The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 23, 1996
Filed:
Mar. 07, 1995
Jeffrey J Norris, Bloomington, MN (US);
ITT Corporation, New York, NY (US);
Abstract
A switching apparatus which includes a rubber keypad (32, FIG. 2) with a rubber cap (36) that can be depressed by a person's finger to snap a snap dome (52) that connects contacts (21, 22) of a first switch (70), provides increased tactile feedback to the person's finger. A keycap (42) of rigid material includes a cover (44) lying on top of the rubber cap and also includes a stem (54) that projects down through a hole in the cap, with a lower stem end (60) lying above the snap dome to snap down the dome when a person's finger depresses the cover. The tactile snap feedback is transmitted directly through the rigid material of the stem to the rigid material of the cover, to the person's finger to indicate that the switch has been closed. The cap has a radially outer part (84), and an electrically conductive element (82) is mounted on the outer part to engage contacts (23, 24) of a second switch (80) to close it, before the snap dome is snapped to close the first switch. The coupling portion (38) is designed to not produce a tactile response, and the conductive element is preferably of conductive elastomeric material to avoid a tactile feedback that would falsely indicate that both switches were closed.