COAT FOR USE WITH VEHICLE SAFETY SEAT
A coat having a thickness of material in a chest region that is thinner than a thickness of material in the sleeves in order to allow a safety harness to be tightened snuggly against the chest of a wearer of the coat. A vest may be worn over the coat to augment the thermal insulating properties of the torso region of the coat when it is not being used with a safety harness. Alternatively, the coat may include a chest cover attached at the sides of the torso region, with the chest cover being opened at the front of the chest to provide access to the chest region for tightening of the safety harness, and closed after the harness is tightened to provide additional thermal insulation. Sleeves of the coat may include an outer material which can be removed for use of the coat in warmer temperatures.
This application claims benefit of the 1 Mar. 2016 filing date of U.S. provisional application No. 62/301,935.
FIELD OF THE INVENTIONThis application relates generally to the field of apparel, and more specifically to a coat configured to allow a child to be safely and warmly secured in a vehicle safety seat.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTIONIt is known to be difficult or impossible to properly secure a child in a car seat when the child is wearing a winter coat because the safety harness of the seat is not tight enough against the child's chest. The National Broadcasting Corporation's Today Show ran a segment of its Rosen Report titled Save My Life which featured crash test video of a child dummy being ejected from a car seat because the dummy was wearing a winter coat in the seat. Most parents prefer not to remove a child's coat before securing the child in a car seat because the child becomes cold. The use of a blanket to cover a coatless child in a car seat is also ineffective because the child may accidently or purposely remove the blanket. Thus, there is an ongoing need to provide a means for safely and warmly securing a child in a vehicle restraint seat.
The invention is explained in the following description in view of the drawings that show:
The present inventor has innovatively designed a winter coat that allows a wearer to be safely secured in a vehicle restraint seat while at the same time providing a high degree of thermal insulation for the wearer. This is accomplished with a coat having a relatively thinner material in the chest region of the coat and a relatively thicker material in the sleeves. The thin chest region material allows a restraint harness to be properly tightened against the chest of the wearer, and it provides a degree of thermal insulation for the torso of the wearer. The thicker sleeve material provides a high degree of thermal insulation for the arms of the wearer without interfering with the operation of the safety harness.
It is known that a person's hands and arms are particularly susceptible to feeling cold because they present a higher ratio of surface area to volume than does the torso of the person. The relatively thicker sleeve material of the present invention addresses this physiological reality by keeping the arms particularly warm. While a reduced level of thermal insulation is provided by the chest region of the coat, the wearer is less likely to feel cold because the torso is a high heat generating region of the body, and because the torso remains covered and is protected from drafts by the relatively thinner material of the chest region of the coat. Moreover, the back region of the torso of the wearer remains covered by the coat and is further protected from the environment by the restraint seat itself, thereby further reducing heat loss from the torso. For use of the innovative coat away from the restraint seat in very cold temperatures, a mating vest may be worn over the coat, thereby bringing the total level of thermal insulation around the torso to at least the level of thermal insulation provided by the sleeves. Various embodiments of the invention are described below in more detail.
The embodiment of
While various embodiments of the present invention have been shown and described herein, it will be obvious that such embodiments are provided by way of example only. Numerous variations, changes and substitutions may be made without departing from the invention herein. Accordingly, it is intended that the invention be limited only by the spirit and scope of the appended claims.
Claims
1. A coat comprising:
- a torso portion; and
- a pair of sleeves attached to the torso portion;
- wherein a thickness of a chest region of the torso portion is thinner than a thickness of the sleeves.
2. The coat of claim 1, further comprising a thickness of a back region of the torso portion is thinner than the thickness of the sleeves.
3. The coat of claim 1, further comprising the thickness of the back region of the torso portion being the same as the thickness of the sleeves.
4. The coat of claim 3, further comprising a chest cover attached to the torso portion, wherein a combined thickness of the chest cover and the thickness of the chest region of the torso portion is at least as thick as the thickness of the sleeves.
5. The coat of claim 1, further comprising a chest cover attached to the torso portion, wherein the chest cover comprises a left panel attached to a left side of the torso portion and a right panel attached to a right side of the torso portion, and further comprising a releasable attachment mechanism for selectively attaching the left and right panels together.
6. The coat of claim 5, wherein the releasable attachment mechanism comprises a zip fastener.
7. The coat of claim 1, further comprising a hood attached to the torso portion.
8. The coat of claim 7, wherein the hood is releasably attached to the torso portion.
9. The coat of claim 1, wherein the sleeves further comprise an inner material and an overlying outer material such that the thickness of the sleeves comprises a sum of a thickness of the inner material and a thickness of the outer material, and further comprising the outer material being releasably attached over the inner material.
10. The coat of claim 9, wherein the sleeve inner material is a same material as that of the chest region of the torso portion.
11. The coat of claim 10, wherein a back region of the torso portion is formed of the same material as that of the sleeve inner material and the chest region of the torso portion.
12. An ensemble comprising the coat of claim 9, and further comprising a vest.
13. An ensemble comprising the coat of claim 1, and further comprising a vest.
14. The ensemble of claim 13, further comprising a hood releasably attachable to the coat.
Type: Application
Filed: Feb 28, 2017
Publication Date: Sep 7, 2017
Inventor: MARYANN SORRENTINO (SOUTH PLAINFIELD, NJ)
Application Number: 15/444,384