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:
Feb. 02, 1999
Filed:
Aug. 08, 1996
Kurt R Kraft, Normandy Park, WA (US);
The Boeing Company, Seattle, WA (US);
Abstract
A hinge (50) for a panel (26) allows movement of the panel (26) between a closed position inside a framed opening and an open position away from the opening. In an exemplary embodiment, the hinge (50) is used to attach a fan cowl panel (26) to a jet engine (20). To prevent loading the hinge (56) in an axial direction when the panel (26) is in the closed position, the panel (26) is movable axially along the hinge line (66). In the past this has resulted in the fan cowl panel (26) being misaligned during closure between the inlet cowl panel (22) and the thrust reverser cowl panel (24) resulting in damage to the fan cowl panel (26) and surrounding structure. The hinge (50) of the present invention automatically aligns a V-blade (38) of the fan cowl panel (26) with a V-groove (40) of the inlet cowl panel (22) during closure of the fan cowl panel (56) in order to overcome this misalignment problem.