Protective helmet

Abstract

A motorcycle helmet, having a helmet shell, a chin part for covering a chin portion of a wearer, and a visor, uses a coupling mechanism by means of which the chin part is fastened to the helmet shell and pivotable between a lower position and an upper position. With the chin part in the lower position, by means of the coupling mechanism, the visor can assume a respective pivoting position between a closed position and an open position. The coupling mechanism is further designed, upon pivoting of the chin part from the upper position into the lower position after the chin part has previously been pivoted from the lower position into the upper position, to cause the visor to occupy a pre-pivoting position differing from the closed position, which pre-pivoting position the visor occupied before the pivoting of the chin part from the lower position into the upper position.

Claims

1. Protective helmet having a helmet shell, a chin part configured to cover a chin portion of a protective helmet wearer, a coupling mechanism, by which the chin part is pivotably mounted to the helmet shell and is movable between a lower position and an upper position, and a visor, which, when the chin part is in the lower position, is pivotably mounted by the coupling mechanism and is movable to a respective pivoting position between a closed position, in which the visor at least partially covers a field of view of the protective helmet wearer, and an open position, in which the visor exposes the field of view, wherein the coupling mechanism is configured such that, when the chin part is pivoted from the lower position to the upper position and subsequently returned to the lower position, the visor is returned to a pre-pivoting position, which pre-pivoting position is different from the closed position and corresponds to the respective pivoting position occupied by the visor prior to pivoting the chin part from the lower position to the upper position.

2. Protective helmet according to claim 1, wherein the coupling mechanism is configured such that, when the chin part is pivoted from the lower position to the upper position with the visor in the open position, the chin part is moved towards the visor in such a way that, in the upper position of the chin part, the visor is closer to the chin part than in the lower position.

3. Protective helmet according to claim 1, wherein, when the chin part is pivoted from the lower position to the upper position with the visor in the closed position, the position of the chin part relative to the visor is maintained.

4. Protective helmet according to claim 1, wherein the coupling mechanism has a latching device, which is pivotably coupled to the helmet shell, and wherein the visor is pivotably coupled to the latching device for changing the respective pivoting position.

5. Protective helmet according to claim 4, wherein the latching device is pivotably mounted relative to the chin part.

6. Protective helmet according to claim 4, wherein the coupling mechanism has a releasable locking device configured to rigidly couple the latching device to the chin part.

7. Protective helmet according to claim 1, wherein the coupling mechanism has a latch carrier, rigidly connected to the chin part.

8. Protective helmet according to claim 7, wherein the coupling mechanism is configured such that, when the latching device is fixed by the latch carrier, the visor is movable to change its respective pivoting position relative to the latching device in response to actuation of the visor.

9. Protective helmet according to claim 7, wherein, in the upper position of the chin part, the latching device is unblocked and is pivotable around the helmet shell in at least one direction.

10. Protective helmet according to claim 1, wherein the coupling mechanism has a visor carrier rigidly connected to the chin part.

11. Protective helmet according to claim 10, wherein, when the chin part is pivoted from the lower position to the upper position with the visor in the closed position, the visor is carried along by the visor carrier.

12. Protective helmet according to claim 10, wherein the visor carrier and/or the latch carrier is arranged in a side region of the protective helmet, and wherein the coupling mechanism is arranged on both sides of the protective helmet in substantially opposite side regions.

13. Protective helmet according to claim 11, wherein, in the upper position of the chin part, a pivoting movement of the visor toward the closed position is limited by the visor carrier, and a further pivoting movement of the visor toward the open position is limited by an upper stop of the coupling mechanism rigidly connected to the helmet shell.

14. Protective helmet according to claim 1, wherein the visor and the chin part are pivotable about a common pivot axis, and wherein the latching device is pivotable about the common pivot axis.

15. Protective helmet according to claim 14, wherein the visor carrier has a visor projection, which, during a pivoting movement of the chin part, performs a pivoting movement in a pivot plane on a first radius about the pivot axis, the first radius being different from a second radius about the pivot axis, on which second radius the latching device is arranged in the pivot plane about the pivot axis.

16. Protective helmet according to claim 1, wherein the protective helmet is a motorcycle protective helmet.

17. Protective helmet according to claim 3, wherein when the chin part is pivoted from the lower position to the upper position with the visor in the closed position, the visor is carried along by the chin part and/or by the coupling mechanism during such pivoting.

18. Protective helmet according to claim 4, wherein the visor is configured to form a latching connection with the latching device in a plurality of positions relative to the latching device.

19. Protective helmet according to claim 5, wherein the latching device is configured to carry along the visor when the latching device is pivoted relative to the helmet shell via the respective latching connection.

20. Protective helmet according to claim 7, wherein the latch carrier is configured to engage with the latching device in the lower position of the chin part in such a way that the latching device is fixed in a closed position of the latching device.

21. Protective helmet according to claim 10, wherein the visor carrier is configured to engage with the visor when the chin part is in the lower position and the visor is in the closed position.

22. Protective helmet according to claim 11 wherein the visor, when carried along by the visor carrier, carries along the latching device.

Description

(1) Further advantageous and preferred embodiments will result from the following description with reference to the figures. In the drawing, which only shows exemplary embodiments:

(2) FIG. 1 shows a schematic side view of a first exemplary embodiment of a proposed protective helmet with the chin part in the lower position and the visor in the closed position,

(3) FIG. 2 shows a schematic side view of the protective helmet shown in FIG. 1 with the chin part in the lower position and the visor in an intermediate position between the closed position and the open position,

(4) FIG. 3 shows a schematic side view of the protective helmet shown in FIG. 1 with the chin part in the upper position and the visor relative to the chin part in the closed position,

(5) FIG. 4 shows a schematic plan view of the coupling mechanism of the protective helmet shown in FIG. 1 with the chin part in the lower position and the visor in the closed position,

(6) FIG. 5 shows a schematic plan view of the coupling mechanism of the protective helmet shown in FIG. 1 with the chin part in the lower position and the visor in the open position,

(7) FIG. 6 shows a schematic plan view of the coupling mechanism of the protective helmet shown in FIG. 1 with the chin part in the upper position and the visor in a compact position,

(8) FIG. 7 shows a schematic top view of the mounting of the chin part on the helmet shell in the coupling mechanism of the protective helmet shown in FIG. 1,

(9) FIG. 8 shows a schematic perspective view of the coupling mechanism of a second exemplary embodiment of a proposed protective helmet with the chin part and the visor in a respective position according to FIG. 4,

(10) FIG. 9 shows a schematic perspective view of the coupling mechanism shown in FIG. 8 with the chin part and the visor in a respective position according to FIG. 5,

(11) FIG. 10 shows a schematic perspective view of the coupling mechanism shown in FIG. 8 with the chin part and the visor in a respective position according to FIG. 6 and

(12) FIG. 11 shows a schematic perspective view of the mounting of the chin part on the helmet shell in the coupling mechanism shown in FIG. 8 in respective positions according to FIG. 7.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

(13) The proposed protective helmet shown in FIG. 1 according to the first exemplary embodiment is a motorcycle protective helmet and specifically a flip-up helmet. It has a helmet shell 1 as well as a chin part 2, a visor 3 and a coupling mechanism 4. The chin part 2 and the visor 3 can be pivoted by means of the coupling mechanism 4, wherein various positions of the chin part 2 and of the visor 3 are respectively shown in FIGS. 1, 2 and 3.

(14) In FIGS. 1 and 2, the chin part 2 is in its lower position 12, whereas the chin part 2 in FIG. 3 is in its upper position 6. In FIG. 1, the visor 3 is in its closed position 7. In FIG. 2, the visor 3 is in an intermediate position between the closed position 7 and the open position. This intermediate position of the visor 3 corresponds here to the pre-pivoting position 8 by way of example. The pivoting position of the visor 3 in FIG. 3 is a compact position, which is even beyond the open position.

(15) If now, based on the situation in FIG. 2, the chin part 2 is pivoted to the upper position 6 according to FIG. 3, the visor 3 correspondingly assumes the compact position shown in FIG. 3. When the chin part 2 is pivoted back to the lower position 12, the visor 3 also returns to the intermediate position according to FIG. 3, specifically therefore to the pre-pivoting position 8. The pre-pivoting position 8 is therefore the pivoting position that the visor 3 occupied before the chin part 2 was pivoted.

(16) This remembering of the pre-pivoting position 8 and the return of the visor 3 to it is enabled by the coupling mechanism 4 shown in detail in FIGS. 4 to 7.

(17) FIG. 4 shows the coupling mechanism 4 in the state of the protective helmet according to FIG. 1. The helmet shell 1, the chin part 2 and the visor 3 are arranged one above the other in the direction of the drawing planein this order. In FIG. 4, only a component rigidly coupled to the helmet shell 1 can be seen through an arcuate opening, which is also regarded as a component of the helmet shell 1 in accordance with the above findings. It should be noted that only a small part of these components is shown here schematically and the connection to the components is not shown. For the visor 3, a first visor projection 3a and a second visor projection 3b are shown separately for clarity. These are part of the visor 3 and rigidly coupled to the visor 3.

(18) The visor 3 can form a respective latching connection with the latching device 5 by latching points (not shown here). These latching points are distributed along the latching device 5 in such a way that such a latching connection is produced in different pivoting positions of the visor 3 relative to the latching device 5.

(19) The coupling mechanism 4 has a latch carrier 9 rigidly connected to the chin part 2, which in the lower position 12 of the chin part 2 together with an upper stop 10 of the coupling mechanism 4, which upper stop 10 is rigidly coupled with the helmet shell 1, fixes the latching device 5 in the position shown. The position of the latching device 5 is referred to here as the closed position 11.

(20) Fixing the latching device 5 in the closed position 11 leads to an actuation of the visor 3 in the direction of the open position causing a relative movement between the visor 3 and the latching device 5. The existing latching connection between the visor 3 and the latching device 5 is therefore released and a new latching connection is created in a different position.

(21) The described actuation of the visor 3 leads, by way of example, to a position of the visor 3 as shown in FIG. 5, which can also be referred to as a pre-pivoting position 8. It should be noted that this pre-pivoting position 8 is different from the pre-pivoting position 8 shown in FIG. 2 as the visor 3 according to FIG. 5 is further open than in FIG. 2. However, this difference is insignificant in terms of how the coupling mechanism 4 functions. It can be seen that the position of the latching device 5 has not changed as a result of the actuation of the visor 3.

(22) In turn, FIG. 6 shows a state of the coupling mechanism 4 that is achieved when, starting from the state shown in FIG. 4, the chin part 2 is pivoted from the lower position 12 to the upper position 6. On the one hand, this pivoting movement releases the latching device 5 because the latch carrier 9 disengages from the latching device 5. On the other hand, a visor carrier 13, which is also rigidly coupled with the chin part 2 and formed as a visor projection here, engages in the visor 3 and more precisely in the first visor projection 3a and carries the visor 3 along in this way. The latching device 5 is also carried along during this pivoting movement as a result of the latching connection between the visor 3 and the latching device 5 without the latching connection between the visor 3 and latching device 5 being released. As a result, the visor 3 and the chin part 2 are positioned as shown in FIG. 3.

(23) It can be seen that the relative position between the visor 3 and the latching device 5 is maintained in this way. At the same time, the latching device 5 always has play in relation to a pivoting movement. In particular, no carrier engages directly with the latching device 5. In contrast, the visor 3 is fixed in its position, as it engages with the visor carrier 13 in the one pivoting direction and with the upper stop 10 in the other pivoting direction. If the chin part 2 is then moved back to the lower position 12, the state shown in FIG. 4 is restored.

(24) This also shows what happens when, starting from the situation in FIG. 5, the chin part 2 is pivoted from the lower position 12 to the upper position 6. Despite the different pivoting position of the visor 3 compared to FIG. 4 prior to the pivoting movementwhich pivoting position is again to be referred to here as a pre-pivoting position 8the visor 3 and chin part 2 also assume a position as in FIG. 3. However, despite the identical position of the visor 3, the configuration of the coupling mechanism 4 is different from that shown in FIG. 6, as the relative position between the visor 3 and the latching device 5 according to FIG. 5 is maintained by the latching connection. With reference to the illustration in FIG. 6, the latching device 5 is simply pivoted anticlockwise, which is in turn enabled by the existing degree of freedom for the latching device 5. This means that when the chin part 2 is pivoted back to the lower position 12, the visor 3 can return back to its previous pivoting position, i.e. the pre-pivoting position 8.

(25) For a better understanding, the coupling mechanism 4 is shown without visor 3 and without latching device 5 in FIG. 7.

(26) FIGS. 8 to 11 show the coupling mechanism 4 or parts of the coupling mechanism 4 of a second exemplary embodiment of the proposed protective helmet in a schematic perspective view.

(27) FIGS. 8 to 11 substantially correspond to FIGS. 4 to 7 in terms of the components shown and their basic positions. Differences exist only in the special measurements, angles and dimensions and similar details such that the above observations on FIGS. 4 to 7 and the components mentioned therein also apply substantially to FIGS. 8 to 11 and the perspective view of FIGS. 8 to 11 supplements that of FIGS. 4 to 7.