GB2186199A - A bubble-blowing toy vehicle - Google Patents

Abstract

A toy vehicle, preferably in the style of a steam locomotive, having an electric motor 21 driving wheels 62 to advance the vehicle over the ground through a reduction gear box 20, a fan 25 to supply air for bubble blowing, and a bubble producing mechanism 80,86,88, the bubble producing mechanism comprising a nozzle (92) for receiving air from the fan, a reservoir 80 for detergent liquid and a wheel having at least one opening capable of alternately passing through the reservoir so as to become dipped in detergent and being held for a while in a stationary position above the nozzle to allow bubble blowing. An arm (41) clicks over a pinion 42 to produce a chugging sound. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Improvements in toy vehicles This invention relates to toy vehicles and, in particular, those which have a drive for advancing the vehicle over the ground and additionally have the function of blowing bubbles.

Children have long enjoyed blowing a series of bubbles through a wire loop dipped in detergent or like solution. It is an object of this invention to combine that type of enjoyment with a toy vehicle so that the vehicle will itself automatically blow the bubbles.

According to the invention, a toy vehicle includes an electric motor drive which powers means to advance the vehicle over the ground through a reduction gear box, and in which the gear box and motor have a number of power off-takes including a first off-take at the highest speed of rotation for driving a fan to supply air for bubble blowing, an off-take for advancing the vehicle over the ground and an off-take for driving a bubble producing mechanism, the bubble producing mechanism comprising a nozzle for receiving air from the fan, a reservoir for detergent liquid and an opening carrier having at least one opening capable of alternately passing through the reservoir so as to become dipped in detergent and being held for a while in a stationary position above the nozzle to allow bubble blowing.

The invention is particularly applicable to toy vehicles in the shape of steam locomotives or engins. Thus, the bubble producing mechanism can be placed in the chimney of such a locomotive so that the bubbles appear to simulate smoke or steam.

The arrangement according to the invention provides a very simple mechanism to provide all the necessary functions both for advancing the vehicle over the ground and for producing the bubble blowing. Thus, the bubble producing mechanism needs a relatively slow drive whilst for example the fan has to be turned at high speed to provide a reasonable supply of air. The gear box can be composed of a relatively compact series of reduction gears linked one to another and the speed reduction gearing can be common to the drive for advancing the vehicle and the drive for the bubble producing mechanism. Therefore the overall mechanism can be reasonably compact and readily fit within the available space in a toy vehicle of conventional and normal size.

Desirably the electric motor will be batterydriven and so the vehicle will additionally have a compartment to hold one or more electric storage batteries.

A toy vehicle according to the invention will now be described, by way of example, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: Figure 1 is a sectional elevation through an example of toy locomotive according to the invention; Figure 2 is a plan section taken on the line 2-2 of Fig. 1; Figure 3 is an enlarged section taken on the line 3-3 of Fig. 1; Figure 4 is an enlarged section taken on the line 4-4 of Fig. 3; and Figure 5 is an enlarged plan diagram of the reduction gear box.

The toy locomotive 10 according to the invention shown in the drawings comprises a chassis 12 and an upper body member 16. It will be noted that this upper body member is in the shape of the toy steam locomotive and includes a funnel 18 and a front cow catcher portion 19. The operating mechanism 20 for the vehicle is supported by the chassis 12 and housed within the body member 16.

The driving mechanism includes an electric motor 21 which has an output shaft 22 extending both upwardly above the motor through an insulating and resilient bearing sleeve 23 and downwardly below the motor.

The motor 21 is positioned in a housing 24 and mounted on top of that housing 24 is a radial fan blower 25 having a rotating fan 26 fixed to the top end of the output shaft 22 of the motor. Upon rotation of this fan, air is drawn in at the centre of the blower 25 and a flow of air is supplied through an outlet 28. It will be noted that the fan can rotate at high speed at the same rate as the electric motor 21 since it is directly attached to the output shaft 22 of the motor.

Housed within the housing 24 is a reduction gear mechanism 30 consisting of a series of meshing pinions. This reduction gear mechanism reduces the high rotational speed of the motor 21 to give one off-take at a shaft 32 and another off-take at a shaft 34. Attached to the lower end of the motor shaft 22 is a small gear 36 meshing with a larger pinion 38 mounted on a stub shaft 40 extending downwardly from the housing 24. This arrangement takes the drive from the motor to the gears constituting the reduction mechanism and indeed the pinions 38 and 40 constitute the first stage in the reduction gear mechanism 30. Because of the large reduction, the output at the shaft 32 has a relatively high torque and so is capable of driving the locomotive over the ground in a manner to be described below.The output at the shaft 34 in turn is also at a relatively low rate of rotation to enable it to drive a bubble producing mechanism 40 housed in the chimney to be described. The reduction gear mechanism 30 is however very compact.

Also cantained in the houring 24 is a resiliently mounted arm 41 whose free and engages a large toothed pinion 42 fixed on the shaft 32. As this pinion rotates, the arm 41 clicks over its teeth to produce a chugging sound. The chassis 12 also carries a battery compartment 43 in which a number of electric batteries 44 can be housed and electrical current is supplied by wires 45 to the motor 21 via an on-off switch 46 mounted on the body member 16. Access to the battery compartment is by means of a hinged door 48 which is normally held in a closed position by means of a latch 50.

The rear wheels 52 and 54 of the locomotives are mounted on a shaft 56 which is idly mounted in the chassis 12. The front pair of wheels 58 and 60 are individually idly mounted and, in the normal operation of the locomotive, are just clear of the ground. The locomotive 10 is advanced by means of a pair of driving wheels 62 mounted in the centre underneath the chassis between the wheels 58 and 60. These wheels 62 are fixed on a rotatable shaft 64 journalled in turn in a rotatable plate 66. The shaft 32 which extends down from the reduction gear mechanism 30 and supports the plate 66 and driving wheels 62. The plate 66 is rotatable about the axis of that shaft 32.

At its lower end, the shaft 32 has a crown gear 68 meshing with a pinion 70 fixed on the shaft 64. Under normal circumstances, therefore, rotation of the shaft 32 rotates the shaft 64 and the two driving wheels 62 via the crown gear 68 and pinion 70. The locomotive will therefore advance in a normal forward direction.

Should the locomotive encounter an obstacle, however, the rotatable nature of the plate 66 allows this to rotate should the driving wheels 62 be stopped because the vehicle encounters an obstacle. Therefore instead of turning the shaft 64, the plate 66 and the accompanying driving wheels 62 tend to be rotated and this continues until a point is reached where the driving wheels 62 are at such an orientation that they will now drive the locomotive away from the obstacle which it has encountered. The drive tends then to continue in that manner until the locomotive clears the obstacle.However, in time the trailing effect of the rear wheels 52 and 54 tends to straighten up the direction of drive so that the vehicle tends to move in the direction in which it clears the obstacle and, at the same time, the plate 66 progressively rotates so that in effect the driving wheels 62 are progressively restored to a forward driving direction.

This arrangement including the driving wheels 62, plate 66, crown gear 68 and pinion 70 is a well known mechanism for driving toy vehicles in such a way that, should they encounter an obstacle, they turn away from the obstacle and drive off in another free direction and so it is not believed that any further explanation of this arrangement is necessary.

The off-take shaft 34 extends upwardly into the funnel 18. This drives the bubble producing mechanism 40.

The bubble mechanism includes an opentopped detergent reservoir 80 having an overflow 82 at the side to prevent the level of detergent being filled above the line 84. Rotatably mounted in the reservoir on a shaft 85 is a drum 86. This has a cylindrical flange penetrated at regular intervals by bubble blowing holes 88. Also within the reservoir is a nozzle 92. This is connected by a tube 94 to the outlet 28 from the fan 25 so that when the motor 21 is running, a stream of air is supplied by the fan out through the nozzle 92.

Integrally moulded with the outside of the reservoir 80 is a stationary clutch plate 94.

This has raised and inclined surfaces 96 which mate with a rotating clutch plate 98 formed integrally with a pinion 100. The number of pairs of inclind faces corresponds to the number of holes 88 in the drum 86. The pinion 100 is keyed to the shaft by a hexagonshaped opening (not shown) asually within it which slidably engage on a hexagon-shaped bush (not shown) on the shaft 85 so that the pinion and shaft are rotatably fixed together but the pinion 100 can move resiliently against the action of a coil spring 104 held around the shaft 85 by a cap 106. The alignment of the faces between the two clutch plates 94 and 98 is such that under the resilient action of the spring 104, the pinion 100 is urged to a rotational orientation such that one of the holes 88 is aligned with the nozzle 92.Engaging the pinion 100 is a step-drive pinion 110 having a few teeth at one orientation around its periphery and this is integrally formed with a pinion 112 engaging a crown gear 114 at the top of the shaft 34. As the shaft 34 rotates, therefore, this in turn rotates the pinion 112 and the teeth on the pinion 110 forming the step gear mechanism advance the pinion 100 by a selected amount each time the pinion 110 rotates once and during the aance the inclined faces 96 of the clutch plates 94 and 98 slide over one another sufficiently far for the drum 86 to bring the next hole 88 into alignment with the nozzle 92. By this stage, the teeth on the pinion 110 have disengaged from the pinion 100 and the clutch mechanism again holds the drum 86 in that orientation whilst bubbles are blown through the holes 86.

It will be appreciated that in this way the holes 86 circulate down into the detergent liquid and a film of liquid is entrained across the hole and then when that hole again becomes positioned above the nozzle 92 that film of detergent is blown in to a series of bubbles.

Claims (9)

1. A toy vehicle comprising an electric motor drive which powers means to advance the vehicle over the ground though a reduction gear box, and in which the gear box and mo tor have a number of power off-takes including a first off-take at the highest speed of rotation for driving a fan to supply air for bubble blowing, an off-take for advancing the vehicle over the ground and an off-take for driving a bubble producing mechanism, the bubble producing mechanism comprising a nozzle for receiving air from-the fan, a reservoir for detergent liquid and an opening carrier having at least one opening capable of alternately passing through the reservoir so as to become dipped in detergent and being held for a while in a stationary position above the nozzle to allow bubble blowing.

2. A toy vehicle as claimed in Claim 1 which is in the shape of a steam locomotive or engine, the bubble producing mechanism being positioned in the chimney of the locomotive so that the bubbles appear to simulate smoke or steam.

3. A toy vehicle as claimed in Claim 1 or Claim 2 in which the electric motor is batterydriven and the vehicle additionally has a compartment to hold one or more electric storage batteries.

4. A toy vehicle as claimed in any preceding claim in which the opening carrier comprises a cylindrical sleeve and a plurality of openings spaced in a ring around the cylindrical surfaces, the openings being alignable one at a time with the said nozzle.

5. A toy vehicle as claimed in Claim 4 comprising means for intermittently rotating the sleeve about its longitudinal axis, those means including stop means for temporarily holding the carrier with one hole in turn in alignment with the nozzle.

6. A toy vehicle as claimed in Claim 5 in which the stop means comprise a pair of cam plates having corresponding fluted faces, one cam plate being rotatable with the sleeve and being stationary and the cam plates being resiliently urged into face to face contact, whereby the said one plate can be turned relative the other to advance the sleeve but, when not being rotated, the flutings on the faces of the cam plates will engage and temporarily hold one opening in the sleeve in alignment with the nozzle.

7. A toy vehicle as claimed in any of claims 4 to 6 in which the opening carrier is advanced intermittently by the meshing of a pair of pinions, the driven one of which has teeth over only a limited extent of the periphery.

8. A toy vehicle as claimed in any preceding claim which is advanced over the ground by drive means including a pair of wheels mounted on an axis rotatable about an upright axis, the off-take from the gear box for advancing the vehicle coinciding with the said upright axis, and the said pair of wheels being driven from the said off-take by meshing gears, one on the said off-take and the other on an axle on which the said pair of wheels are mounted.

9. A toy vehicle substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawings.