TOY BUILDING SET

Abstract

A toy building set comprising separate building elements adapted for building a toy figure, the building elements comprising a number of body elements (1, 2, 3) that are interconnected or adapted for being interconnected by means of articulated joints, and where the toy building set also comprises a number of dressing elements (5) and means for mounting the dressing elements on the body elements. The toy building set further comprises a number of design elements (4), and the at least one design element and at the least one body element has a first type of complementary coupling means (7) adapted for releasably mounting the design element on the body element, and where at least one dressing element and the design element has a second different type of complementary coupling means (8, 9) adapted for releasably mounting a dressing element on the design element, so that it is not possible to mount the dressing element on a body element.

Description

The present invention relates to a toy building set comprising separate building elements adapted for building a toy figure, the building elements comprising a number of body elements that are interconnected or adapted for being interconnected by means of articulated joints, and where the toy building set also comprises a number of dressing elements and means for mounting the dressing elements on the body elements.

In this type of building elements the body elements are designed to be connected to each other via the articulated joints, in order to provide the possibility of building a toy figure. The purpose of the separate dressing elements is to provide the possibility of dressing the toy figure to illustrate clothes, helmets, armour or the like.

DESCRIPTION OF RELATED ART

Toy building sets for building toy figures are well known in many different embodiments in the prior art.

From EP patent no. 856341 e.g. is known a toy building set comprising a torso element, and a number of body elements that can be attached to the torso and to each other by means of ball and socket joints.

A problem with this kind of building sets is that the body elements do not look very much like real body parts or limbs, and therefore they do not provide much appeal to e.g. a child, using the toy building set.

A lot of other toy building sets also exist, such as disclosed in GB patent no. 1313277, where the body parts are designed to look like real or fantasy body parts, and thereby providing the possibility of building a complete figure by using the body parts only, where the complete figure to a much higher degree gives the impression of a real person, animal, monster, robot or creature.

A problem with this last mentioned kind of toy building set, however, is that a lot of the body elements have to be designed for a dedicated use in a specific toy figure, and thereby the freedom to build other figures by using the dedicated body elements is limited. As an example it is evident that a body element, being designed to look very much like an arm, would not be a very good element for a tail.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The main object of the present invention is therefore to provide a toy building set giving a high degree of freedom with respect to different use of the body elements, and on the same time the possibility of building bodies of persons or the like with very different designs.

This is obtained by the toy building set according to the introductory part of this description, where the toy building set further comprises a number of design elements, and in that at least one design element and at least one body element has a first type of complementary coupling means adapted for releasably mounting the design element on the body element, and where at least one dressing element and the design element has a second different type of complementary coupling means adapted for releasably mounting a dressing element on the design element.

Thereby it is possible for the child playing with the toy building set, to construct a bone structure for the figure that he wants to build, simply by using the body elements, and thereafter he can mount a number of design elements on the toy figure in order to put e.g. muscles on this bone structure, and at last to dress the figure by mounting the dressing elements on the design elements.

It is thereby possible to provide a set of very standardized body elements that are primarily designed for building a bone structure, and thereafter the same body elements can be used with very many different designs of design elements and dressing elements.

In a preferred embodiment the first type of complementary coupling means is incompatible with the second type of complementary coupling means, so that the dressing elements can not be mounted on the first type of coupling means on the body elements.

In another preferred embodiment the first type of complementary coupling means is adapted for providing a snap function for mounting the design element on the body element.

In a further embodiment the snap function comprises a ball and a socket.

In this relation the ball can advantageously be a part of the body element, and the socket be a part of the design element.

In order to avoid that the design elements, illustrating muscles or the like on the bone structure, is not possible to rotate around the ball, then it is further advantageous if the body element and the design element comprises positioning means adapted for fixing the two elements in a mutual position with respect to each other, when the design element is mounted on the body element by means of the first type of complementary coupling means.

In a further preferred embodiment the second type of complementary coupling means comprises at least one coupling pin arranged on one of the elements and a corresponding coupling hole arranged on the other one of the elements, and where the coupling pin and the coupling hole are formed so that insertion of the coupling pin into the coupling hole requires elastic deformation of at least one of them.

In this relation it is especially advantageous if the coupling pin is arranged on the dressing element, and the coupling hole is arranged on the design element. Thereby it is easier to design the design elements to look like e.g. muscles on the toy figure.

The dressing element can advantageously be made of a more resilient material than the design element, so that the pin on the dressing element can be made relatively thin and still be very resistant to breaking.

In a preferred embodiment, providing an efficient positioning of the dressing element on the design element, the second type of complementary coupling means comprises at least two coupling pins arranged on the same element, and a corresponding number of coupling holes arranged on the other element, and where the coupling pins and coupling holes are arranged with a mutual distance, allowing simultaneous insertion of at least two coupling pins into two coupling holes.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

In the following, the invention will be described in greater detail with reference to embodiments shown by the enclosed figures. It should be emphasized that the embodiments shown are used for example purposes only and should not be used to limit the scope of the invention.

FIG. 1 shows a toy figure.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view of one of the design elements according to the invention, and shown on the figure in FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 shows a dressing element.

FIGS. 4, 5 and 6 show different embodiments of body elements shown in FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENTS

The toy figure according to FIG. 1 has an articulated bone structure built by a number of the elements 1, 2, 3 shown in FIGS. 4, 5 and 6, and on this bone structure a number of design elements 4 are releasably attached by means of snap couplings.

At least some of the design elements 4 shown on FIG. 1 also have a coupling socket 8 comprising a pair of holes for mounting one or more dressing elements shown in FIG. 3. The dressing element 5 according to FIG. 3 has for this reason a pair of coupling pins 9 designed for insertion into the holes in the coupling socket 8 on the design elements.

An example of a design element 4 is shown in FIG. 2, and this design element is formed as a shell part. The shell part has the coupling socket 8 arranged on one side of the shell, and another coupling socket 7 arranged on the other side for mounting the design element on a body element.

The bone structure is therefore possible to build at first, so that it is easy to build a figure having the wanted bone structure and articulation, and thereafter it is possible to select and mount the design elements that give the wanted design of the toy figure.

At last a second layer of elements, namely the dressing elements can be mounted on the design elements.

FIGS. 4, 5 and 6 shows different embodiments of body elements 1, 2 and 3 according to the present invention, and as all of the body elements 1, 2 and 3 has at least one ball 11, and the two body elements 2, 3 shown on FIGS. 5 and 6 has a socket being formed as a complementary formed cup 13 such that it is possible to snap the complementary formed cup 13 on each of the balls 11. In this way it is possible to use the body element 1 according to figure 4 as a corpus for the figure according to FIG. 1, and the two body elements 2, 3 according to FIGS. 5 and 6 can be mounted on the corpus in order e.g. to represent an upper arm and a forearm respectively. In this case the two balls arranged at the middle of the upper arm and the forearm can be used for mounting a design element by snapping the socket 7 on the ball 11 such as it is shown in FIG. 5.

In this relation the socket 7 comprises side flanges 10 arranged on each side of the socket, so that the side flanges 10 engages with the outer surface of the connection rods 12 that connects the balls 11 and the cups 13. According to this embodiment the connections rods 12 has a square cross section at least at the end near the ball 11, and thereby the side flanges 10 arranged on the design element 4, ensures that the design element 4 is held in a fixed position in relation to the body element 2.

It will be evident to the skilled person that it is possible, without departing from the idea of the present invention as defined in the claims, to design a lot of different embodiments of the body elements, the design elements and the dressing elements according to the present invention.

Claims

1. A toy building set comprising separate building elements adapted for building a toy figure, the building elements comprising a number of body elements that are interconnected or adapted for being interconnected by means of articulated joints, and where the toy building set also comprises a number of dressing elements and means for mounting the dressing elements on the body elements, wherein the toy building set further comprises a number of design elements, and in that at least one design element and at least one body element has a first type of complementary coupling means adapted for releasably mounting the design element on the body element, and where at least one dressing element and the design element has a second different type of complementary coupling means adapted for releasably mounting a dressing element on the design element.

2. A toy building set according to claim 1, wherein the first type of complementary coupling means is incompatible with the second type of complementary coupling means.

3. A toy building set according to claim 2, wherein the first type of complementary coupling means is adapted for providing a snap function for mounting the design element on the body element.

4. A toy building set according to claim 3, wherein the snap function comprises a ball and a socket.

5. A toy building set according to claim 4, wherein the ball is a part of the body element, and the socket is a part of the design element.

6. A toy building set according to claim 4, wherein the body element and the design element comprises positioning means adapted for fixing the two elements in a mutual position with respect to each other, when the design element is mounted on the body element by means of the first type of complementary coupling means.

7. A toy building set according to claim 1, wherein the second type of complementary coupling means comprises at least one coupling pin arranged on one of the elements and a corresponding coupling hole arranged on the other one of the elements, and where the coupling pin and the coupling hole are formed so that insertion of the coupling pin into the coupling hole requires elastic deformation of at least one of them.

8. A toy building set according to claim 7, wherein the coupling pin is arranged on the dressing element, and the coupling hole is arranged on the design element.

9. A toy building set according to claim 8, wherein the dressing element is made of a more resilient material than the design element.

10. A toy building set according to claim 7, wherein the second type of complementary coupling means comprises at least two coupling pins arranged on the same element, and a corresponding number of coupling holes arranged on the other element, and where the coupling pins and coupling holes are arranged with a mutual distance, allowing simultaneous insertion of at least two coupling pins into two coupling holes. ii. (Currently Amended) A toy building set according to claim 5, wherein the articulated joints also comprises a ball and a socket, and where the ball is compatible with the socket on the design element.