Technical Field

The present invention relates to a fence or guardrail, and more particularly to a prefabricated kit for constructing a fence or guardrail.

Background Art

There is considerable advantage in prefabri¬ cating the railings and balusters for a fence or guard¬ rail, whereby these elements can be erected on site with a minimum of tools and fasteners and the like.

There have been many examples of guardrail kits designed to avoid separate fasteners. An early version of such a kit is described in my US Patent 4,334671 issued June 15, 1982. Other such guardrails are illustrated in US Patents 4,390,164 Cokelekoglu, issued June 28, 1983; 4,451,025 Spera, issued May 29, 1984; 4,586,697 Tornya, issued May 6, 1986 and 4,805,879 Spera. All of these patents describe clip-on type kits, having a plurality of balusters to which the top and bottom railings can be snapped on.

However many of the kits referred to above have require special tools to erect the guardrails. Other available kits require several parts, making assembly complicated and generally requiring experts. Disclosure Of The Invention

It is an aim of the present invention to provide a kit for erecting a fence or guardrail that is devoid of separate fasteners.

It is a further aim of the present invention to provide a guardrail kit that uses conventional tools and includes few parts.

A construction in accordance with the pre¬ sent invention comprises a kit for a fence or guardrail which includes at least one railing and a plurality of identical balusters to be engaged in the railing. The

railing includes a bottom wall and a pair of side walls forming a channel, and at least a pair of inwardly extending flanges projecting from the side walls and parallel to the bottom wall. Each baluster has at least a portion engageable by the railing which has a circu¬ lar cylindrical cross section, and at least one rib projecting on the outer surface of the circular cylin¬ drical portion, parallel to the axis thereof. The rib is provided with a notch at a predetermined location thereon. The bottom wall of the railing is provided with a circular opening having a diameter slightly greater than the diameter of the circular cylindrical portion of the baluster, but less than the combined diameter of the circular cylindrical portion and the thickness of the rib. The bottom wall of the railing has a notch, opening into the circular opening, for receiving the rib when the baluster is aligned with the opening and the rib is aligned with the notch, such that the baluster can be inserted through the opening in the bottom wall with the rib aligned with the notch in the bottom wall and when the notch in the rib of the baluster is in the same plane as the bottom wall, the baluster can be rotated and locked with the railing.

In a more specific embodiment of the present invention the distance between the flanges extending inwardly from the side walls of the railing is the same as the diameter of the baluster and at least a notch is provided on one of the flanges adapted to receive the continuation of the rib on the circular cylindrical portion of the baluster in order to engage the rib and to prevent the baluster from being rotated about its axis when the baluster is engaged in the railing.

Brief Description Of The Drawings

Having thus generally described the nature of the invention, reference will now be made to the

accompanying drawings, showing by way of illustration, preferred embodiments thereof, and in which:

Figure 1 is a perspective view of a guard¬ rail in accordance with the present invention; Figure 2 is a fragmentary exploded view showing a detail of Figure 1;

Figure 3 is a fragmentary enlarged perspec¬ tive view taken from the bottom showing certain ele¬ ments of Figure 2; Figure 4 is a top plan view of the embodi¬ ment shown in Figure 3;

Figure 5 is a fragmentary cross section taken along lines 5-5 of Figure 4;

Figure 6 is a perspective view of an element of the present invention;

Figure 7 is an enlarged exploded view of the embodiment shown in Figure 2 but with the elements aligned and ready to be engaged;

Figure 8 is a vertical cross section showing the elements of Figure 7 in a position being assembled; and

Figure 9 is a vertical cross section showing another embodiment of the rail assembled on the balus¬ ter in accordance with the present invention. Mode For Carrying Out The Invention

Figure 1 shows a guardrail 10 having iden¬ tical top railing 12 and base railing 14, and a plu¬ rality of identical balusters 16, extending between the base railing 14 and the top railing 12. A cap 20 is placed on the top of the railing 12.

Selected balusters 116 extend below the railing 14 and are received within sleeve brackets 15 which in turn can be fastened to the deck or porch platform 17. Referring now to Figure 2 railing 12 is shown as including a bottom wall 26 with parallel side walls 22 and 24. The bottom wall is provided with a

series of circular openings 25 adapted to receive the balusters 16 as shown in Figure 3. A pair of opposed ribs 28 and 30 are provided on the inner surfaces of walls 22 and 24 and flanges 32 and 34 extend inwardly near the top of the walls 22 and 24. As shown in Figures 2 and 4, the flanges 32 and 34 are spaced apart a distance equivalent to the dimension of the outer diameter of the circular cylindrical body 40 of balus¬ ter 16. The flanges 32 and 34 are provided with opposed notches 33,35 respectively.

As shown in Figure 2, cap 20 has a channel shape with inwardly extending ribs 37 and 39 at the lower extremities thereof of the side flanges 20a,b. These ribs 37 and 39 are meant to engage the slight concave indents 36 and 38 formed in the side walls 22 and 24 respectively of the railing 12. Upstanding rein¬ forcement ribs 26a and 26b are also provided on bottom wall 26.

Each baluster 16 is provided with diametri- cally opposed ribs 42 and 44 which extend longitudi¬ nally of the circular cylindrical tube body 40 of the baluster 16. As shown in Figures 3 and 4, grooves 43 and 45 correspond with diametrically opposed ribs 42 and 44. As seen in Figures 2, 5, 1 , 8 and 9, the ribs 42 and 44 are provided with notches 46 and 48.

The bottom wall 26 is provided with notches 27 and 29 diametrically opposed on the periphery of opening 25 and located in the longitudinal axis of the railing 12. When a kit of balusters 16 and railings 12,14 is delivered for assembly, each baluster 16 is inserted into an opening 25 of the respective railings 12,14 with the ribs 42 and 44 aligned with the notches 27 and 29 in the bottom wall 26 as shown in Fig. 7. The baluster 16 is inserted until the notches 47 and 48 of ribs 42 and 44 are coincident with the plane of the bottom wall 26, so that the baluster can be rotated in order to fix the baluster 16 in the

railing 12 and 14. The baluster 16 would also be pro¬ vided with notches (not shown) corresponding to the plane of the wall 26.

The railing 14 can be identical to railing 12 but would normally be inverted so that the bottom wall 26 becomes the top wall. The assembly of the kit would include passing a baluster 16 through both a railing 12 and a railing 14. The baluster 16 would be rotated to snap into the notches 33 and 35 of flanges 32 and 34 of both railings 12 and 14, simultaneously.

By rotating the baluster 16 an angle of 90°, the ribs 42 and 44 engage the flanges 32 and 34 and spread them apart as shown in Figs 8 until the ribs 42,44 come into engagement with notches 33 and 35 on the flanges 32 and 34. The ribs 42 and 44 snap into the notches 33, 35, allowing the baluster 16 to be locked therein in view of the resilience of the railing to return to its rest position, as shown in Fig. 5 for instance. A tool adapter 50 is proposed in Fig. 6. The tool 50 is an adapter for use with a ratchet set (not shown) . The ratchet socket 52 is located at one end thereof, and the cylindrical adapter 50 includes ribs 54 and 56 adapted to engage the grooves 43 and 45 of the tube body 40. Thus, when the baluster 16 is inserted through the opening 25 with ribs 42 and 44 aligned with notches 27,29 in bottom wall 26, the adapter 50 is inserted into tube 40 and rotated by way of the ratchet wrench, to rotate the baluster 16 90° against the flanges 32 and 34 until the ribs 42 and 44 on the cylindrical tube 40 are engaged in notches 33 and 35, in flanges 32 and 34 respectively.

The cap 20 shown in Fig. 2 is then snapped onto the railing 12. Figure 9 shows a different embodiment of a top railing. The numbers identifying the various ele¬ ments of the embodiment in Figure 9 have been raised by

100. In the railing 112 of Figure 9 two pairs of flanges 132,134 and 162,164 have been provided on extended side walls 122 and 124. A cap 20 would engage the extended railing 112 in the same manner as the cap 20 with railing 12.