US20080173652A1

US20080173652A1 - Integral heat-resisting structure of a disposable drinking cup

Info

Publication number: US20080173652A1
Application number: US11/656,420
Authority: US
Inventors: Bob Chou
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2007-01-23
Filing date: 2007-01-23
Publication date: 2008-07-24

Abstract

The present invention discloses a heat-resisting disposable drinking cup comprising: a cup body made by a plastic injection molding and having a cup opening disposed at the top of the cup body and folded outward to form a cup lip; several tens of radial ribs integrally formed at the bottom of the cup lip of the cup opening, and the radial rib is extended more than 1.5 mm from the surface of the cup body but remained within the external periphery of the cup lip of the cup opening, and the interval between two adjacent radial ribs falls within a range of 3˜5 mm, and the height of each radial rib is less than 10 mm measured downward from the cup lip of the cup opening; such that radiating fins can be formed around the external periphery of the cup opening.

Description

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a heat-resisting drinking cup, and more particularly to a portable coffee cup having radial ribs integrally formed around the external periphery of a cup opening of the cup for preventing the high-temperature heat from being conducted directly to the outside or a handle of the cup.
2. Description of the Related Art
Drinking coffee or tea becomes an indispensable part of life to coffee or tea drinkers. At an early stage, people usually drink coffee or tea in restaurants or at home, but the style of our living has changed, and chained coffee shops such as “Starbucks” arise. People change their dining and drinking habits, and take-out coffee is a good example of these changes.
Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2 for a traditional disposable drinking cup used for take-out coffee, the drinking cup is a paper cup 10, and thus a joint 11 is disposed at the edge of a cup opening, and such joint 11 is adhered by glue. Since the paper cup 10 contains a hot drink such as coffee or tea and its temperature is very high, therefore the glue at the joint 11 may be melt slowly within a few minutes after the adhesion, and coffee may leak from the position of the joint 11. Furthermore, the internal edge of the paper cup 10 is coated with a layer of water-resisting film 12 for preventing water from moistening the whole paper cup or softening the paper cup. Although a disposable paper cup 10 is convenient to use, the surface of the disposable paper cup 10 will become very hot after a few seconds after the hot water at 95° C. is poured into the cup, since the temperature at the external surface of cup is decreased by 5° C. only and remained at a high temperature of 90° C. after the heat is dissipated to the external surface of the disposable paper cup. In addition, the external surface of the disposable paper cup is a smooth surface and the external surface of the paper cup touched by a user's palm is almost equal to the whole thermally conducting area. When a user drinks a hot drink, it is quite often that the user gets burned by the hot drinking cup. Since the thermally conducting area is too large, therefore heat may be dispersed to the outside easily, and the cup no longer can provide a good heat preserving function anymore.
Referring to FIG. 3 for a perspective view of a conventional disposable plastic cup 20, the plastic cup 20 is formed by an injection molding process, and thus it does not have a joint 11 as in the paper cup 10 or a risk of leaking. However, the thermal insulating effect of the plastic cup 20 is not as good as that of the paper cup 10, and thus a user's hand may get burned easily. Although the plastic cup 20 may have a plurality of circular lines 21 disposed at the periphery around the middle of the cup, the circular lines 21 are just shallow lines provided for users to hold the cup by a hand. The user's hand still will touch the surface of the cup body, and the practical heat-resisting effect is poor. Therefore, the circular lines 21 is provided simply for improving the friction at the surface of the cup and facilitating users to hold the cup by a hand.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Although the conventional disposable paper cup 10 and plastic cup 20 are convenient, these cups 10, 20 still have the drawback of burning a user's hand easily when the cups 10, 20 contain hot drinks. Therefore, the prior art requires further improvements by providing a heat-resisting drinking cup.
Therefore, it is a primary object of the invention to provide an integral heat-resisting structure of a disposable drinking cup, wherein the heat-resisting structure is integrally formed and has no joint or a risk of causing a leaking problem.
Another objective of the present invention is to install radiating fins at the external periphery of a cup opening of the disposable plastic cup, so as to prevent a user's hand from touching the surface of the cup body and enhance the effect of preventing a user's hand from getting burned.
A further objective of the present invention is to use the heat-resisting radiating fins to improve the friction for a user's hand to hold the cup, so as to provide a more secured and convenient grip of the cup.
In order to achieve the above-mentioned objectives, several tens of radial ribs are integrally formed at the bottom of the cup lip of the cup opening, and the radial ribs 40 are extended at least 1.5 mm from the surface of the cup body, and an interval D between two adjacent radial ribs falls within a range of 3˜5 mm. Meanwhile, the height of each radial rib is less than 10 mm measured downward from the cup lip of the cup opening. In this way, a plurality of radiating fins are formed around the external periphery of the cup opening. In addition, the high-temperature heat can be prevented from being conducted directly to the outside or a handle of the cup.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a conventional disposable paper cup;

FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view of Section 2-2 as depicted in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a conventional disposable plastic cup;

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of a preferred embodiment of the present invention;

FIGS. 5 and 5A are a cross-sectional view and a schematic view of Section 5-5 as depicted in FIG. 4 respectively;

FIG. 6 is a schematic view of an application of the present invention;

FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional view of Section 7-7 as depicted in FIG. 6;

FIG. 8 is an enlarged view of a portion as depicted in FIG. 7; and

FIG. 9 is a cross-sectional view of a cup cover combined with a disposable drinking cup in accordance with the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

Referring to FIG. 4 for a perspective view of a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the invention comprises: a cup body 30 formed by a plastic injection molding process and made of a polypropylene (PP) material or a polyethylene (PE) material. The cup body 30 has a cup opening disposed at the top of the cup body 30 and folded outward to form a cup lip 31 around the cup opening, and these elements constitute the structure of a general plastic cup.
The present invention is characterized in that several tens of radial ribs 40 are integrally formed at the bottom of the cup lip 31 of the cup opening as shown in FIGS. 5 and 5A, and the radial ribs 40 are extended at least 1.5 mm from the surface of the cup body 30, and an interval D between two adjacent radial ribs 40 falls within a range of 3˜5 mm. The results of experiments show that the interval D can prevent a user's palm or finger from touching an external surface 33 of the cup body 30 while the user is holding the cup. If the interval D is too large and exceeds 5 mm, then the user's finger may touch the external surface 33 of the cup body 30 easily and may even get burned. If the interval D is too small, then the convection of air for dissipating heat within the interval will be decreased, and the heat of the hot drink in the cup body 30 will be conducted to an outer distal surface of the radial ribs 40 (which is the contact surface with the user's finger or palm) through the external surface 33. Therefore, it is necessary to have an appropriate interval D between two radial ribs 40, or else the heat-resisting effect cannot be maximized.
In FIG. 6, the radial ribs 40 formed around the external periphery of the cup opening are in the form of radiating fins to provide a holding portion for users to hold. Such arrangement not only provides the heat-resisting effect, but also improves the secured grip of the holding portion.
Referring to FIG. 7 for a cross-sectional view of the present invention, the radial ribs 40 are disposed at the bottom of the cup lip 31 of the cup opening, and their protruding length falls within the external periphery of the cup lip 31. Referring to FIG. 8 for an enlarged view of a portion of FIG. 7, the width W of the cup lip 31 of the cup opening is approximately equal to 5 mm, and the protruding length L of the radial rib 40 preferably falls within the range of 1.5 mm˜4 mm, and an upper edge 41 of the radial rib 40 is connected to the bottom of the cup lip 31 of the cup opening, and its height H is at least 10 mm measured downward from the cup lip 31 of the cup opening, and an edge 42 tapered towards the cup body 30 is preferably formed at the bottom of the cup body 30, so as to improve the comfort and facilitate a user's palm or finger to grip the cup body 30.
The cup body 30 further includes an outwardly protruding circular groove 32 formed on a cup wall corresponding to the bottom of the cup lip 31 of the cup opening. The circular groove 32 is provided for preventing the drink in the cup body 30 from spilling out from the cup opening. In FIG. 9, the circular groove 32 is provided for embedding and fixing a cup cover 50, so that an external edge of the cup cover 50 can be latched simultaneously inside and outside the cup opening to improve the securing effect.
With the foregoing technical measures, the disposable plastic cup of the present invention can overcome the shortcoming of burning a user's hand easily. In addition, the radial ribs 40 are integrated with the cup body 30 as a whole, and thus there will have no leaking problem of the paper cup. The present invention definitely can overcome the shortcomings of the conventional disposable drinking cup.
With the foregoing technical measures and extensive researches and experiments, the present invention definitely can achieve the expected effects and overcome the foregoing shortcomings of the prior art.
Many changes and modifications in the above-described embodiments of the invention can, of course, be carried out without departing from the scope thereof. Accordingly, to promote the progress in science and the useful arts, the invention is disclosed and is intended to be limited only by the scope of the appended claims.

Claims

1. An integral heat-resisting structure of a disposable drinking cup, comprising:

a) a cup body, integrally formed by a plastic injection molding, and having a cup opening disposed at the top of the cup body, and folded outward to form a cup lip; and

b) a plurality of radial ribs, integrally formed at the bottom of the cup lip of the cup opening, and extended at least 1.5 mm out from the surface of the cup body but remained within the external periphery of the cup lip of the cup opening, and an interval between two adjacent radial ribs falling within a range of 3˜5 mm, and the height of the each radial rib being less than 10 mm measured downward from the cup lip of the cup opening;

whereby a plurality of radiating fins are formed around the external periphery of the cup opening.

2. The integral heat-resisting structure of a disposable drinking cup as recited in claim 1, wherein the cup body and the radial ribs are made of a polypropylene (PP) material or a polyethylene (PE) material.

3. The integral heat-resisting structure of a disposable drinking cup as recited in claim 1, wherein the radial rib has its upper edge connected to the bottom of the cup lip of the cup opening, and an edge tapered towards the cup body is formed at the bottom of the radial rib.

4. The integral heat-resisting structure of a disposable drinking cup as recited in claim 1, wherein the cup body further comprises a circular groove disposed on a cup wall corresponding to the bottom of the cup lip of the cup opening.