Patent ID: 6435421
Filing Date: 2002-08-20
Classification: E01B

Abstract:
A rail for use in a track for a camera dolly or a camera crane having either conventional grooved wheels or conventional flat wheels, said rail comprising:a rail head having a substantially radiused top surface that would mate with a conventional grooved dolly wheel; said rail head having a pair of laterally spaced edges, for reference purposes one of said edges is referred to as an interior edge and said other edge is referred to as an exterior edge; said rail head having a vertically extending centerline axis that would align with a vertical centerline of a conventional grooved camera dolly wheel; said rail head having a bottom end; said lateral distance between said vertical centerline axis and said interior edge of said rail head is equal to a distance (r); extending downwardly from and connected to said bottom end of said rail head are a pair of laterally spaced side walls each having an outer surface; for reference purposes one of said side walls is referred as an interior side wall and said other side wall is referred to as an exterior side wall; said lateral distance between said vertical centerline axis and said outer surface of said interior side wall is equal to a distance (w) and (w) is at least equal to or greater than (r); a base and said interior side wall extends down to and is connected to said base; at least one longitudinally extending pin channel formed in said rail head adjacent its bottom end for receiving an alignment pin that would allow two rail segments to be butted together and securely aligned by fitting a pin into the pin channel and each of the rail segments to be joined; and said rail having been formed by an extrusion process with a longitudinally extending upper bore and a longitudinally extending lower bore that are vertically spaced from each other by an interior horizontal strip thereby forming a rigid truss framework.