Abstract: A garden tiller tine assembly for use with a tiller assembly which includes a drive shaft having a longitudinal axis of rotation includes a rotary blade aligned at a predetermined angle with respect to the axis of rotation. The planar body of the rotary blade is angled at a dihedral angle with respect to a plane normal to the axis of rotation. Upon rotation of the tine assembly about the axis of rotation, the rotary blade oscillates laterally from side to side along the axis of rotation to cut a wider path through the soil than conventional rotary blades.

Abstract: A brake caliper is provided for applying a braking force to a wheel, rotor, disc, or the like. The caliper includes a brake actuator, an actuator housing, a bearing for rotatably and slideably receiving the brake actuator in the actuator housing, and a ramp for displacing the brake actuator in an axial direction in relation to the actuator housing between an inactive position and a brake-actuating position in response to rotation of the brake actuator. At least one braking pad is actuable to apply a braking force in response to predetermined axial displacement of the brake actuator. The ramp includes at least one contoured camming surface inclined in a counterclockwise direction and at least one contoured camming surface inclined in a clockwise direction. Axial displacement of the brake actuator is accomplished by camming engagement between the brake actuator and one of the contoured camming surfaces formed in the ramp block.

Abstract: A rotary lawn mower blade mounted on a blade carrier by diametrically spaced bolts is further retained against release from the drive shaft by a retainer fixed on the drive shaft and having a shank extending through a central opening in the blade and having an enlarged head to obstruct separation of the blade from the retainer. Preferably, the blade opening is larger than the shank and the retainer head is in the form of a transverse bar, narrower than such opening, so that the blade can be removed by manipulation in one direction to an eccentric position, then tilted to disengage it from one end of the bar, and then moved in the opposite direction to disengage it from the other end of the bar.

Abstract: A combined safety clutch and brake mechanism for a rotary lawn mower blade has a driven blade carrier with self-energizing centrifugal shoes biased to engagement with a driving drum. Brake drum segments fixed to the shoes are engaged by a brake band which physically forces the shoes to declutched position. To ensure reliable operation, the brake band is connected to a lever arm which is strongly biased to brake-ON position by a coil spring engaged about a guide rod and disposed along the movable end portion of the brake band, in a chordal position between the band and a surrounding protective bowl. The geometry of the lever arm and spring thrust line progressively reduces the force required to actuate the brake band to OFF position, relative to the spring force, as the lever arm is moved and the spring compressed.

Abstract: A lawn trimmer has a tubular shaft assembly which structurally and drivingly connects an upper power head to a lower rotary tool head in a lawn-trimming tool. The assembly includes a bent portion to dispose its opposite ends at an angle to each other, and comprises an outer frame shaft of relatively large diameter and structural strength and an inner sheath tube of relatively smaller diameter formed of rigid but bendable tubing extending coaxially of the frame tube. The sheath tube is supported over the bent length of the assembly by a continuous semirigid bushing, and its lower end is held coaxial with the lower end of the frame tube by a substantially rigid bushing. The lower end of the frame tube, beyond such rigid bushing, is expanded to form a sleeve of enlarged diameter and predetermined length, and an arbor assembly is mounted in such sleeve and consists of a pair of ball bearings mounted by their inner races on the arbor and having their outer races supportingly received in the sleeve.

Abstract: A lawn mower blade clutch-brake mechanism having a driving drum and a driven blade carrier, the carrier having clutch shoes engageable with the inside of the drum and brake drum segments fixed to the shoes and disposed outside the drum for engagement by an encircling brake band which both applies braking drag and mechanically forces the segments inward to disengage the clutch shoes, and including the improvement that the clutch shoes are pivoted to the carrier at their leading ends in the direction of rotation so as to be aggressive and self-energizing, and the segments are pivoted on the same pivots and have trailing ends which are swung outward from a cylindrical position concentric with the axis of rotation when the clutch shoes are engaged so that the segments are first engaged by the brake band at and in the direction of their outward sloping trailing ends.

Abstract: A lawn mower engine having a lightweight top rotor of low polar inertia drives a rotary blade through a clutch-flywheel rotor having sufficient inertia to provide the major flywheel effect for the engine. Clutch faces at the rotor periphery engage a surrounding blade-carrier drum and have a maximum torque arm for positively driving the blade. The faces are preferably on centrifugal shoes which slip at load-reduced speed so as to maintain engine operation, and release at idling speed to allow engine starting with the blade stopped. A brake band or ring about the drum is spring-pressed ON to stop the blade when a deadman control is released. The preferred clutch-flywheel rotor is made of two heavy circular plates (e.g., 1/4".times.6") riveted together against spacer slugs and a shouldered hub. Wide clutch shoes are mounted on such rotor by end tangs and springs between the plates. The top rotor plate substantially closes the top of the drum. Access and hub openings in the two plates provide rotor spacer slugs.

Abstract: A warning device for a lawn mower having a rotary blade driven from a motor through a centrifugal clutch and normally held stopped by a brake which is released by a deadman control. The warning device comprises a flexible clicker post such as a close-wound helical spring carried by the clutch driver and having a weighted clicker head at its free end which normally stands in the path of a blade-mounting nut or other striker on the clutch-driven part so that the clicker head on the post will be repeatedly struck by the nut or other striker in the event the clutch driver element is stopped while the brake is disengaged and allows the blade to rotate under its own momentum. When the clutch driver is rotating at normal driving speed, centrifugal force bends the flexible arm to carry the clicker head out of striking relation with the striker element on the driven clutch part.

Abstract: A combined engine flywheel and centrifugal clutch driver for a rotary lawn mower blade. Two heavy circular plates, as a quarter-inch steel plate, of large diameter, e.g., six inches, are riveted together against three peripherally spaced pairs of spacer slugs stamped from the same material, and against a central shouldered hub. This forms a rotor of sufficient rotational inertia when mounted on the depending shaft of a mower engine to provide the principal flywheel effect for an engine having a relatively lightweight magneto and fan rotor at its top end.

Abstract: A drive and frame shaft assembly for a lawn trimming tool or the like, having a bent portion to dispose the tool end of the assembly at an angle to the head end thereof.

Abstract: A coil spring clutch connects a driving hub to a driven sleeve rotatable on the hub and the sleeve drives an output or second driven member through a torque limiting clutch. The spring is readily declutched by arresting rotation of its leading end, as by interposing a stop in the path of an out-turned tang on that end, and is re-engaged by releasing the leading end. Re-engagement is characteristically abrupt and harsh, and the torque-limiting clutch in series with the spring clutch limits torque stress on the spring so that the series assembly is usable in applications which would destroy the spring clutch alone. The torque-limiting clutch may be a spring-biased friction clutch. The driven members are desirably mounted on the driving hub in a compact unitary assembly.

Abstract: A lawm trimmer chain saw conversion attachment has a mounting blade which mounts to a chain saw power head in place of the chain bar. The blade supports a housing formed of complementary die-cast halves which contains bevel gears between an input shaft that is chain driven at reduced speed from the saw drive sprocket and an output shaft that couples to the flexible drive shaft of a lawn trimmer frame tube. The frame tube is clamped at its upper end between half-sleeves on the housing halves, and carries a rotary cutter head at its lower end. A D-handle on the frame tube cooperates with the saw handle for convenient manipulation and control. The frame tube is rotatably adjustable and the D-handle is both axially and rotatably adjustable to adapt the assembly to the operator's convenience and to the desired operating angle of the cutter head, e.g., for horizontal lawn trimming, angular edging, sweeping, etc.

Abstract: A warning device for a lawn mower having a rotary blade driven from a motor through a centrifugal clutch and normally held stopped by a brake which is released by a deadman control. A clicker arm is pivoted to the clutch driver and spring-pressed toward engagement with the driven clutch drum so as to repeatedly strike a notch therein and sound a warning in the event the motor stops and thereby stops the driving clutch element while the brake is disengaged and allows the blade to spin from its own momentum. A centrifugal weight connected to the clicker arm retracts it when the clutch drive is operating normally.

Abstract: A rotary cutter head for a lawn trimmer or the like has a die cast head body comprising a top circular wall and a depending hub, with a plate riveted to the bottom of the hub for forming a spool to receive a winding of flexible cutting line such as monofilament nylon. A peripheral depending skirt on the circular wall is segmented by spaced downward open notches defined at their axial sides and their tops by convex faces, so as to form line apertures. A molded bottom glide cup has its cylindrical side wall inside and spaced from the segmented skirt by a distance less than the line thickness, with its top edge close below the tops of the notches. The body is mounted on a drive arbor by a nut seated in and removable by manual rotation of the glide cup relative to the body.The cutting line end extends from the winding, over the cup wall edge, through the top of the notch, and then outward in a free length which forms the cutting element.

Abstract: A lawn mower blade mounted coaxially at the bottom of a vertical engine drive shaft is normally de-clutched from the shaft and stopped by a brake. When the engine is accelerated, the blade is released by the brake and clutched by a centrifugal clutch to the engine driven shaft. The blade carrier and clutch and brake drum are included in a compact assembly on a hub and mounted as a unit on the engine shaft. To replace the flywheel effect normally provided by a blade fixedly mounted on the engine shaft, the unitary assembly also includes a flywheel mounted on the hub. The assembly and flywheel are protected from blade cuttings by a protective bowl shaped to surround the flywheel and form a mounting platform for a brake band about the drum.

Abstract: A drive and frame shaft assembly for a lawn trimming tool or the like, having a bent portion to dispose the tool end of the assembly at an angle to the head end thereof.

Abstract: A centrifugal clutch and variable-speed pulley has a movable pulley flange mounted for both axial and rotational movement relative to a fixed flange. The fixed flange hub has a cylindrical primary bearing at the opposite side of the pulley groove from the flange and has a hub extension of reduced diameter which provides an elongated outboard bearing surface. The movable flange is on a hub sleeve which has an elongated internal bearing liner engaging the primary bearing and has an outboard bearing riding on the hub extension surface. The hubs have counterbores defining a spring chamber about the hub extension, where a spring acts to urge the flanges apart. Thrust faces on the hubs, radially outward of the spring, come together to limit flange closing movement.

Abstract: A coil spring clutch connects a driving hub to a driven sleeve rotatable on the hub and the sleeve drives an output or second driven member through a torque limiting clutch. The spring is readily declutched by arresting rotation of its leading end, as by interposing a stop in the path of an out-turned tang on that end, and is re-engaged by releasing the leading end. Re-engagement is characteristically abrupt and harsh, and the torque-limiting clutch in series with the spring clutch limits torque stress on the spring so that the series assembly is usable in applications which would destroy the spring clutch alone. The torque-limiting clutch may be a fully-releasable centrifugal clutch, in which case, the spring declutching mechanism may be actuated in common with or in response to application of a brake to stop the second driven member, or may be a frictionally-engaged centrifugal clutch or a spring-biased friction clutch.

Abstract: Mounting and control apparatus for a driven element such as a lawn mower blade mounted coaxially on an engine drive shaft, in an arrangement in which, under control of a deadman lever, the driven element is normally de-clutched from the shaft and stopped by a brake, as when the driving engine is idled, and for operation is released by the brake and clutched by a centrifugal clutch to the drive shaft, as when the engine is speeded up. The compact nested assembly includes a driven drum element having an outer cylindrical brake and clutch drum and an inner bearing ring which lies within the axial length of the drum and is mounted on the outer race of a ball bearing carried by a reduced-diameter bearing sleeve on a main hub fixed to the motor shaft. A clutch carrier plate on the hub carries centrifugal shoes engageable with the inside of the drum and partially nested between it and the bearing ring. The hub carries a flywheel when the engine is designed to depend on the mower blade for flywheel mass.