Floating pivot hinge and knee brace

Abstract

A knee brace includes a thigh cuff having inner and outer spaced brace arms adapted to extend along the user's thigh toward the knee, a calf cuff including inner and outer spaced brace arms adapted to extend along the user's calf toward the knee, and floating pivot axis hinges rotatably connecting the inner and outer brace arms of each pair. The hinge is formed by a pair of juxtaposed hinge plates, each having a pivot face in opposition to a pivot face on the juxtaposed plate, with a concave groove in each of the face. A pivot bearing ball is confined between the opposed faces and retained in the concave grooves. A spring, bellville spring, or disk spring biases the hinge plates together when the pivot bearing ball is positioned in the opposed grooves between. The pivot bearing ball provides a floating pivot axis for hinge rotation of said hinge plates and thereby said braces relative to each other, the ball and concave grooves allowing the hinge plates simultaneously to slide and pivot relative to each other. The pivot axis floats between the hinge plates depending on the degree of pivoting and sliding movement in a wearer' s knee joint as a result of flexion thereof.