Importance

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Abstract

The housing of a shock absorber is constructed to include an inner chamber surrounded by an outer chamber. The inner chamber is divided by the piston to which the piston rod is connected into two portions. One of these portion has a number of orifices that fluidly connect that portion to the outer chamber. A piston slidably and movably fitted along the length of the outer chamber divides the outer chamber into two compartments, one of which is in fluid communication with the portion of the inner chamber to which it is connected by means of the orifices. An incompressible fluid is provided in the fluidly interconnected compartment and portion. A biasing force acts against the piston in the outer chamber by means of a pressurized gas provided in the other compartment of the outer chamber. With the shock absorber thus constructed, when the piston rod moves, the piston to which it is connected would force an exchange of fluid between the inner chamber and the outer chamber, which acts as a reservoir. Both the size of the orifices and the pressure of the gas that acts against the piston in the outer chamber contribute to defining the stiffness of the shock absorber, i.e., how much dampening is to be effected to the movement of the piston rod relative to the housing. Another embodiment of the shock absorber partitions the outer chamber into three compartments, with the two end compartments being in fluid communication with the inner chamber. An alternative embodiment of the shock absorber is constructed with coacting pairs of plunger/bore and plunger/cavity for enhancing the damping effect of the shock absorber.

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First Claim