Asmo Co., Ltd.

Mazda Co., Ltd.

Sigeki Okabe

Kozo Odoi

Seiichi Omoto

Tatsuo Maeda

Masaya Horikawa

A drive device for opening and closing a vehicle top includes a pair of control devices each fixed in the side of the vehicle body, a falling pillar swingably supporting the vehicle top on the vehicle body and a pair of extendable link mechanisms that include link rods which are inclinable and which couple a swinging arm of the respective control device with the falling pillar. Each of the control devices includes a housing in which is rotatably positioned at least a portion of an output shaft for rotating the swinging arm, a driving device attached to the housing and generating a rotary driving force, a first reduction gear stage formed as a worm drive which is coupled with the driving device and which is housed in the housing, and a second reduction gear stage formed as a spur gear drive which is coupled with the worm drive for driving the output shaft and which is housed in the housing. A clutch disk is positioned on a gear shaft of a transmission gear in an axially movable manner and the clutch disk is substantially rotationally fixedly positioned on the gear shaft. The transmission gear forms a part of the spur gear drive. The clutch disk includes a connecting arrangement located in a side thereof for generating a claw clutch engagement with a connecting arrangement formed in a side of the transmission gear. A transferring device transfers movement of the transferring device to the clutch disk along the gear shaft in order to engage and disengage the claw clutch engagement.

Growing community of inventors

Toyohashi, Japan

Sigeki Okabe