US3434257A - Tile-setting frame apparatus - Google Patents

Description

Mrh 25, 1969 YouuKou sAKUMA 3,434,257

T ILE-SETT ING FRAME APPARATUS Filed Jan. 18. 1967 United States Patent Oice 3,434,257 Patented Mar. 25, 1969 3,434,257 TILE-SETTING FRAME APPARATUS Youukou Sakuma, 9-10 Kiribatake, Kamigawa-ku, Yokohama-shi, Japan Filed Jan. 18, 1967, Ser. No. 610,143 Int. Cl. E04f 13/ 08 U.S. Cl. 52-387 1 Claim ABSTRACT F THE DISCLOSURE A tile setting frame having integral T-shaped ribs thereon which interlock with grooves in the sides of the tiles and ller strips which extend between said tiles and overlap the surface thereof.

The present invention relates to a tile-setting frame apparat'us for use in building and construction, and more particularly to a frame apparatus for setting pieces of tiles made from porcelain, synthetic resin or other molded products for facing with tiles the walls, panels and other tiling-necessitated sections of the houses and other buildings.

The tiling of this kind has conventionally been practiced either by placing pieces of tiling material on the tile-setting faces on which an adhesive is applied and then providing a proper joint iiller to the joints of the tile pices, or by first setting the tile pieces in a lattice frame and then applying this setting on the desired surfaces. But these methods require considerable skillfulness on the part of the tilers for achieving orderly and evenlysurfaced tile-setting. Further, since the tiles are supported on the setting faces only with the adhesive, they are likely to come off due to difference of humidity and temperature of other dynamic elements such as impact or vibration.

A primary object of the present invention is to provide a tile-setting frame with which any person can easily and decently practice tile-setting at any desired place.

It is another object of the present invention to provide a tile-setting frame whereby the tile facing can be achieved easily and the joining of the tiles can be effected orderly and securely.

It is still another object of the present invention to provide a tile-setting frame which permits extremely solid tile joint whereby the set tiles are kept free from coming off even if subjected to difference of humidity or temperature, or to impact or vibration.

Various features and advantages of the present invention will :become clear from reading the following descriptions specifying an embodiment of the present invention shown in the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG-URE l is a partial perspective view of a base plate of the tile-setting frame according to the present invention;

FIGURE 2 is a perspective 'View of a piece of tile;

FIGURE 3 is a partial perspective view of tiles fixed on the base plate;

FIGURE 4 is a partial tile-set surface view in which the spaces between the tiles are joined up;

FIGURE 5 is a sectional view as taken on the line 5-5 of FIG. 4;

FIGURE 6 is a partial perspective view of a tile joint lling band; and

FIGURE 7 is an illustration showing the condition in which the tile pieces are being set in position.

Now the invention will be discussed on its particular structure shown in the above-described drawings, and iirst the reference is made to FIG. l in which is shown, in part, the base plate 11 of the tile-setting frame, said base plate being molded from a plastic material and having integrally formed on its surface the projected ribs 12 which are arranged parallel to each other at a constant interval both lengthwise and crossWise.

Each of said ribs 12 is T-shaped in section and fonmed with a head 13 at its tip. At the side edges of said head 13 are formed a pair of projections 15 at the identical position for each rib 12, and at proper positions on the surface of said base plate 11 are formed holes 1.4 for receiving fastening rivets 14a.

Each tile piece 17 made from porcelain, plastics or other molding materials has formed around its periphery a groove 16 arranged so as to tly receive the head 13 of each rib on the surface of said base plate 11, and on the inside of said groove 16 are formed recesses 18 at the positions corresponding to the projections 15 provided at the side edges of said rib head 13.

The latticed frame-shaped packing band 19 which is also made from plastic material separately comprises a front piece 20 provided with any desired coloring and pattern and a back piece 21, each piece being so formed as to correspond to the positions which cover the joint spaces 17a between the tile pieces 17. Thus, by applying a suitable adhesive agent, the ribs 12 and the filling band 19 are bonded together tightly to thereby lill up the joint spaces 17a and the tile pieces 17 are thus excellent in joint filling operation may be attained by conventional jointing means using cement or other similar materials.

The base plate 11 of the tile-setting frame, which is composed as described above, is beforehand set at fixed length both lengthwise and crosswise and is provided on its surface with parallelly arranged ribs 12 in a number corresponding to the number of tile pieces 17 to be used. After binding this base plate 11 ou a desired place to be tiled and fixing the same solidly with rivets 14a or other means, the tile pieces 17 are inserted into the spaces between the ribs 12 on the surface of the base plate 11 in such manner that the heads 13 of the ribs 12 are suitaa bly fitted into the grooves 16 on the periphery of the tile pieces 17 and that the projections 15 formed on both sides of the head 13 of each rib 12 are iitted into the recesses 18 formed in the inside of each groove 16, whereby the tile pieces 17 are fixed in position securely. Sincel te position of the projections 15 and the shape of the tile pieces 17 are set uniform, the tile pieces 17 are arranged extremely orderly on the surface of the base plate 11.

The spaces 17a between the adjoining tile pieces 17 are covered by the plastic-made filling band 19 so formed as to correspond to the shape of said spaces 17a, said band being bonded on the surface of the heads 13 of the ribs 12 by applying a suitable adhesive thereto. The resulting surface configuration is extremely decent and also stable.

It is of course possible in this case to cement conventional iilling material instead of the filling band 19 of the present invention.

As described above, the tile pieces 17 are not only lbonded on the surface of the base plate 11, but also supported by the ribs 12 of which the heads 13 are fitted in the grooves 16 of the tiles, resulting in an extremely solid tiled condition. Further, the jointing sections of the spaces 17a and the tile pieces 17 are th-us excellent in interchangeability and mass-productivity, and the tiling operation can be effected very economically.

It is also to be understood that various changes and modifications in structures in practicing the tiling opera tion can be made within the scope of the present invention without departing from the spirit of the present invention described in the', appended claim.

What is claimed is:

1. A tile-setting frame apparatus on which a plurality of tiles are mounted comprising: a base plate, a plurality of integral ribs arranged at xed intervals and horizontal- 1y and vertically spaced from one another on the surface of said base plate, an enlarged head on each of said ribs, projections on each of the enlanged heads; the tiles ybeing preformed and including peripheral grooves receiving the heads of the ribs, recesses formed in the grooves of said tile pieces for receiving the projections, to maintain the tile pieces in mounted position whereby the head portions of the ribs are shaped as to engage the grooves of adjacent tile pieces arranged on opposite sides of the rib, and a lling band secured between the mounted adjoining tile pieces and serving to cover the joint spaces.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS JOHN E. MURTAGH, Primary Examiner.

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