Rotatable Cable Guide with Snap-Fit Roller for Wire Basket Tray Corners
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Solution Overview
Problem
Cable installation is challenging at corners and turns in wire basket cable trays due to the risk of cable damage and tangling, and low-voltage cables require specific bend radius compliance, particularly avoiding 90-degree corners.
Innovation Solution
A cable guide with a rotatable stem and snap-fit components that securely attach a roller to the stem, allowing for easy alignment and secure attachment to the wire basket cable tray, ensuring cable alignment and protection at turns without additional tools or fasteners.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If cables are manually guided around corners and turns in wire basket cable trays, then cable installation can be completed, but there is a risk of cable damage, tangling, and failure to meet bend radius requirements
Solution Approach 1:
A cable guide device is introduced as an intermediary component between the cable and the cable tray corner. The guide includes a guide body with a curved surface that mediates the cable's path around the corner, preventing direct contact with sharp edges and ensuring proper bend radius compliance while simplifying the installation process.
Solution Approach 2:
The cable guide is pre-installed on the cable tray at the corner location before cable installation. This preliminary action prepares the path for the cable, ensuring that when the cable is later installed, it automatically follows the correct trajectory with proper bend radius without requiring manual guidance or risk of damage.
2Reliability
If cable guides are securely attached to wire basket cable trays, then cable alignment and protection are ensured, but installation complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The cable guide incorporates a self-retaining mechanism where the guide body's geometry allows it to automatically secure itself to the cable tray wires. The guide body can be inserted through the tray wires and then rotated or manipulated to lock into place, eliminating the need for external fasteners, tools, or complex attachment procedures while ensuring reliable cable alignment.
3Stability of the object's composition
If cable guides are designed with secure attachment mechanisms, then the guide remains fixed during cable installation, but the attachment process requires additional tools or fasteners
Solution Approach 1:
The cable guide is designed with integrated retention features where the guide body itself serves as both the guiding element and the attachment mechanism. The guide can be manually inserted through the cable tray wires and then secured by rotating or manipulating the guide body, which causes it to lock onto the wires without requiring any additional fasteners, tools, or complex assembly steps.
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 cable guide effectively guides cables around corners and bends, preventing damage and tangling while adhering to bend radius requirements, ensuring secure and tool-free installation on wire basket cable trays.
Implementation Method 1
The snap-fit component is resiliently deflectable relative to the stem body
Implementation Method 2
The roller is sized and shaped to be slidably received on the stem body
Data Source
AI summary
A guide body for a cable guide includes a stem having an upper end, a lower end, and a longitudinal axis extending between the upper and lower ends, and base adjacent the lower end of the stem. The guide body is rotatable about the longitudinal axis of the stem to configure the base from an unlocked orientation relative to the wire basket cable tray, in which the base is receivable in and removable from a floor opening of a wire basket cable tray, and a locked orientation relative to the wire basket cable tray, in which the base is secured to the wire basket cable tray in the floor opening. A snap-fit component attaches a roller retainer to a stem body by snap-fit connection when a roller is received on the stem body to retain the roller on the stem body.