Worm Screw Buckle for Weightlifting Belt Fine Adjustment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional weightlifting belts often fail to provide a perfect fit due to the spatial periodicity of holes, leading to either loose or overly tight belts, and their buckles can be flimsy, prone to snagging, and expensive to manufacture.
Innovation Solution
A buckle design for weightlifting belts that includes a car movable along rails, a worm screw for fine adjustments, and a compact, sleek design minimizing material usage and snag points, allowing for a more precise and snug fit than conventional buckles.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If conventional buckles are used with fixed hole spacing, then the belt can be worn with standard lengths, but the fit is imperfect and cannot achieve intermediary lengths between holes
Solution Approach 1:
The buckle incorporates a car that can move dynamically along rails within the buckle body, allowing the belt length to be adjusted continuously rather than in fixed increments. This dynamic mechanism enables intermediary lengths between traditional hole positions, achieving precise fit without requiring complex additional components.
Solution Approach 2:
The buckle is divided into distinct functional segments: a body with rails, a movable car with engagement elements, and adjustable components. This segmentation allows the car to move independently along the rails to achieve precise positioning, resolving the contradiction between fit precision and mechanism complexity.
2Reliability
If conventional buckles are designed to be rugged, then they provide high durability, but they become expensive and use more material
Solution Approach 1:
The buckle design utilizes thin-walled structures and optimized material distribution, particularly in the body and car components. The rails are formed as thin but structurally sound guides, and the overall design minimizes material usage while maintaining durability through intelligent structural design rather than excessive material thickness.
Solution Approach 2:
The buckle design allows for cost-effective manufacturing using plastics and other affordable materials. The modular construction with standardized components enables economical production while maintaining sufficient durability for the application, reducing the need for expensive metals throughout the entire structure.
3Strength
If conventional buckles are designed with robust materials, then they provide high ruggedness, but they increase manufacturing cost and material usage
Solution Approach 1:
The buckle can be constructed from composite materials or plastic-metall combinations that provide the necessary strength and ruggedness with reduced material quantity. The design allows for strategic use of materials where strength is critical while using lighter, cheaper materials in less stress-intensive areas, optimizing the strength-to-material-ratio.
Solution Approach 2:
The buckle design applies different material properties and thicknesses to different regions based on local stress requirements. Critical load-bearing areas receive enhanced material properties while non-critical areas use minimal material, achieving overall ruggedness without excessive material usage throughout the entire buckle structure.
Data Source
AI summary
A buckle configured to hold a wrapped weightlifting belt and provide fine adjustments to the snugness or tightness of the weightlifting belt is disclosed. The buckle may include an adjustable element, which allows the buckle to pull-in or ease the two ends of the weightlifting belt. The adjustable element may be a worm screw that can be rotated by a user to move a car of the buckle relative to the body of the buckle. The car may have legs that hold onto one end of the weightlifting belt via holes in the weightlifting belt, while the other end of the weightlifting belt is fixed to a fastener plate of the buckle. The buckle may include a wedge and lever design to latch the buckle closed. Additionally, the buckle's rugged design allows for the manufacture thereof with polymeric materials using low-cost manufacturing techniques, like injections molding.