Load support structure
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional load support structures, such as seating structures, face challenges in providing comfortable posture and stability across varying body weights due to complex construction and high costs, often resulting in unhealthy rounded-back postures and excessive weight.
Innovation Solution
A load support structure featuring a seat with a complex mechanism that utilizes rocking devices to change spring forces, comprising a front seat part, rear seat part, lower backrest part, and upper backrest part with supporting arms, allowing for active movement and deformation to counteract potential energy loss, thus maintaining comfortable posture independently of body weight.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a complex mechanism with rocking devices is used to automatically change spring forces, then comfortable posture is achieved across varying body weights, but device complexity and construction costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
The supporting arm is designed as a dynamic structure with arcuate profile sections that automatically change geometry in response to applied loads. The arcuate regions allow the arm to deform and redirect forces, creating adaptive support characteristics without requiring complex adjustment mechanisms or multiple components.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the geometric parameters of the supporting arm by incorporating arcuate profile sections instead of straight segments. This geometric parameter change allows the structure to naturally adapt to different body weights through passive deformation, eliminating the need for active spring force adjustment mechanisms.
2Adaptability or versatility
If conventional load support structures are designed to accommodate varying body weights, then comfort is improved, but the structure becomes heavier and more complex
Solution Approach 1:
The supporting arm incorporates flexible arcuate profile sections that can deform under load. These flexible regions act as passive adaptive elements that accommodate varying body weights without adding significant weight to the overall structure, replacing heavier active adjustment mechanisms.
3Adaptability or versatility
If the backrest is designed with articulations and skins without rigid connections, then adaptability to body contours is improved, but structural stability and health support deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The supporting arm is segmented into distinct functional regions: guide element region, arcuate profile region B, arcuate profile region C, and connection region. This segmentation allows each section to perform its specific function - the arcuate regions provide flexibility for contour adaptation while the guide elements and connection regions maintain structural stability.
Solution Approach 2:
Different sections of the supporting arm have different structural qualities tailored to their specific functions. The arcuate profile sections have local flexibility for contour adaptation, while the guide element regions and connection points have local rigidity for stability. This local differentiation resolves the contradiction between adaptability and stability.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The structure ensures comfortable sitting for individuals of different weights without the need for spring adjustments, providing intrinsic compensation and reducing construction complexity and weight, thereby enhancing stability and reducing costs.
Implementation Method 1
the upper support and the lower support having an arcuate profile in the region B of the rear seat part and in the region C of the lower backrest part
Data Source
AI summary
A body support structure includes a frame and a membrane attached to the frame. The membrane includes elastomeric filaments. The membrane includes different regions with different stiffness. The membrane may form a part of a seat or a backrest.