This invention relates to a rope tensioning aid and also, in combination, a rope tightening aid with a vehicle load supporting facility having ropes which need to be tightened.

It is at the present time conventional to use ropes pulled tightly across a load on a vehicle tray and tie these ropes to a tie bar which extends below the circumference of the load carrying tray of the vehicle.

It is essential that such ropes or anything equivalent to ropes such as straps or even metallic strips be firmly tightened not only necessarily at the commencement of a trip but during a trip as loads might consolidate and shift and ropes stretch.

The task of continually tensioning such ropes can be arduous and wearying and the hands of the person so tightening the ropes, the present task being performed manually, can become chafed.

This will result in the ropes being not necessarily sufficiently tightened and in an extreme case this could result in a dangerous situation! arising.

I have discovered a device which when used in conjunction with a technique of using a rope or its equivalent, can significantly minimise firstly the possibility of a driver having hands which will become chafed, and further can result in the ropes being maintained at a high tension with less effort than previously necessary resulting in both better load stability and less chance in a dangerous situation arising.

The device which comprises a rope tightening aid comprises a member having the features that at an inner end there is a portion adapted to be retained for pivotable motion about a transversely located tie bar as this is conventionally located beneath the perimeter of a vehicle tray, and at an outer end means providing either a handle or a socket or spigot to support an extension providing for a handle to be located thereon, or in and located between such inner and outer ends, rope grippable means which are adapted to engage and firmly grip a rope when the member is caused to pivot about a tie bar in a rope tightening direction and provide a looser grip or release the rope when the member is caused to p-±vot about a tie bar in an opposite to the rope tightening direction.

Such a device is particularly suited to be used where a rope or of course its equivalent for instance a strap or cable is first looped around a tie bar as exists in a conventional load carrying tray of a motor vehicle and then further proceeds through a loop attached to a further portion of the rope so that the end of the rope might be engaged thereafter by the rope tensioning aid.

By use of the aid in such an arrangement, the rope can be tensioned with the mechanical advantage achievable by the rope passing through its own loop and around the tie bar, and this has the joint effect of firstly allowing the rope to be adequately tightened where the direction of pull is generally offset from the alignment of the rope to be tensioned and secondly that the rope once it has been tensioned can be manually held in the tension state.

In a further form then the invention could be said to reside in the combination of a rope tensioning aid as above characterised or subsequently characterised, with a load carrying tray of a vehicle having a tie bar beneath an outer periphery of the tray, and a rope extending around a load, also extending around the tie bar and passing through a loop located with and either comprising or attached to a distal portion of the rope, the rope extending from such loop to the rope grippable means of the rope tensioning aid and the rope being gripped therein, the rope tensioning aid having its inner end engaging the tie bar with however pivotable freedom about an axis aligned in the elongation direction of the tie bar.

In a broadest concept, the rope tensioning aid can be either an integral lever member with static rope grippable means or it can comprise articulate members with relatively movable jaws that tighten when the aid is moved in a rope tightening direction.

According to a preferred arrangement, the rope tensioning aid has two portions which are pivotably secured on with respect to the other, and the rope grippable means are comprised mating jaws, one secured to each of the two portions, the arrangement being such that the jaws are located in a position offset from -the pivot axis so that they will be caused to be forced together in a tighter rope grippable action when the aid is being pivoted in a rope tigh - ening direction.

In practice this can mean that the jaws can be located when the aid is in a rope tightening position, either above the pivot axis or below the pivot axis, the difference being that when the jaws are above the pivot axis, a jaw secured to a first member extends to an inner side of a jaw secured to the other member.

Preferably, there are resilient means retained to effect an urging of the jaws to assume a rope gripping position.

Preferably, the rope tensioning aid has at an inner end a portion of concave shape and adapted to locate around the tie bar of the tray of a vehicle.

Preferably, there is a resiliently retained lever arm adapted to hold the inner end in a supported position with respect to a tie bar of a tray of a motor vehicle.

With the aid as generally described or having the above characteristics, a very substantive tensioning force can be applied in a very effective and efficient manner especially useful for tightening ropes with respect to loads on motor vehicles.

For a better understanding of this invention it will now be described with the assistance with drawings in which:

FIG.l is a rear view of a portion of a truck with the rope tensioning aid being used in accord with the invention,

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FIG. 2 is an uppermost view of the preferred embodiment of the rope tensioning aid, and

FIG. 3 is a side elevation of the same embodiment as in FIG. 2.

In this embodiment, a rope tensioning aid 10 comprises an article which acts as an articulated lever and has an inner portio ^' 12 and an outer portion 13.

The two portions namely the inner portion 12 and the outer portion 13 are held together by a pin 14 which allows for relative pivotable movement of portion 12 with respect to 13. Hinge plates 15 and 16 provide a mutually engaging bearing surface to assist in the hinging action.

The pin 14 has at an outer end a head 17.

There is an axis 18 which passes through the centre a socket portion of member 13 and is generally aligned with an axis aligned in the direction of elongation of the tie bar 19.

The respective portions 12 and 13 have secured thereto jaws respectively 21 and 20 which are shaped at their mating edges to be co-operatively engaging a rope firstly so as not to unreasonably damage this but at the same time distort its path so as to effect a useful rope gripping action.

The jaws are appropriately of slightly concave shape across their mating surfaces to assist in maintaining the rope position centrally with respect to the jaws.

Affixed within a hollowed out portion ^' between the respective hinge plates 15 and 16 is a helical spring 22 one end of which is secured with respect to the portion 12 and the other end of which is secured to the portion 13 and the spring is biased so that in the position as shown in the drawings, there is a resultant pressure causing the jaws 21 and 20 to be caused to close together.

The result of this is that when an opening force is caused to occur, the spring 22 will act to close the jaws again so that when a rope is located between the respective jaws 20 and 21 there will be an initial closing force which assists in a starting position.

It will be observed especially from FIG. 2 that the alignment of the several concave portions of the jaws 20 and 21 Is such that these are aligned centrally with respect to the axis 18.

To ensure this, it will be noted that hinge plates 15 and 16 are offset to one side to accomodate this positioning.

At an inner end of the member 10 there is located a member having an inner arcuate shape especially of concave shape and adapted to engage around but still allow pivotable freedom of the member 10 about the tie rail 19.

The effective hook shape of member 24 is not entirely open but is provided with a closure tongue 25 which is pivotably supported about axis 26 and has a resilient compression spring 27 arranged such that this will close upon any tie rail located within the concave shape of the member 24 and generally hold the member 10 thereto except where this is removed with significant force.

The location of the inner end of portion 12 is achievable because of the slight convex shape of the underneath forward portion of member 25 so that this will ride up and around the tie rail 19.

Tie rail 19 is a rail as conventionally located beneath the outer circumference of the tray 27 of a vehicle 28.

In use the aid 10 is positioned as is shown in FIG. 1 and has attached to an end thereof an extension handle 29 by which substantial leverage in addition to that provided at spigot 30 is offered.

The ^' rope 31 is pulled in the first instance around the load 32 and is tied into a sheep shank type knot at 33 from whence the rope continues to pass around the tie rail 19 and then return at 34 to pass through loop 35 and then be gripped by the jaws 20 and 21.

The action as shown in FIG. 1 includes a downward pressure on the extension handle 29 which both pushes the jaws 20 and 21 together with substantive effort and this in turn pulls the rope so as to tension this substantively.

When the extent of the freedom of movement is achieved, the bottom of the rope 31 is hand held and by manipulation of pressures on the extension handle 29 the portions 12 and 13 can be articulated one with respect to the other opening the jaws 20 and 21 against the action of the helical spring 22 so that in effect the rope is pulled through the jaws in a released state.

The action is then in turn repeated so that in fact the rope 31 is pulled successively and held against return of the rope until sufficient tension in the main portion of the rope is achieved.

At this stage, the handle extension 29 is released with the aid 10 thereby dropping and indeed hanging from the tie rail and the rope Itself is tied off around the tie rail 19.

Upon completion of this task, in practice the tongue 25 is opened to allow the device' to be pulled away from the tie rail and the next rope along the load is then operated in the same way.

This then describes the preferred embodiment but it will be seen that there are many variations possible within the general concept without departing from the spirit of the invention.