Patent ID: 7536971

Claim:
A water craft with an automatic lowering tow tower, the water craft and tower comprising: a water craft having a bow, a mid-section, and a stern; a tower support structure firmly attached to the water craft and residing near the mid-section of the water craft; a pair of laterally spaced apart tower pivots attached to the tower support structure; a tower loop pivotally attached to the tower support structure by the tower pivots and forming a “U” shaped loop, an open end of the “U” to the bow of the water craft; and two lockable linear actuators pivotally attached between the tower support structure and the tower loop, the linear actuators having a retracted position, wherein the tower loop is lowered and an extended position wherein the tower loop is raised, and wherein the linear actuators jam-lock in the fully extended position until the linear actuators are reversed, the linear actuators comprising: an actuator body; an actuator motor residing inside the actuator body; an actuator piston residing partly in the body and longitudinally slidable in the body and having an inside end and an extending end; an actuator piston nut fixed to the inside end of the actuator piston and having internal threads; a rotatable actuator screw residing inside the body and having a driven end connected to the actuator motor and external threads engaging the internal threads in the actuator piston nut, and having an actuator piston end opposite the driven end; and a screw cap on an end of the actuator screw opposite the actuator motor, wherein, the linear actuator includes a jam-lock feature selected from the set consisting of: the screw cap includes a compressible material facing the actuator piston nut and the compressible material is jammed against the actuator piston nut to jam-lock the linear actuator in the fully extended position; and the actuator piston nut include the compressible material facing the screw cap and the compressible material is jammed against the screw cap to jam-lock the linear actuator in the fully extended position.