Floor-mountable retractable roller device

Environmentally employable in combination with a slidable-door type open-wall and for maintaining an angular-dog type slidable-door in tight opening-obstructed temperature-protective contact adjacently about the wall-opening of a said upright open-wall, a floor-mountable retractable roller device including a floor-mountable horizontal base-plate and including a pivotably mounted elongate rear-arm having a rotatable horizontal-roller springably urged toward the slidable-door underlying angular-dog to temperaturely-protectively urge the slidable-door in closure-condition about the wall-opening. The springably urged force between the slidable-door lower angular-dog and the device horizontal-roller can be empirically adjusted with an adjusting screw disclosed herein.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
Building structures having horizontal-floors and upright open-walls 
oftentimes include an upright slidable-door horizontally movable across 
the wall-opening of an upright-wall having opposed upright surfaces. It is 
customarily required that the temperature-gradient between the 
upright-wall opposed parallel surfaces be protectively minimized whenever 
the slidable-door is placed horizontally across the wall-opening, and in 
this regard, prior art workers have sought to attain a tight 
opening-obstructed contact between the slidable-door's upright 
rearward-plane and the upright-wall peripherally about the entrance/egress 
wall-opening thereof. 
OBJECT OF THE INVENTION 
In view of the foregoing, it is the general objective of the present 
invention to provide improved apparatus and method for attaining 
heretofore unattained tight opening-obstructed peripheral 
temperature-gradient-protective contact between a slidable-door's upright 
rearward-surface and the wall-opening border of an upright-wall structural 
environment. 
GENERAL STATEMENT OF THE INVENTION 
With the above general objective in view, and together with other ancillary 
and specific objectives which will become more apparent as this 
description proceeds, this invention provides a novel "floor-mountable 
retractable roller device" comprising: a horizontal base-plate mountably 
superimposable upon a horizontal-floor and having a horizontal upper-plane 
located above a said horizontal-floor; a horizontally elongate rear-arm 
having a trail-end portion overlying and pivotably attached to an upright 
rear-station of said base-plate and having a lead-end provided with a 
horizontal-roller impingeable toward a lower angular dog of a 
slidable-door having opening-obstructed condition with a wall-opening; a 
springsupport extending uprightly from the base-plate; a helical extending 
horizontally from said springsupport to the trailing-end of a horizontal 
front-arm overlying said base-plate; said front-arm extending horizontally 
along a front arm-axis toward a front-arm leading-end for a finite-length 
and being leadwardly pivotably attached to a mid-part of said rear-arm; 
extending uprightly from the base-plate and directionally forwardly of 
said rear-arm, a rear-arm intrusive stop-means whereby said helical spring 
through said front-arm tends to maintain the horizontal-roller abuttably 
toward the slidable-door underlying angular dog to thusly maintain the 
closed-condition slidable-door in tight opening-obstructed peripheral 
contact about the wall-opening to protect the upright-wall 
temperature-gradient; and preferably also, means for adjusting the 
front-arm axial-length to control the degree of force impingeable by a 
said rear-arm horizontal-roller against the underlying angular dog of a 
said slidable-door toward a said upright-wall peripherally about a 
wall-opening thereof.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING 
Environmentally, for the novel "floor-mountable retractable roller device" 
(e.g. 9), of the present invention, there is an environmental 
slidable-door type open-wall (E) comprising an upright-wall (W) extending 
uprightly from a horizontal-floor substrate (FF) and which has an upright 
frontal-plane WF that is directionally horizontally interrupted by an 
uprightly extending wall-opening WA. Said open-wall environment (E) also 
includes an upright slidable-door D extending along an upright 
rearward-plane DR provided therethrough with a door-closeable 
opening-nonobstructed (FIG. 1) and door-opening-obstructed condition (FIG. 
2) conditions. The environmental slidable-door portion (D) immediately 
above horizontal-floor (FF) is equipped with an angular dog DG extending 
directionally forwardly transversely horizontally from a forward-plane DF 
of a said slidable-door D. 
For a said environment (F), representative embodiment (9) of the 
"floor-mountable retractable roller device" of the present invention, and 
employable for tightly maintaining environmental slidable-door D abuttably 
peripherally against environmental wall-opening WA in 
door-opening-obstructed condition (FIG. 2) primarily comprises a laminar 
base-plate 10 having a horizontal lower-plane (11) located below said 
angular dog (DG) and mountably super mposeable upon a horizontal-floor 
(FF) forwardly of environmental open-wall (E), In this regard, base-plate 
10 includes: 
a horizontal rear-side 10R immediately parallely confronting a said 
environment (E); 
a horizontal front-side 10F located finitely transversely for-forwardly of 
base-plate rear-side 10R; 
a horizontal upper-plane 12 overlying a said lower-plane 11; 
mounting means (e.g. screws 13, etc. ) for mounting base-plate 10 to a 
horizontal-floor (FF); 
extending rigidly uprightly from upper-plane 12 and located much nearer to 
front-side 10F than to rear-side 10R, a preferably peg-like rear-station 
16; 
extending rigidly uprightly from upper-plane 12 and located much nearer to 
rear-side 10R than to front-side 10F, a preferably peg-like springsupport 
means 15; and 
extending rigidly uprightly from upper-plane 12 and located directionally 
transversely between a said rear-station (16) and a said springsupport 
means (15), a preferably peg-like stop-means at the rearside of a 
horizontally elongate rear-arm 20 overlying base-plate 10 and having a 
trail-length part (21) pivotably attached to a said rear-station (16). 
A helical spring 30 horizontally overlies the base-plate (10) and includes 
a trailward-end part 31 attached to a springsupport means (15). 
Moreover, and common to both said door-opening-nonobstructed "ready 
condition" (FIG. 1) and to said door-opening-obstructed "actuated 
condition" (FIG. 2), the said "floor-mountable retractable roller device" 
representative embodiment (9) comprises: 
(i) a horizontally elongate rear-arm 20 extending horizontally obliquely 
forwardly from its pivotably-secured trail-end length (21) toward a 
lead-end length (22) thereof that is located directionally ally 
transversely between base-plate rear-side 10R and environmental open-wall 
(E) and which rear-arm is leadwardly provided with a horizontal-roller 23 
that is revolvable about an upright roller-axis 23A; and 
(ii) a horizontally elongate front-arm 40 overlying base-plate 10 and 
horizontally extending along a frontarm-axis 40A for a finite-length 
between a front-arm trailing-end portion connection (33) to a spring 
member leadward-end portion (32) and a front-arm leading-end portion (42) 
pivotal (43) to said rear-arm at a location intermediately between 
trail-end length (21) and lead-end length (22). The pivotal connection 
(43) and between rear-arm 20 and front-arm 40 is also located transversely 
rearwardly of a said base-plate upright stop-means (19). 
In view of the recitations made in sub-paragraphs (i) and (ii) of the 
instant paragraph, it will be readily appreciated that the aforedescribed 
roller part (23) will be resiliently manually urged (30) toward the 
environmental open-wall (E) and especially toward the slidable-door dog 
(DG) at the "ready-condition" (FIG. 1) and at the "actuated-condition" 
(FIG. 2). 
And also explanatory of the conclusionatory remarks of the immediately 
preceeding paragraph, it will also be readily appreciated that at the FIG. 
1 "ready-condition", wherein the upright slidable-door (D) is at 
open-condition (i.e. away from environmental wall-opening WA), the 
slidable-door's forwardly-extending lower-dog (DG) is not in transverse 
alignment with the apparatus (9) whereby a finite-gap (G) exists between 
horizontal-roller (23) and the slidable-door's upright forward-plane (DF). 
And also explanatory of the conclusionatory remarks of the second 
immediately preceeding paragraph hereabove, it will also be readily 
appreciated that at the FIG. 2 "actuated-condition", wherein the 
slidable-door (D) is brought to a closed-condition (i.e. manually 
horizontally moved adjacently forwardly of the environmental wall-opening 
WA), 
(i) the slidable-door forwardly-extending lower-dog (DG) becomes in 
transversely alignment abutment with the apparatus horizontal-roller (23) 
whereby the slidable-door's rear-ward-plane (DR) tightly abuts the 
wall-framework about environmental wall-opening WA; and 
(ii) whereby, because of the resultant tightly abutting relationship 
between the slidable-door's rearward-plane (DR) and the wall-framework 
peripherally about environmental wall-opening WA, differential 
temperatures existing between wall upright surfaces (WR, WF) are 
meritoriously protected. 
The aforementioned meritorious protection of the temperature differential 
is at least partially dependent upon the degree of force empirically 
effected between the base-plate springsupport-means (15) and the front-arm 
pivital-connection (43) to the rear-arm. Such empirically provided force 
might be alternatively provided: by empirical selection of the helical 
spring resiliency (30); or, by empirically selecting the front-arm 
axial-length (40A) between its terminii (41, 42). Inasmuch as the latter 
alternative is preferable from the economic and operational standpoints, 
the adustable-length front-arm alternative embodiment 400 of FIGS. 4A and 
4B will be described in the immediately ensuing paragraph. 
The empirically adjustable-length (40A) front-arm 400 depicted in FIGS. 4A 
and 4B comprises two separate parts (410, 420) slidably adjustably (430) 
horizontally extending along axis 40A for an adjustable front-length 
frontarm-length 40A (i.e. from 41-42). In this regard, there is described: 
a horizontal frontal-leg 420 that is pivotably attached (43) to a said 
rear-arm 20 and having a centrally-threaded upturned-end 421; and a 
rearward-leg 410 that is attached (41) to a said helical spring (30, 32) 
and having a horizontally centrally-threaded upturned-end 411 confronting 
the other upturned-end 421; and a horizontal adjusting-screw 430 
threadedly passing through said centrally-threaded upturned-ends 411 and 
421, whereby adjusting-screw 430 is capable of adjusting the 
frontarm-length 41-42 along axis 40A of front-arm embodiment 400. 
From the foregoing, the construction and operation of the "floor-mountable 
retractable roller device" will be readily understood and further 
explanation is believed to be unnecessary. However, since numerous 
modifications and changes will readily occur to those skilled in the art, 
it is not desired to limit the invention to the exact constructions shown 
and described, and accordingly, all suitable modifications and equivalents 
may be resorted to, falling within the scope of the appended claims.