The present invention concerns an automotive jack with a vertical main structure resting on the ground and comprising a load supporting arm swinging around a horizontal axis on that structure.
When employing jacks with an upright that can be erected on a foot resting on the ground and with a load-supporting arm articulated at one end to the upright and swinging up to produce a lifting motion in relation to the leg, care must be taken in particular to ensure that the leg is applied, erected on the ground, that is, at a prescribed angle to the ground and to the vehicle being lifted. This is the only way to prevent the load from being improperly accommodated as the vehicle is lifted, with the jack and in some cases the vehicle as well slipping out because the load""s line of application does not extend straight through the foot. To ensure that the jack is erected on the ground with its leg at the proper angle even when employed by an unskilled operator accordingly, European Patent 0 688 736 A1 discloses establishing the jack""s angle of application by means of a foot-adjustment slide that slides along the leg subject to the motion of the load-supporting arm, whereby either the motion of the foot, connected to the leg, is controlled or, in the event the foot is not movable, another point of application is made available to the jack.
The motion of the load-supporting arm is in the known approach transmitted through a cogged segment at the end of the arm remote from its free end and operating in conjunction with counterparts in the form of matching cutouts in the foot-adjustment slide. There is a drawback to this state of the art in that the slide is a complicated sheet-metal component. The design increases the manufacturing cost along with the weight of the overall jack.
The object of the present invention is a jack with a simpler and easier to fabricate foot-adjustment slide.
The main advantage or me present invention is that a two-part foot-adjustment slide can be economically fabricated from simple and inexpensive materials. The jack""s overall weight will accordingly also be decreased. Another advantage is the simplicity with which the slide can be adapted to legs of different lengths just //be// by mounting a carriage of appropriate length on a track without having to modify the other parts.