Suspension of rails

Rails supporting vehicles are suspended under utilization of a mounting plate being laterally adjustable by means of a detent structure and oblong slots secured to a lowermost portion of support tower or the like and having four bores threadedly receiving four suspension bolts for a C-shaped bracket member having an uppermost suspension plate with arc-shaped bores for receiving the suspension bolts; a plurality of nuts threadedly secure the suspension plate to the suspension bolts from above and from below in an elevationally adjustable manner; the rail is secured to the lower portion of the bracket member.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
The present invention relates to the suspension of rails for supporting 
trolley vehicles or the like and including particular constructions by 
means of which the rail is suspended from a carrying, support tower or the 
like. 
A suspension for a rail of the type to which the invention pertains is for 
example disclosed in German printed patent application 1,808,210. The 
patent application particularly discloses a rigid suspension of the rail 
so that even vehicles running on the rail and having eccentrically located 
center of gravity can still be guided on the rail without swinging motion. 
This particular suspension, however, does not permit vertical level 
adjustment, for example for orienting the rail or for compensating level 
and height differences in the principle carrier construction. Such level 
adjustment is for example disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 1,188,659 and 
includes basically a bolt with an adjusting nut. The latter suspension 
however permits swinging motion of the rail. Since in that particular 
example as per the U.S. patent, the load is suspended to be basically 
below the rail such a swinging motion does not produce any disadvantage. 
However, the situation is different if the load (vehicle) is basically 
situated above or even along-side the rail, particularly as far as the 
location of the center of gravity of the vehicle is concerned. Lateral 
displacements and lateral swinging motions are not permitted in such a 
case and therefore the vehicle suspension must compensate against such 
undesired motion. 
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
It is an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved 
suspension for rails, the suspension permitting vertical adjustment and is 
to be provided to accommodate vehicle loads with eccentric center of 
gravity. 
In accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present invention, it is 
suggested to bolt a plate to the lower end of the principle support 
construction which plate supports in turn suspension bolts to which a rail 
supporting bracket can be bolted in vertically adjustable positions; 
preferably one uses four such suspension bolts so that even in the case of 
an eccentrical load upon the rail the bracket suspension will remain and 
will not escape, for example, through bending of any of the bolts. The 
rail is affixed to the lower end of the bracket which is preferably of a 
C-shaped configuration. The mounting plate from which the suspension bolts 
extend, is preferably provided with recesses for receiving the bolt heads. 
Moreover, this plate is to have at least one, preferably two, transverse 
slots for receiving bolts by means of which this support plate is 
laterally displaceably connectable to the basic support construction. This 
latter feature concerning the mounting is particularly important because 
it is not possible to determine in advance the exact position of the rail 
vis-a-vis the principle support system. The variability of a mounting 
plate in conjunction with clamping brackets engaging teeth on the mounting 
plate establishes a particular degree of freedom of adjusting the mounting 
structure in a direction transversely to the general extension of the rail 
to be mounted. On the other hand, the lateral adjustability of the 
mounting plate does not interfere at all with the angular and 
orientational adjustment and positioning of the rail and its immediate 
support bracket. The aforementioned mounting plate and the clamping 
brackets cooperate preferably by means of a plurality of detent teeth 
wherein each tooth is arranged to have a shallow angle towards the center 
of the system and a steep angle in the opposite direction. The 
bracket-tooth arrangement prevents an unwanted migration of the clamping 
brackets as a result of variable dynamic loads on the rail. 
In furtherance of the invention four bolts are provided on the mounting 
plate for purposes of suspending the principle bracket element and they 
cooperate with a plurality of four arc shaped slots in the suspension 
plate permitting for example the relative angular displacement of the 
mounting bracket by not more than about 45.degree.. This arc shaped 
arrangement of slots permits turning of the principle mounting bracket 
over a range amounting in effect to 50 percent of all possible positions. 
This basically is a matter of tolerances and, as an empirical value, was 
found to be sufficient to accommodate a large variety of possible 
misalignments inherent in the overall arrangement. Moreover, the 
particular arrangement and the constructural features permit a high degree 
of adaptability of the system to a variety of basic support construction. 
The mounting bracket for the rail has a profile which can be termed as I 
shaped, particularly in the basic part of its configuration. The bracket 
has a cross-shaped contour in the range of the suspension by means of the 
aforementioned suspending bolts whereby particularly the cross is 
established through flat suspension plate that receives the suspending 
bolts and a pair of upwardly and downwardly extending bars are provided so 
as to establish the cross. Essential here is that the arcuate slots are 
not interrupted. This means that the particular plate is not weakened by 
fairly long arcuate slots. The principle bracket has an overall C shaped 
configuration as was mentioned above, whereby the particular rail to be 
suspended is affixed to the lowermost point of the C while the upper part 
of the C is configured as the mounting part of cross-shaped configuration 
by means of which this mounting bracket is suspended through the bolts 
from the mounting plate mentioned above.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
FIG. 1 illustrates the lower cord 1a or construction part of a carrying and 
support construction 1 of general design. A mounting plate 5 (see also 
FIG. 4) is secured to this lower portion 1a of carrier construction 1 by 
means of four bolts 4 which also traverse clamping jaws 3 situated on top 
of this lower construction part 1a. These jaws 3 are provided with lower 
end legs 3a which bear upon upwardly directed teeth 5f of the mounting 
plate 5. FIG. 3 illustrates the particular tooth construction in an 
enlarged scale. The teeth have shallow portions or flanks facing towards 
the center and steep flanks that face outwardly. 
The mounting plate 5 is provided with four threaded bores 5a there being 
recesses 5b for receiving the heads 6a of bolts 6. The recesses 5b are 
actually provided immediately for guide rings 5c, which support directly 
the heads 6a. FIG. 4 illustrates further two transverse slots 5d which are 
traversed by the bolts 4 for purposes of adjusting the lateral position of 
the jaws 3 in the length direction of extension of these slots 5d. Jaws 
and teeth establish an adjustable detent arrangement that prevents 
migration of plate 5 under variable load. FIG. 1 illustrates particularly, 
that this lower end portion 1a of the support construction 1 may have 
different lateral extensions so that the adjustability of the relative 
disposition of the jaws 3 through appropriate configuration of this 
mounting plate 5 is an important feature. 
An upper end suspension plate 9a of bracket element 9 is provided with 
circular arc shaped slots 9d for being traversed by the suspension bolts 6 
which extend from below the mounting plate 5. Nuts 7 can be threaded on 
the bolts 6 to fasten the suspension plate 9a to the bolts from above as 
well as from below. Thus, there is a four point suspension with double 
nuts preventing any vertical displacement. The slots 9b have an arc length 
of 45.degree. and therefore permit rotational adjustment of the bracket 9 
about the common center of these four arc slots. This, of course, requires 
loosening of nuts 7. The bracket 9 with support and suspension plate 9a is 
therefore adjustably positionable in relation to the plate 5. As was 
outlined above, the lateral slots 5d permit lateral adjustment of the 
position of the mounting plate 5 vis-a-vis the support and carrier 
construction 1. Plate 9a has a cross-like configuration in a three 
dimensional pattern. 
It can readily be seen that in addition to the lateral displacement and the 
angular displacement of the bracket 9 it is also height adjustable due to 
the length of the threaded bolts 6 because the carrier plate 9a can be 
fastened by means of the nuts 7 to the suspending bolts 6 in a variety of 
levels. 
The bracket element 9 supports at its lower end a rail 2. In view of the 
adjustment as described in the preceding paragraphs, the rail 2 can be 
laterally shifted, lowered and raised as well as pivoted over a range of 
amounting to a total of 45.degree.. Bracket element 9 has a carrier plate 
9c of crimped configuration and receives the rail 2 in the illustrated 
orientation and disposition. The upper crimped end portion of plate 9c 
bears centrally from below against the upper portion 2a of the rail, and 
the central web 2b of the rail bears centrally against the flat part of 
plate 9c whereby laterally displaced aperture-holes 9d receive fastener 
bolts by means of which the rail 2 is fastened to and urged against the 
carrier plate 9c. 
Further features are to be seen in that the cross-section through the 
bracket element 9 has an I shaped configuration while the bracket element 
in the range of the upper, suspension plate 9a is a cross-like 
cross-sectional configuration as stated. This multiple cross-contour is 
chosen so that the arcuate slots 9b are not interrupted. The bracket 
element 9 as a whole has the configuration of a C and the bores 9d are 
laterally displaced from the plane of the C. The bracket element 9, the 
plate 5 and the clamping bracket 3 are preferably all made of cast iron. 
The invention is not limited to the embodiments described above, but all 
changes and modifications thereof, not constituting departures from the 
spirit and scope of the invention, are intended to be included.