Patent ID: 7404570

Claim:
An air bag apparatus for a motorcycle having body parts including a frame for supporting a seat in which a rider sits rearwardly of handle bars, the air bag apparatus comprising: a retainer mounted to a portion of the frame; an inflator in the retainer; an air bag housed in the retainer for being deployed in a generally vertical upward direction in the event of forward crash conditions generally occurring forwardly of the handle bars; a rolled portion of the air bag in the retainer that is rolled in a predetermined rotary direction in the retainer so that the air bag unrolls in an opposite rotary direction during inflation in the generally vertical, upward direction and above the handle bars; a bellows-shaped portion of the airbag in the retainer having a plurality of straight uninflated portions that are interconnected by generally U-shaped bent portions so that adjacent straight uninflated portions lay flat on and against each other in the retainer with the bellows-shaped portion being between the rolled portion and the inflator in the generally vertical, upward direction with inflation gas from the inflator flowing through the bellows-shaped portion and then into the rolled portion so that the bellows-shaped portion is fully inflated before and below the rolled portion is fully inflated; wherein the airbag is rolled in an orientation that is centrally aligned over the straight uninflated portions of the airbag bellows-shaped portion for being inflated in the vertical, upward direction over the inflated bellows-shaped portion; and a lowermost uninflated portion of the rolled portion in the retainer that is directly connected to an uppermost one of the straight uninflated portions of the airbag bellows-shaped portion and which extends in the vertical upward direction therefrom from a lateral position that is spaced laterally across the uppermost straight uninflated portion from an uppermost one of the U-shaped bent portions of the airbag bellows-shaped portion so that with airbag deployment and prior to full inflation of the bellows-shaped portion with the straight uninflated portions reoriented to extend in general vertical alignment with each other, the rolled portion of the airbag will already have begun to unroll.