This invention relates to recreational and sporting eyewear capable of floating above the surface in water and thus easy to locate and retrieve in open bodies of water. This invention further relates to eyewear comprising an arrangement of modular pods to enable sustain floatation above the surface of water. The invention further relates to modular pods for floating eyewear that comprise fracture-resistant structures.
Eyewear solutions have evolved to address a range of different recreational activities, allowing for fashion to merge with function, and protecting its wearer's eyes against the elements of nature and injury. In particular, sunglasses have become integral accessories in water recreational activities where the environment for wearers of sunglasses comprises bodies of water with flow, waves and other forms of turbulence. Often, prescription lenses are integrated into the frames of sunglasses, as other modifications or accessories that add weight to the overall eyewear. As the quality and design of recreational sunglasses increase to meet the needs of those who enjoy the recreational outdoors, so do the value and ultimately cost of the eyewear.
Prior art solutions do not address the issue of preventing eyewear slipping from the face of the user, especially from the nose bridge area. Preventing eyewear from falling into water is an unfulfilled need.
Another issue with prior art solutions is that the solution for floatation is difficult to maintain on a long-term basis. First, eyewear is often subjected to crushing and many other damaging events, especially in during recreational activities that require activities in motion, high levels of exertion, or exposure to implements and tools used for sporting events. Trauma to eyewear can also damage insufficiently designed buoyancy technology of the eyewear so that it fatigues, leaks and otherwise fails. Because modern recreational eyewear must endure such repeated trauma, often to the frontal portion of the eyewear, prior art solutions have not considered how resulting stress forces impact its structural integrity.
Specifically, the unaddressed challenge in providing eyewear having air chambers to enable floatation is to properly account for forces of impact upon the eyewear. Anytime eyewear sustains a frontal impact, there is a risk to a user's eyes. As forces impact the front or lens portion of eyewear, the resulting ripple of force lines throughout the eyewear tend to concentrate stress around any voids within the eyewear. If the structures around voids have compromised integrity, those structures may rupture fragment and cause injury to the eye. By deploying eyewear with seams that seal an air chamber within the frames, like those seen in Goodman U.S. Pat. No. 3,740,124, the weakest portion of the air chamber is at risk for rupture, which can result in a fragmentation of the materials around the air chamber.
A common apprehension with investing in recreational sunglasses is the possibility of losing them into a body of water. Though prior art solutions may provide properties of buoyancy and momentary floatation, if the lens portion is not sustained above the water surface then only the tips of the arms of the eyewear may be visible. When trying to recover eyewear in a moving body of water like an ocean, a river, or lake, exposing only tips of the arms above the water can render the chance for spotting the eyewear only slightly better than searching at the bottom of the body of water. Once the eyewear of the prior art assumes the profile of the lens portion being parallel to the surface of the water will result in further sinking, well below the surface.
Specifically, some prior art solutions have provided so-called floating eyewear with frames that are multiple pieces that are joined to capture air within chambers of the frames, especially at the temple and the arms. However, those attempts fail to compensate for how buoyant eyewear behaves in the water. The weight of the front portion of most buoyant eyewear solutions fails to sustain the lens portion above the surface of the water, exposing the often bowl-like facial sides of the lenses to an opposing force of water weight and surface tension. The difference is critical when examining the structures of eyewear and accompanying weight distribution. The lens frame portions of eyewear available in the current arts and popular in recreational sports comprise most of the total weight, especially in recreational sporting environments. When these eyewear solutions fall into water, the weight of the lenses pull the lenses downwardly below the surface of the water, and tips of arms of the eyewear in an upwardly fashion so the arms are above the water. Even if the eyewear does not initially submerge during the initial fall, turbulence in open water often will sweep over the eyewear and apply a pressure onto the surface area of the facial lens portion. As a result, three critical disadvantages occur. First, if the arms are positioned above and perpendicular to the surface of water, with the lenses parallel to the surface of the water, the arms are difficult to spot. The lenses may reflect sunshine and provide a superior visual signal if they are perpendicular and above the surface of the water. Second, after the eyewear submerges for any reason, water pressure and surface tension will often prevent the eyewear from resurfacing as the weight of water atop the facial side of the lenses bias them downwardly, eventually pushing the entire eyewear below the surface of the water, rendering a search from a vessel or above search vantage point fruitless. The prior art has provided examples of buoyant eyewear but failed to provide a solution to keeping recreational sporting eyewear afloat.
Manufacturing multiple lines of floating eyewear provides additional challenges, as the relative weights of such eyewear may vary according to utility. For example, though the lens portion of the frame typically weighs more than the combined weight of the arms, the overall weight of an impact resistant, a large sized, military grade line of sunglasses will comprise more material and thus weight than a small sized, less reinforced model. Additionally, manufacturers of diverse lines of similar sized eyewear may wish to make value-based, short-life models that are lighter than resilient, models that may be used for prescription lenses. Providing a solution that allows manufacturers to provide a range of air volumes for the same basic mold of eyewear would resolve a need for providing a comprehensive line of floating eyewear for customers with different needs while maintaining an efficient and cost-effective sourcing strategy.
The present invention solves these problems by providing eyewear that is not only buoyant, but may remain floating in turbulent waters. The present invention provides eyewear that floats in a preferred profile that minimizes the possibility of the lens frame portion dropping below the surface of water in a perpendicular orientation. The present invention further provides an eyewear configured with floating structures that fit upon a user's anatomy in a manner that reduces the likelihood that the eyewear will slip and fall from the user's face into the water. Additionally, the present invention provides floating eyewear that is impact and fracture resistant to offer superior protection of the user's eyes than other solutions offered in the prior arts. The present invention offers a long-term floating eyewear that maintains floating functionality after traumatic events that may otherwise breach the floatation structures provided in the prior art.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds