Patent ID: 7487850

Claim:
A children's ride-on vehicle, comprising: a body having at least one seat sized for a child; a plurality of wheels rotatably coupled to the body, wherein the plurality of wheels includes at least one driven wheel and at least one steerable wheel; a steering assembly comprising a steering mechanism adapted to receive steering inputs from a child sitting on the at least one seat, and a steering linkage adapted to convey the steering inputs to the at least one steerable wheel; a drive assembly, comprising: a motor assembly including at least one electric motor adapted to selectively drive the rotation of the at least one driven wheel; a battery assembly adapted to selectively energize the motor assembly, and a velocity control assembly adapted to selectively configure the drive assembly to be in a plurality of drive configurations, the velocity control assembly comprising: a switch assembly including at least one switch, wherein the switch assembly is adapted to be selectively configured between a plurality of velocity settings, and wherein each velocity setting in turn configures the drive assembly to be in a predetermined drive configuration; an actuator assembly adapted to receive user inputs from the child sifting on the at least one seat, wherein the actuator assembly includes: a shifter handle adapted to be selectively moved by the child between a plurality of shift positions along a plurality of shift paths, including between a first shift position and a second shift position along a first shift path, and a second shift position and a third shift position along a second shift path, wherein the first shift path is not co-linear with the second shift path; and a biasing mechanism that urges the shifter handle towards a selected one of the shift positions; and wherein the actuator assembly includes an actuator operatively coupled to the shifter handle, and less than all movements of the shifter handle cause movement of the actuator, and wherein the actuator configures the switch assembly to be in a first velocity setting when the shifter handle is in the first shift position, a second velocity setting when the shifter handle is in the second shift position, and a third velocity setting when the shifter handle is in the third shift position.