1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicular lamp and more specifically to a vehicular lamp that has a reflector tiltable with respect to a lamp body and has an improved assemblability of the reflector and lamp body.
2. Description of the Related Art
In one of the known vehicular lamps, a reflector that holds a light source is tiltably supported by a lamp body, and the reflector is tilted by turning an aiming screw, which connects the lamp body and the reflector, from the back of the lamp body using a screwdriver or the like.
Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-Open (Kokai) No. 7-27004 discloses a vehicular headlamp of the type described above.
In the vehicular headlamp of Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-Open (Kokai) No. 7-27004, an aiming screw that has an umbrella gear integrally formed on the rear end is rotatably installed in the lamp body, and the tip end of the aiming screw is screwed into a synthetic resin nut that is installed in the reflector. The aiming screw is rotated using, for instance, a Phillips-head screwdriver with the tip end of the screwdriver meshed with the umbrella gear. The aiming screw is screwed into and out of the synthetic resin nut depending on the direction of the rotation, so that the distance between the reflector and the lamp body is changed.
The assembly of the reflector to the lamp body in the vehicular headlamp of Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-Open (Kokai) No. 7-27004 is performed in a two-step operation. First, the aiming screw is inserted into the lamp body from the back; a fix is pushed onto the aiming screw, thus allowing the aiming screw to be rotatably supported by the lamp body; and then, a reflector to which a synthetic resin nut is attached is set in a jig; and the aiming screw is turned and screwed into the synthetic resin nut until it reaches a predetermined position.
In the vehicular headlamp disclosed in Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-Open (Kokai) No. 7-27004, in order to assemble the reflector to the lamp body, a process of pushing the fix onto the aiming screw to rotatably install the aiming screw by the lamp body is first necessary. In order to push the fix onto the aiming screw, a fairly large size device is required, resulting in an increase in size of the assembly apparatus.
Furthermore, the distance between the reflector and the lamp body is set by the aiming screw which is screwed into the synthetic resin nut until a predetermined position, so that the tilt of the reflector with respect to the lamp body is, as a result, set to a predetermined state (or to a predetermined angle). Therefore, it is necessary to turn the aiming screw to be screwed into the synthetic resin nut until it reaches a predetermined position while the reflector to which the synthetic resin nut is attached is set in a jig. This process of screwing in the aiming screw, however, takes time, which means that the process of assembling the reflector to the lamp body takes time.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds