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:
Aug. 01, 2000
Filed:
Sep. 24, 1998
Robert H Howe, Bend, OR (US);
Other;
Abstract
A tent clip design for coupling with similar adjacent clips comprises a C-shaped upper portion (11) that can be snapped onto a tent pole (12), a webbing slot (19) at the bottom for attaching a loop of webbing (20) extending up from the tent (21) below, a laterally extending tongue (14) with a toothed lower surface (15) near its distal end, and a corresponding tongue slot (16) immediately below the tongue with a toothed upper surface (17) on its lower edge to join in locked engagement with the toothed lower surface (35) of tongue (34) of a similar adjacent tent clip (30) when two or more similar clips are aligned and pressed together. The portion of the clip below the tongue slot is made of flexible material and comprises flexible portion (18) of the clip. A user of the clip can interlock the clip with similar adjacent clips into clusters which can be far more rapidly mounted than can the same number of separated clips, and with considerably less likelihood of being attached in the wrong sequence or orientation, or attached to the wrong pole. Once the clusters are mounted on the poles, a user of the clips can pull down on loops of webbing (20) residing in webbing slots (19) to temporarily widen tongue slots (16) and axially release any toothed tongues held within the tongue slots. The user can thus disengage interlocked clips individually or may disengage them in groups by pulling simultaneously on their webbing or on the attached tent fabric. Thus the tent clip considerably simplifies and expedites the otherwise tedious process of connecting tent clips to overlying support poles. This will greatly reduce the exposure of mountaineers, particularly less experienced mountaineers, to the extreme weather conditions commonly prevailing when tents are erected at high altitudes.