TOOL ENHANCEMENTS

• US 20150136829A1
• Filed: 11/17/2014
• Published: 05/21/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 11/20/2013
• Status: Active Application

• Current Assignee: Revive Construction, LLC
• Original Assignee: Revive Construction, LLC
• Inventors: Howes, Clint Elijah
• Application Number:
  US14/542,972
• Publication Number:
  US 20150136829A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 227/140
• CPC Class Codes: B25C 1/008 Safety devices
• CPC Class Codes: B25C 1/04 operated by fluid pressure , e.g. by air pressure

Abstract

Tool enhancements, and related systems and techniques, are disclosed herein. For example, a nail gun may include a trigger; an actuator to drive a nail in response to a pull of the trigger; a sensor to generate data indicative of a property of operation of the nail gun prior to or during driving of a nail, wherein the property is a resistance experienced by the nail as it is driven or an angle at which the nail is driven; monitoring circuitry to determine whether the data generated by the sensor satisfies a predetermined event condition; and an output interface to provide an indicator that the predetermined event condition has been satisfied in response to a determination by the monitoring circuitry that the predetermined event condition has been satisfied. Other embodiments may be disclosed and/or claimed.

Claims

1. A nail gun, comprising:

a trigger;

an actuator, coupled to the trigger, to drive a nail in response to a pull of the trigger;

a sensor to generate data indicative of a property of operation of the nail gun prior to or during driving of a nail, wherein the property includes a resistance experienced by the nail as it is driven or an angle at which the nail is driven;

monitoring circuitry, coupled with the sensor, to determine whether the data generated by the sensor satisfies a predetermined event condition; and

an output interface, coupled with the monitoring circuitry, to provide an indicator that the predetermined event condition has been satisfied in response to a determination by the monitoring circuitry that the predetermined event condition has been satisfied.

2. The nail gun of claim 1, further comprising an input device to receive an indication from a user of the nail gun that a subsequent driving of a nail is for calibration of the sensor or the monitoring circuitry.

3. The nail gun of claim 1, wherein the property includes the resistance experienced by the nail as it is driven.

4. The nail gun of claim 3, wherein the actuator comprises a piston and the sensor comprises an accelerometer arranged to generate data indicative of an acceleration of the piston.

5. The nail gun of claim 3, wherein the predetermined event condition comprises a resistance that falls below a predetermined threshold.

6. The nail gun of claim 1, wherein the property includes the angle at which the nail is driven.

7. The nail gun of claim 6, wherein the sensor comprises an optical sensor.

8. The nail gun of claim 7, wherein the sensor comprises an emitter-detector pair.

9. The nail gun of claim 8, wherein the sensor comprises a plurality of emitter-detector pairs located at a tool application interface of the nail gun.

10. The nail gun of claim 6, wherein the sensor comprises a magnetic sensor.

11. The nail gun of claim 10, wherein the magnetic sensor comprises first and second magnets and is configured to generate an output signal based at least in part on a spacing between the first and second magnets.

12. The nail gun of claim 6, wherein the sensor comprises an accelerometer.

13. The nail gun of claim 6, further comprising an input device to receive an indication from a user of the nail gun that a subsequent positioning of the nail gun is for calibration of the sensor or the monitoring circuitry.

14. The nail gun of claim 6, wherein the predetermined event condition comprises an angle that falls outside a range around a predetermined reference angle.

15. The nail gun of claim 1, wherein the monitoring circuitry comprises a memory to store the predetermined event condition.

16. The nail gun of claim 1, wherein the output interface comprises an audio interface, and the indicator comprises an audible indicator.

17. The nail gun of claim 1, wherein the output interface comprises a visual interface, and the indicator comprises a light.

18. The nail gun of claim 1, wherein the output interface comprises a tactile interface, and the indicator comprises a vibration of the nail gun.

19. The nail gun of claim 1, wherein the output interface comprises a communication interface, the communication interface is to wirelessly transmit data representative of the indicator to a remote monitoring device, and the remote monitoring device is to display at least some of the data representative of the indicator.

20. The nail gun of claim 19, wherein the data representative of the indicator comprises an identifier of a user of the nail gun.