Rearview mirror
First Claim
1. A mirror having a substantially flat, primary viewing surface, said primary viewing surface having a border merging substantially tangentially into an edge viewing portion which curves away from said primary viewing surface, said edge viewing portion having a cycloidal curvature having a continuously decreasing radius of curvature from the border of said primary viewing surface to the outer edge of said edge viewing portion.
3 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A rearview mirror for passenger vehicles has a primary viewing surface that is substantially flat. This surface curves to the rear of the mirror, with a continuously decreasing radius of curvature, toward at least one lateral edge thereof. This provides peripheral vision to the operator of a vehicle in addition to this vision directly to the rear. The peripheral vision introduces a very gradually increasing rate of distortion as the reflected image approaches the edge of vision. This causes the peripherally reflected images to be easily relatable to those reflected from the primary viewing surface.
131 Citations
7 Claims
- 1. A mirror having a substantially flat, primary viewing surface, said primary viewing surface having a border merging substantially tangentially into an edge viewing portion which curves away from said primary viewing surface, said edge viewing portion having a cycloidal curvature having a continuously decreasing radius of curvature from the border of said primary viewing surface to the outer edge of said edge viewing portion.
- 3. A mirror having a substantially flat, primary viewing surface, said primary viewing surface having a border merging substantially tangentially into an edge viewing portion which curves away from said primary viewing surface, said edge viewing portion having a curvature developed by projecting at right angles to a major axis successive positions, equally spaced angularly, of a point on the circumference of a circle rolling along said major axis, and tracing the curve defined by intersections of successive projection lines of the point perpendicular to said major axis with successive equally spaced lines parallel to said major axis.
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5. A mirror having a substantially flat primary viewing surface, said primary viewing surface having a border merging substantially tangentially into an edge viewing portion which curves away from said primary viewing surface, said edge viewing portion having a curvature conforming to a portion of an ellipse and having a continuously decreasing radius of curvature from the border of said primary viewing surface to the outer edge of said edge viewing portion.
Specification