Rotatable Weather Strip for Vehicle Swing Doors
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Solution Overview
Problem
Airtight sealing between opposite swing doors in vehicles without a center pillar is compromised due to overlapping and friction, leading to wear and tear of weather strips, and insufficient sealing when doors are opened or closed in incorrect order.
Innovation Solution
A weather strip assembly featuring a rotatable main sealing member made of compressible flexible material, mounted between the rear end of the front door and the front end of the rear door, with sub-sealing members and a guide block to ensure airtight sealing and reduce friction, allowing doors to be opened or closed regardless of order.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If weather strips are mounted in both front and rear doors to achieve airtight sealing, then sealing performance is improved, but the weather strips overlap and wear down due to friction during door operation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent removes the weather strip from the front door, keeping only the weather strip on the rear door. This eliminates the overlapping and friction between two weather strips while maintaining airtight sealing through the single remaining weather strip and the door-to-door contact mechanism.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of having weather strips on both doors that overlap, the patent inverts the approach by having the door frames contact each other directly without overlapping weather strips, using a single weather strip on the rear door for sealing.
2Ease of operation
If opposite swing doors are configured without a center pillar to maximize opening width, then passenger access is improved, but airtight sealing between doors becomes insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The patent changes the sealing mechanism from overlapping weather strips to direct door frame contact with a single weather strip, altering how the sealing parameter is achieved while maintaining the no-center-pillar configuration for easy passenger access.
3Duration of action of stationary object
If doors are required to open and close in a specific order to prevent weather strip interference, then weather strip durability is improved, but operational flexibility is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
By removing the weather strip from the front door, the patent eliminates the interference that required specific opening/closing orders, allowing doors to operate independently without restricting operational flexibility while maintaining weather strip durability.
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
Enhances airtight sealing performance, reduces wear due to friction, and allows independent operation of doors, ensuring effective sealing and easy passenger access without the need for a specific opening or closing order.
Implementation Method 1
the main sealing member includes a compressible flexible material to airtightly seal between the rear end portion of the front door and the front end portion of the rear door
Data Source
AI summary
A weather strip assembly for applying to opposite swing doors configured such that a front end portion of a front door and a rear end portion of a rear door of the opposite swing doors are rotatably connected to a vehicle body respectively to allow sides of a vehicle to be open or closed and airtightly sealing a rear end portion of the front door and a front end portion of the rear door, may include a main sealing member mounted to rotate between the rear end portion of the front door and the front end portion of the rear door to airtightly seal between the rear end portion of the front door and the front end portion of the rear door while rotating when one of the front and rear doors is opened or closed.