Noise reducing heel tip   

Abstract: The heel tip of a heeled shoe uses rubber to reduce the noise produced when using the heeled shoe.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates in general to footwear.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Heeled shoes are any shoe with a heel. Heeled shoes have a bottom component called a heel tip to protect the heel of the shoe and balance the shoe. The heel tip is glued, nailed, screwed in, or attached by any means to the bottom of the heel that touches the walking surface. The heel tip varies in size according the shape of the bottom of the heel.

Heel tips are made with a hard, rigid plastic. Using heeled shoes with plastic heel tips produces sound due to the impact of the heel tip\'s hard material hitting the surface. This sound is reduced when a heel has a heel tip made fully or has a coating of rubber on the bottom part of the heel tip. The use of rubber minimizes the noise produced while using the shoe by softening the impact of the heel tip hitting the surface.

The noise produced by heeled shoes with hard plastic heel tips is a nuisance. It creates unnecessary noise pollution. The wearer of hard, plastic heel tips creates a noise disturbance which may attract negative attention. Using heel tips with rubber reduces this noise and creates a quieter environment. Wearing quieter shoes takes away any negative attention from the wearer from the noise disturbance created by hard plastic heel tips.

SUMMARY

Heel tips on heeled shoes are typically made of a hard plastic material in various sizes according the size of the bottom of the heel. Heel tips are glued, nailed, screwed in, or attached by any means during the shoe manufacturing process. Heel tips produce noise when using the shoe due to the impact of the hard material hitting the surface. This invention minimizes the noise produced when using heeled shoes by coating a plastic heel tip with rubber and/or using an entirely rubber heel tip if size allows. The rubber lessens the noise due to its ability to soften the impact of the heeled shoe to the surface. The softness of rubber lessens the impact producing less noise than that of hard plastic. Subsequently, incorporating rubber in the heel tip lessens the noise produced when wearing a shoe with this heel tip.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Heeled shoes have a heel tip to protect the heel of the shoe and balance the entire shoe. Heel tips are nailed, screwed in, glued, or attached by any means to the heel. The heel tip varies in size according to the width, length, size of the heel. The heel tip in this invention uses rubber to reduce the sound produced when wearing a heeled shoe.

The noise reducing heel tip uses rubber to reduce the noise produced while wearing, walking, and/or moving in the shoe. Rubber is durable yet soft. Rubber is durable enough to protect the heel, hold the weight of the wearer, and balance the shoe. Yet rubber is soft and lessens the impact of the heel tip hitting the surface thus creating less noise production.

The heel tip is fully composed of rubber if the width and length of the heel tip allows for this to happen for the purpose of reducing noise produced when wearing the heeled shoe. Rubber heel tip may be screwed, glued, or attached by any means to the heel. If the heel is too narrow to use a fully rubber heel tip then a two layer heel tip will be used for the purpose of reducing noise produced when wearing the heeled shoe. A narrow heel would not allow for a fully rubber heel tip since it would have to be screwed into the heel where plastic would cover the top of the screw and then rubber on the bottom surface which hits the ground. If heel is too narrow the two layer heel lift with adjacent screw can be screwed or glued into the heel. The two layer heel tip is composed of plastic and rubber. The top layer (closest to the heel) is made of a nylon based plastic that is rigid and strong enough to bear the weight on a narrow heel. The bottom layer (furthest from heel, actually hits walking surface when wearing the shoe) is made of rubber to reduce the noise produced when walking or moving while wearing the shoe. The fully or partial rubber heel tip both serve the same purpose of reducing the sound produced while wearing the shoe.

FIG. 1: Location of Heel Tip in Various Heel Shoes

FIG. 2: Rubber Heel Tip in Heeled Shoe

FIG. 3: Full Rubber Heel Tip

FIG. 4: Partial Rubber Heel Tip