FIELD OF INVENTION
The present invention is directed to a floating oil seal for sealing the oil. This invention is applicable to Hydraulic Actuators for a big spectrum of functions including land vehicles and all types of machines and equipments which involve oil in contact with reciprocating and / or rotating parts . This can also be extended to Dampers , Shock Absorbers or Front Forks for stationary vibrating equipment and land vehicles and the like .
PRIOR ART
O Rings and Oil Seals of various profiles are used in hydraulic actuators , dampers , shock absorbers and many other engineering applications . Its applications are to restrict the oil to one chamber and not let out. of the system across a rotating or reciprocating shaft in the chamber as well outside that chamber. However, it is associated with a drawback that, many a times the rotating or reciprocating shaft of actuator or damper or any other engineering application is not coaxial with the chamber . The O Ring or profiled Oil Seal is mounted in the housing . It implies that, O Ring or profiled Oil seal will not be coaxial with rotating shaft / reciprocating shaft. This phenomenon leads to leakage of oil / early wear out of O Ring / Oil Seal .
In the known art sealing arrangements the oil seals ( O Rings or Profiled Oil seals ) are rigidly held in the housing relative to which a shaft rotates or reciprocates . This rigid arrangement is associated with the following disadvantages :
1. It is more often that the axis of rotating or reciprocating shaft is non collinear to the axis of housing .There also exists a possibility that, the oil seal on being assembled to housing may generate a new axis which is again non collinear to the axis of housing and axis of reciprocating or rotating shaft . This further reinforces the possibility of non collinear axis of rotation or reciprocation to axis of housing or oil seal.
2. The above non conformity leads to following two major problems :
a. The face of the oil seal will not be normal to the rotating /
reciprocating shaft throughout the periphery . Accordingly
there will be non uniform pressure of the oil seal on the
periphery of the rotating or reciprocating shaft . This will
cause over sealing at some sector and under sealing at
another . The consequence of the above is that - the system
can fail very fast based on the degree of non uniformity .
b. There will be non uniform interference between the rotating
/ reciprocating shaft and the oil seal . This will lead to quick
wearing of the oil seal where the interference more leading to
failure of the whole sealing system
OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
The primary object of the present invention is to provide a floating oil seal for sealing the oil which overcomes disadvantages associated with the prior art(s).
Another object of the present invention is to provide a floating oil seal for sealing the oil which is simple in construction.
Further object of the present invention is to provide a floating oil seal for sealing the oil which is efficient.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Floating oil seal is an arrangement which can be achieved in many a ways but the basic concept remains the same that the oil seal (whether O Rings or profiled Oil Seal) is not rigidly held to the housing and can align itself to the reciprocating or rotating part . Aligning of Oil seal with the reciprocating or rotating shaft ensures that the sealing lip or sealing contact is always normal to the reciprocating or rotating shaft and exerts more or less equal sealing pressure on the total periphery of the rotating
or reciprocating shaft . This ensures that rotating or ceciprocating shaft is subjected to equal sealing pressure throughout the life of oil seal and the sealing effect is uniform across the periphery of the rotating or reciprocating shaft. The above will result in high efficiency of oil seal in real life situations where due to variations in manufacturing there always exists some degree of non collinearly between reciprocating or rotating shaft and the housing or in turn the oil seal internal diameter . Also the life of the sealing will be very long in this case as compared to the standard fixed type oil seals.
STATEMENT OF INVENTION
According to this invention, there is provided a floating oil seal for sealing the oil comprising of a housing accommodating atleast two grooves with a controlled inside diameter therebetween, in which O ring is disposed in the groove.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE ACCOMPANYING DRAWINGS
Further objects and advantages of this invention will be more apparent from the ensuing description when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and wherein:
Fig 1 shows Housing for O Ring. Fig. 2 shows O Ring
DETAIL DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION WITH REFERENCE TO THE ACCOMPANYING DRAWINGS;
Reference may be made to different views of Housing for O Ring, which include front view , cut section view and an isometric view to explain the
complete constructional details of the housing for O Ring . As shown in the cut section view, the Housing is provided with atleast two grooves and one controlled inside diameter in between the two grooves.
Fig 2. shows the part view of the Front Fork Leg Assembly and its cut section view to show the Oil sealing region of the Front Fork . In this view, the assembly of Housing for O Ring and O rings on to the outer tube has been clearly shown. Also shown in the figure are other parts of the assembly such as spacer above the Housing assy and the dust seal . There is provided an inner tube which slides against the internal diameter of the
Outer tube housing . It also slides past the O Rings mounted in the Housing .
Description of the Preferred Embodiment
Fig 2 shows the cross sectional view of the sealing zone of the leg assembly of a Front Fork . This sealing pack can be of damper / shock absorber or any hydraulic actuator . We are showing a case study of reciprocating movement of shaft and the role of floating oil seal but the fact is that it is applicable for rotating shaft.
As it is evident from the fig 2 the O Ring can move in and out of the groove as there is a gap between internal diameter of the groove and the outside diameter of the O Ring . At the same time O Ring have an interference with both the faces of groove . This means the oil will not, be able to go past O Ring in any case . O Ring will always remain clung to the reciprocating shaft ( in this case ) even if the shaft has a different axis than the axis of outer tube due to standard non conformities of manufacturing . The O Ring will always be wiping out the oil effectively across the complete periphery of the reciprocating shaft (in this case ). The two O rings along with a
controlled internal diameter guide in between them in the housing makes the oil sealing even more effective.
It is to be noted that the present invention is susceptible to modifications, adaptations and changes by those skilled in the art. Such variant embodiments employing the concepts and features of this invention are intended to be within the scope of the present invention, which is further set forth under the following claims:-

WE CLAIM:
1. A floating oil seal for sealing the oil comprising of a housing accommodating atleast two grooves with a controlled inside diameter therebetween, in which O ring is disposed in the groove.
2. A floating oil seal for sealing the oil as claimed in claim 1, provided with a spacer above the housing assembly and dust seal.
3. A floating oil seal for sealing the oil as claimed in claim 1 or 2, wherein the oil seal is not rigidly held to the housing and can align itself to the reciprocating or rotating part.
4. A floating oil seal for sealing the oil substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawings.