The world is literally full of inventions of any kind: some technologies are world changing and has important impact on economic and social life and some others technologies are more simple and developed just to make life easier.
To this second category belongs the invention we would like to introduce today for our “Patents world” section: the collapsible wagon or “Fold-It & Go Portable Wagon”, invented by Tami Galt. Let’s see the invention on the following video, developed by David Freeman for PBS Digital Studios:
The idea is so simple that is brilliant, like most of the technical solution to a simple “everyday life” problem. Tami Galt got the idea of her collapsible wagon boing to the farmers market and having too much to carry; looking around her, she noticed a few people with a nice wagon, but hard to fit into the car.
That is how she came with the invention of making a collapsible wagon: a simple thing, which can make life much easier and can be used on many ways.
How does the collpasible wagon works? How it has been made? Easy: “is comprised of a rectangular bag and flexible support panel positioned within a rectangular frame, and wheels connected to the frame by legs. The frame is comprised of pairs of scissoring members on the ends and sides for being quickly collapsible in two dimensions. The ends of the scissoring members in each pair are offset toward each other at the corners of the frame to avoid binding during folding. An arched section is provided in each leg at one end of the frame that curve around the wheel at the other end of the frame when folded. A flexible bag is attached to the top corners of the frame, but not to the bottom corners to enable the frame to be collapsed. The flexible support panel is attached to the bottom corners of the frame to prevent the bag from sagging under a heavy load.” , as it is specified in the abstract of the patent document: US6491318
