Kawasaki Jukogyo Kabushiki Kaisha

Shinji Narita

Hideki Tanaka

Kazuto Fujiyama

Tadashi Anada

Kazuya Matsumoto

A spool valve capable of suppressing deterioration of position controllability of a spool due to misalignment includes: a housing including a spool hole; a spool inserted into the spool hole of the housing so as to be movable in an axial direction; and an electric actuator configured to move the spool in the axial direction. The electric actuator includes: an electric motor configured to rotate an output shaft; a linear-motion converting mechanism including a linear-motion member configured to be linearly movable, the linear-motion converting mechanism being configured to convert a rotational motion of the output shaft into a linear motion of the linear-motion member; and a coupling member coupling the linear-motion member and the spool moves in accordance with the linear motion of the linear-motion member. The coupling member allows one of tilt and eccentricity of an axis of the spool relative to an axis of the linear-motion member.

Spool valve

A spool valve includes: a housing including a spool hole; a spool inserted into the spool hole of the housing so as to be movable in an axial direction; a screw shaft arranged coaxially with the spool; an electric motor configured to rotate the screw shaft; a nut threadedly engaged with the screw shaft and configured to move in the axial direction when the screw shaft is rotated; a coupler through which the nut and the spool are coupled to each other; and a coil spring configured to apply biasing force to the spool, the biasing force acting so as to maintain the spool at a neutral position, the coil spring being arranged so as to overlap the nut when viewed from a radial direction of the screw shaft.

Growing community of inventors

Akashi, Japan

Shinji Narita