Roller tappet

Applicant claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119 of German Application No. 199 58 314.5 filed Dec. 3, 1999. Applicant also claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §120 of PCT/EP00/10805 filed Nov. 2, 2000. The international application under PCT article 21(2) was not published in English.

The invention relates to a roller tappet according to the preamble of claim 1 for internal combustion engines. Such a roller tappet is known from Japanese Patent 7-208121 A.

In the known roller tappet, the roller is mounted in conventional manner.

The invention deals with the problem of providing a weight-saving mounting for the roller in the main tappet body. For roller tappets of the class under consideration, this problem is solved by the characterizing features of claim 1. Advantageous improvements are subject matter of the dependent claims.

The invention will be explained in more detail hereinafter on the basis of a drawing, wherein:

FIG. 1 shows an inventive roller tappet in cross section

FIG. 2 shows a three-dimensional diagram of the main tappet body.

A roller tappet 1 is provided with a main tappet body having a shank 5 , which guides roller tappet 1 in an engine case 4 . The main tappet body is made of fiber-reinforced plastic. In the main tappet body there is mounted a pin 6 , which carries a roller 2 , indicated by a broken line in the drawing. Onto the main tappet body there are molded, in total, four elastically deformable or compliant stays 7 , into which pin 6 is clipped. A metal component 9 , which absorbs the force of a tappet rod 3 and transmits it via pin 6 to roller 2 , is embedded in the main tappet body by injection molding. Pin 6 is in contact over an angle of about 130° with metal component 9 which, together with the main tappet body and stays 7 molded thereon, functions as a bearing for the pin.

Metal component 9 has in its lower region a spherical recess to receive tappet rod 3 and in its upper region two bearing stays to support the pin. In FIG. 2, the separating line between the metal component and the plastic region of the main tappet body can be seen under stays 7 .