1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cable steering device in which a steering wheel and a steering gear box are connected to each other by flexible cables such as Bowden cables.
2. The Related Art
A conventional steering device for a vehicle is designed such that a steering shaft having a steering wheel at its upper end is connected at its lower end to a steering gear box, so that a steering torque inputted to the steering wheel is transmitted through the steering shaft to a rack and pinion mechanism provided within the steering gear box.
However, if the steering wheel and the steering gear box are connected to each other using the steering shaft, the following problem is encountered. That is, it is difficult to freely select the position of the steering wheel relative to the position of the steering gear box. For this reason, not only is the degree of freedom of the design limited, but also the steering gear box cannot be commonly used in both a right-side driven vehicle and a left-side driven vehicle. Moreover, there is another problem in that the vibration inputted from a road surface to a tire and the vibration of an engine are inputted through the steering shaft to the steering wheel, so that such vibrations detract from the calmness within a vehicle compartment and the riding comfort.
Therefore, in place of the conventional steering shaft, a cable steering device has been proposed which uses a flexible transmitting means such as Bowden cables (see Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 8-2431).
If the cable steering device is designed in the above manner, the position of the steering wheel relative to the position of the steering gear box can be freely selected and moreover, the vibration of the steering gear box is prevented from being transmitted to the steering wheel. Thus, the above-described problems can be eliminated.
In assembling such cable-type steering device, the steering wheel is coupled to the driven pulley and the follower pulley is coupled to the steering gear box, with the cables wound around the driven and follower pulleys. In this case, it is necessary to couple the driven pulley and the follower pulley to the steering wheel and the steering gear box with their phases aligned, so that when the steering wheel is brought into a neutral position, the wheels are brought correctly into their neutral positions and the steering wheel can be rotated through laterally equal angles. However, the conventional steering device suffers from a problem in that it is impossible to easily confirm from the outside whether the cables have been correctly wound around the driven pulley and the follower pulley, because the driven pulley and the follower pulley are generally housed within the housing.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds