Side-by-side household refrigerators include a fresh food storage compartment and a freezer storage compartment. Each storage compartment has a front access opening normally closed by a fresh food door and a freezer door, respectively. The doors are mounted to the cabinet by hinge mechanisms. With at least some known refrigerators, no positive stop is provided to prevent opening the door beyond a preselected position. For example, with some known refrigerators, the door can be rotated away from the refrigerator cabinet to a point at which the hinge mechanism itself prevents further rotation. In some house installations, the hinge mechanisms may not prevent rotation of the refrigerator door beyond a point at which the refrigerator door impacts against adjacent cabinets or walls of the house.
It would be desirable to provide a positive door stop which prevents opening a refrigerator door beyond a preselected position. It also would be desirable to provide such a positive door stop which is easy to assemble and does not add significant labor and material cost to the assembly of refrigerator hinge and closure mechanisms.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds