Movable Vehicle Seat Cushion Rotates to Expose Storage
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing seat devices for vehicles face challenges in providing convenient storage and accessibility features to rear row seat occupants due to the presence of a center seat, which limits the use of storage trays and cup holders, and require complex mechanisms that increase weight and manufacturing costs.
Innovation Solution
A seat device with a movable cushion portion that rotates and translates between seating and extended positions, utilizing a pin and groove mechanism with a pin shuttle to provide access to storage space and convenience features, allowing the cushion to move away from the seat base to expose storage and tray areas.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a center seat is provided in the rear row to accommodate a third passenger, then seating capacity is improved, but storage trays and cup holders formed in the armrest or center seat cannot be used when the center seat is occupied
Solution Approach 1:
The center seat cushion is made movable rather than fixed. It can be dynamically adjusted between a lowered position (providing seating surface for third passenger) and a raised position (creating storage space). This dynamic transformation allows the same space to serve different functions at different times, resolving the contradiction between seating capacity and storage accessibility.
2Volume of stationary object
If a center-seat-moving mechanism is provided to move the center seat cushion, then storage space is improved, but the mechanism becomes complicated with multiple link members, brackets, and pivot brackets increasing weight and manufacturing cost
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts and eliminates the complex link mechanisms, brackets, and pivot brackets from the center-seat-moving mechanism. By removing these unnecessary components, the mechanism is simplified while still achieving the desired storage space functionality through a more straightforward movable cushion design.
Solution Approach 2:
The center seat cushion is designed to be movable by user action itself rather than requiring a complex automated mechanism. The cushion can be manually raised or lowered by passengers, making the system self-service and eliminating the need for complicated mechanical linkages, thereby reducing weight and manufacturing cost while maintaining storage functionality.
Data Source
AI summary
A seat device for a vehicle includes: a seat cushion and a seat base of a rear row seat, the seat base mounted on a floor of a vehicle standing upward from the floor and forming a support structure of the seat cushion; a movable cushion portion forming a sitting surface for a passenger; a seat-cushion-moving mechanism to rotate and translate the movable cushion portion so that the movable cushion portion moves between a seating position, an extended position, and a tray position. In particular, a passenger sits on the movable cushion portion in the seating position, the movable cushion portion rotates away from the seat base in the forward direction to expose a lower side of the movable cushion portion in the extended position, and the tray position is obtained when the movable cushion portion translates rearwardly from the extended position with the lower side remaining exposed.