prevent the insulating element from being displaced transversely to the stacking direction and from rotating about the stacking direction. The spacer elements 4 have a substantially Y-shaped configuration, each of the legs forming guide surfaces as a positioning aid during the stacking. Moreover, the spacer elements 4 of adjacent insulating elements overlap in the stacking direction.

[0097] Finally, FIG. 6 illustrates a detail of an exemplary insulating element 16. Here, in particular, a region of a fixing element 3 can be seen. The region of the fixing element 3 comprises both the fixing element 3 itself, which is in the form of a clip, and a base of the fixing element 3 and expandable material 13 which is arranged on the base of the fixing element 3 and is required to seal off an opening in the structural element in which the fixing element 3 can be inserted.

[0098] In this exemplary embodiment, a height 21 at the base of the fixing element 3 is marked. This height 21 at the base includes both a base of the fixing element and the expandable material at the base of the fixing element that is required to seal off the opening in the structural element in which the fixing element is inserted. Furthermore, a height 20 of the fixing element 3 itself is marked.

LIST OF REFERENCE SIGNS

[0099] 1 System [0100] 2 Base element [0101] 3 Fixing element [0102] 4 Spacer element [0103] 5 Step [0104] 6 Support element [0105] 7 Mechanical locking [0106] 8 First coupling element [0107] 9 Second coupling element [0108] 10 Vehicle body [0109] 11 Carrier [0110] 12 Structural element [0111] 13 Expandable material [0112] 14 Structural element [0113] 15 Stack height of an insulating element [0114] 16 Insulating element [0115] 17 Top side [0116] 18 Bottom side [0117] 19 Stacking direction [0118] 20 Height of the fixing element [0119] 21 Height of the base of the fixing element