Seat slide mechanism

Claim 1

A seat slide mechanism comprising a. a rail securable to a floor so as to be fixed thereto; b. a slide securable to a seat so as to be fixed thereto, said rail and said slide being interengageable; c. two outwardly and oppositely directed flanges on said rail, each of said flanges having a track surface, said flanges having parallel marginal portions which extend along the outer edges of said tracks and which are substantially perpendicular to said track surfaces; d. two inwardly and oppositely directed flanges on said slide, said slide having two spaced parallel track surfaces; e. the track surfaces on said rail flanges being in vertical register with the spaced parallel track surfaces on said slide; f. two pairs of metal rollers in contact with said track surfaces, one of said pairs being spaced longitudinally of the rail and the slide from the other of said pairs, one roller of each pair being in contact with the track surface of one flange of said rail and with the corresponding track surface of the slide, and the other roller of each pair being in contact with the track surface of the other flange of said rail and with the other corresponding track surface of the slide; g. two roller retainers, each of which accommodates one pair of said pairs of rollers with freedom for rotation therein as the slide is moved relative to the rail and each of which is made of a synthetic resin material having a low coefficient of friction; h. each roller retainer comprising means defining two individual roller housings which are spaced from one another and each of which snugly accommodates and positively holds one roller of the pair associated therewith in a manner such that the roller retainer, when the seat slide mechanism is being assembled, can be held in any attitude without the rollers dropping out; and i. each roller retainer further having parts which embrace both the flanges on said rail and the parallel marginal portions of said flanges, whereby said roller retainers position the rollers on and guide the rollers along the respective track surfaces by virtue of the accommodation of each of said rollers within the confines of its own individual housing and whereby the stability of the slide relative to the rail in directions transverse to the longitudinal axis of said rail is maintained solely by the presence of those parts of the longitudinally spaced roller retainers which are sandwiched between and are in contact with the outer faces of said parallel marginal portions of the rail flanges and the portions of the slide which are aligned therewith at any particular time.