WO2003043906A1

WO2003043906A1 - Distributing device

Info

Publication number: WO2003043906A1
Application number: PCT/EP2002/012793
Authority: WO
Inventors: Edgar Jaeschke; Johannes Dettinger; Detlef Seidel
Original assignee: Buck-Chemie Gmbh
Priority date: 2001-11-23
Filing date: 2002-11-15
Publication date: 2003-05-30
Also published as: EP1451082A1; AU2002366214A1; DE10157593A1

Abstract

The invention relates to a distributing device for a sanitary agent for cleaning and/or disinfecting and/or for releasing fragrance, preferably for using in sanitary objects such as toilet bowls and sinks. The inventive device comprises a container for receiving the sanitary agent, said container being thus provided with a receiving chamber (5) which is defined by a housing (1). According to the invention, a manually operable discharge device (9, 13) is provided, comprising a discharge piston (9) which is arranged in the receiving chamber (5) and is used to displace the sanitary agent from the receiving chamber (5) of the container in the direction of an outlet (7) of the container, in order to thus apply the sanitary agent to the sanitary object.

Description

Dispensing device

The invention relates to a dispensing device for a sanitary agent for cleaning and / or disinfecting and / or dispensing a fragrance, preferably for use in sanitary articles, such as toilet sinks, with a container serving to hold the sanitary agent, the container for this purpose having a housing has limited recording space.

Dispensing devices for toilet bowls are known from EP 0 940 509 A2 with a receptacle consisting of two shell halves for a water-soluble, highly viscous preparation of active substance, in particular in the form of a gel or a paste, with inlet openings for the rinsing water and outlet openings for the parts of the rinsing water which are each dissolved Active substance preparation, the outlet openings being arranged and separated from one another in such a way that, when the quantity of active substance decreases and the level of flushing water in the reception container decreases, the dissolved parts of the active substance preparation can be dispensed into the toilet bowl via one of the outlet openings. The size of the outlet openings is dimensioned such that they are permeable to aqueous liquids with viscosities up to 3000 mPas, but not for the preparation of active substance with viscosities above 3000 mPas. The outlet openings mentioned run along an arcuate dividing line in the receptacle and are separated from one another by spacer webs. If you are at the Known solution arranges the outlet openings in an alternating sequence with the spacer webs at different level levels, regardless of the rinse water level in the receptacle, there is always at least one outlet possibility via one of the outlet openings for the active ingredient preparation dissolved in the rinse water. This ensures that the preparation of active substance can be stored in the receptacle with a correspondingly long service life, and yet, with each rinsing process, the dissolved active substance preparation is dispensed continuously via one of the assigned outlet openings.

Such a dispensing device has a hanging bracket on which the container with the active substance preparation is fixed and by means of which the container can be fixed on the edge of the toilet bowl.

This known dispensing device is suitable for dispensing gel-like sanitary agents, consisting essentially of pastes and gels containing surfactants, which are produced using commercially available thickeners. A disadvantage of this known solution is that to refill the dispensing device with sanitary agents, it must frequently be removed from the toilet for the refilling process and, if necessary, contaminants and gel residues must be removed before it is refilled for a certain period of use. In particular in the case of frequent rinsing applications, the gel-like cleaning agent is also rapidly discharged, which often necessitates corresponding refilling processes. If, in modern delivery systems, the sanitary agent is refilled using refill and delivery bottles, with which it is possible to subsequently refill the dispensing container in the toilet via a refill opening provided for this purpose, without the container having to be removed from the toilet by hand, comes alongside that must be removed from the toilet by hand, a refill container is used in addition to the dispensing container in the toilet, which increases the total costs for the entire system in question. It has also been shown in practice that, despite the convenient refilling, the dispenser still has to be touched by hand at least at times, for example to hold it on the edge of the toilet for the refilling process, so that touches cannot be avoided. In the course of the further development of sanitary products, it would also be desirable to use cleaning media with highly viscous properties that are well above 3000 mPas for cleaning processes in the toilet bowl. This is not possible with the known solutions.

Based on this prior art, the object of the invention, while maintaining the advantages of the known dispensing devices for sanitary ware, to further develop them in such a way that contact with parts of the sanitary article is avoided for an operator, so that the costs for such a dispensing device are reduced and that highly viscous sanitary products can also be used. A corresponding object is achieved by a dispensing device with the features of claim 1 in its entirety.

Characterized in that according to the characterizing part of claim 1, a manually operable discharge device is provided, which has a discharge piston arranged in the receiving space, which pushes the sanitary agent out of the receiving space of the container in the direction of a discharge opening of the container, so that the sanitary agent by hand Applying the sanitary object can also dispense with the conventional dispensing devices with containers to be fixed on the toilet bowl are like corresponding refill systems in the form of refill containers such as bottles or the like.

With the dispensing device according to the invention, the medium can be dispensed into the sanitary object, such as a toilet sink, in a brushing motion onto the basin wall via the manually operable discharge device, without the operator coming into contact with parts of the basin or other parts of a sanitary object. Since the sanitary agent is dispensed via the dispenser of the container, the dispenser also does not come into contact with the sanitary object when used properly, so that increased hygienic regulations are also taken into account. The discharge device with discharge piston also ensures that a definable amount of sanitary agent is always dispensed into the basin of the sanitary object. Dispensing is preferably carried out to parts of the basin that are not covered by the standing water in the toilet bowl, provided that the toilet is of a customary design. Furthermore, it has been shown that extremely high-viscosity sanitary agents can also be dispensed with the dispensing device according to the invention, which cannot be achieved with the conventional dispensing devices. In this way, a preparation of active substance can be put together in a larger variety and dispensed into a toilet sink or the like as a highly effective sanitary agent.

In a preferred embodiment of the dispensing device according to the invention, the housing of the container has a cylinder tube which forms the receiving space, in which the discharge piston is guided on the outer circumference side, and the discharge device has a plunger which can be inserted manually into the cylinder tube in order to move the piston in the direction the To move the dispensing opening. This design of the housing and the discharge device, namely in the form of a cylinder tube and a plunger which can be manually pushed into the cylinder tube to actuate the discharge piston, is not only characterized by particularly low production costs, but also enables particularly simple handling for the targeted discharge of the sanitary agent from the container.

In a particularly preferred embodiment, a tubular body is provided as the tappet, which is open at its end intended for bearing against the piston and closed at the other end intended for manual actuation. Here, the arrangement can be such that the tappet is slidably guided with a part of the outer lateral surface of its tubular body on the inner surface of the cylinder tube of the receiving space. With this design, there are very special advantages if the tubular body forming the tappet has on one part of its lateral surface a continuously extending, concave curved outer surface on the tubular body, the radius of curvature of which corresponds to the radius of the convex outer surface of the cylindrical tube of the housing of the Container is adjusted. In this design, the plunger can be connected together with the cylinder tube forming the housing to form a compact, particularly space-saving unit before the dispenser is put into use, or if it is pulled out of the cylinder tube after use of the dispenser, by connecting the plunger to the its outer surface is formed to fit the cylinder barrel of the housing. Such a compact unit is extremely advantageous for both shipping and storage. In a particularly advantageous manner, the housing of the container can have a releasable holding device, by means of which the plunger can be removably attached to the outside of the housing in such a position that the plunger, with its concavely curved outer surface, clings to the outside of the housing.

The housing forming the receiving space is preferably formed in one piece from plastic together with the discharge opening. The delivery opening molded onto the housing at the relevant end of the cylinder tube can be designed as a metering aid and can be delimited by an elongated delivery slot which allows the sanitary agent to be applied to the respective sanitary object over a wide area.

A plastic cap that can be plugged onto the opening edge can be provided as the closure of the dispensing opening, or a releasable seal, for example in the form of a perforable closure element or a peelable closure film or the like. It goes without saying that a different design of the closure of the dispensing opening is also provided can be.

In a preferred embodiment of the dispensing device according to the invention, the sanitary agent to be dispensed with it has an adhesion promoter, the adhesion promoter being selected from the group of longer or long-chain organic molecules, which are at least partially hydrophilic, and the hydrophilic part of the adhesion promoter interacts in the presence of water at least partially with the water molecules and becomes so sticky that the agent can be applied directly to the sanitary article in the presence of small amounts of water and adheres there such that the agent only after a large number is completely rinsable from rinsing processes. A sanitary agent adhering in this respect, which is very well suited for dispensing with the dispensing device described above, has already been presented in WO 99/66017.

The invention is explained in detail below using an exemplary embodiment shown in the drawing. Show it:

1 shows a longitudinal section of the housing of an embodiment with discharge piston located in the housing and a piston actuating plunger, which is shown partly in longitudinal section and partly in view;

2 shows a longitudinal section of the empty housing of the embodiment;

3 shows a plan view of the housing with dashed lines

Outline of the actuating plunger applied to the housing;

4 shows a larger scale compared to FIGS. 1 to 3

Representation of the actuating plunger, partly in view, partly in longitudinal section;

5 and 6 are a plan view and a side view of the actuation tappet;

7 shows a longitudinal section of the embodiment of the dispensing device, which is shown in its starting or shipping position, and Figure 8 is a top view of that shown in Figure 7.

The embodiment of the dispensing device according to the invention described below has as a container for the sanitary agent a housing designated as a whole with 1, which forms a cylinder tube 3, which serves as a receiving space 5 for the sanitary agent inside, which is provided at one end of the cylinder tube 3 Dispensing opening 7 can be discharged in order to apply it to the sanitary object. As can be seen most clearly from FIG. 3, the dispensing opening 7 forms an elongated dispensing slot which enables the sanitary agent to be applied flatly to the sanitary object.

A discharge piston 9, which is displaceably guided in the cylinder tube 3 and forms part of a discharge device for the metered delivery of the sanitary agent via the opening 7, closes off the receiving space 5 at the open end 11 of the cylinder tube 3 opposite the delivery opening 7. 1, and likewise FIG. 7, show the piston 9 in its initial position corresponding to the largest volume of the receiving space 5, from which it can be displaced in the direction of the discharge opening 7 by means of a piston actuating plunger 13 forming a further part of the discharge device is. In a practical example, this initial volume of the receiving space 5, ie the filling volume for the sanitary agent, is 50 ml with a diameter of the cylinder tube 3 of 30 mm.

1 shows the operating state in which the plunger 13 is inserted into the cylinder tube 3 at the open end 11 and bears against the piston 9 in the starting position. The plunger 13 is a tubular body which is open at the end to be applied to the piston 9 and at the opposite end 15 is closed, a recess 17 being formed in the end wall forming the end, which forms a pressure surface against which the thumb of a user can be placed when, according to the actuation of an injection syringe, the housing 1 on one with the index and middle fingers grips at its end 1 1 radially projecting end flange 19 with index and middle fingers and presses on the recess 17 with the thumb in order to move the piston 9 by means of the plunger 13.

In the present embodiment, the tubular body forming the tappet 13 and the housing 1 with the discharge opening 7 and the end flange 19 formed at the end 11 are each molded in one piece from plastic. The piston 9 is also a plastic molded part, which is guided on the outside circumference on the inside of the cylinder tube 3 and can be displaced by means of the plunger 13 against a frictional force caused by the sealing contact on the cylinder tube 3.

As can be seen from FIGS. 1 to 3 and in particular from FIG. 3, adjacent to the upper flange surface 21 of the end flange 19 facing the discharge opening 7 there is a dovetail-like projection 23 in the form of a rib extending in the axial direction. As explained in more detail below, the projection 23 forms part of a holding device due to its dovetail-like design, by means of which the plunger 13 can be detachably attached to the housing 1 when the device is in its shipping state or in the state of non-use.

As can be seen in particular from FIGS. 4 to 6, the tappet 13 is circular only on part 25 of its outer surface and is attached to the interior of the cylinder tube 3 for the displaceable guidance of the tappet 13. fits. A second part of the outer surface of the plunger 13, however, forms a bulge 27 which extends continuously in the longitudinal direction of the plunger 13 and forms a concave curved outer surface on the plunger 13, the radius of curvature of which is adapted to the radius of the convex outer side of the housing 1. Due to this configuration, the plunger 13 can be placed on the outside of the housing 1 in such a way that the plunger 13 with its arch 27 fits snugly against the outer surface of the housing 1, see FIGS. 7 and 8.

As already mentioned, the dovetail-like projection 23 on the housing 1 forms part of a holding device, by means of which the plunger 13 can be releasably fixed to the housing 1 in this conformed position. This dovetail-like projection 23 interacts with a slot opening 29 which is formed at the open end of the plunger 13 intended for interaction with the piston 9 and extends axially with a length which is somewhat greater than the axial length of the on the housing 1 located dovetail-like projection 23. The plunger 1 3 can thus be plugged onto the dovetail-like projection 23 at its slit opening 29, the wall of the tubular body of the plunger 1 3 being engaged behind by the dovetail-like design of the projection 23, so that the plunger 13 against radial lifting off is secured. In addition, as can be seen from FIG. 3, a recess is formed in the flange surface 21 in the form of a narrow groove 31, the course and clear width of which are adapted to the shape of the end edge 33 of the plunger 13 in the region adjacent to the slot opening 29 is so that this end edge 33 can be inserted into the groove 31. In Figure 3, the outline of the tubular body of the plunger 13 is illustrated by dashed line 35 when the slit opening 29 is slipped onto the dovetail-like projection 23 and engages with its end edge 33 in the groove 31. As already mentioned, all components of the dispenser are made of plastic material. Since the described embodiment of the device consists of only three individual parts, namely the housing 1, the piston 9 located therein and the piston actuating plunger 13, there is the advantage of simple and very inexpensive production, in particular if plastic material is used which is good in terms of injection molding can be processed. Since all components are designed as hollow chamber parts, the weight is particularly low. Furthermore, the dispenser can consist of recyclable plastic material; however, it is also possible, if necessary, to refill such dispensing devices in the factory and / or in areas of daily use of such dispensing devices. The dispensing device can be operated and operated hygienically since skin contact between the operator and the toilet bowl does not occur, since this is prevented by the dispensing device itself. Otherwise, one-handed operation is possible, in which the operator operates the discharge device in accordance with the handling of an injection syringe.

Particularly suitable sanitary agents for use in the dispensing device described above are those as published in PCT application WO 99/6601 7. Suitable sanitary agents for cleaning and / or disinfecting and / or for fragrance delivery include an adhesion promoter, water, aniαnic and / or non-ionic and / or amphoteric surfactants as well as optionally other conventional ingredients such as fragrances, thickeners, dyes and preservatives. The adhesion promoter is preferably selected from the group of longer or long chain organic molecules that are at least partially hydrophilic, the hydrophilic part of the adhesion promoter being used The majority of water interacts at least partially with the water molecules and becomes sticky, so that the agent can be applied directly to the sanitary article in the presence of small amounts of water and adheres there. The viscosity of the agent should be at least 1 5000 mPas, so that the agent can only be completely rinsed out of the toilet bowl after a large number of flushing processes. The viscosity mentioned was determined with a HAAKE viscometer, so-called rigid gels with higher viscosities around 50,000 mPas, particularly preferably with more than 150,000 mPas, can also be used as sanitary agents.

In view of the very high viscosities, it is advantageous to dispense via a dispensing opening 7 which, in the manner of an application nozzle, suitably applies the sanitary agent to the sanitary object. In the example of the dispensing device described, an elongated slot is provided as the dispensing opening 7, which, as can be seen most clearly from FIG. 3, extends in the direction of the flange surfaces 21, which serve as gripping surfaces for the user. It goes without saying that the slot can extend in any other direction, for example at right angles to the position of the grip surfaces, depending on the position of the surface on the sanitary object to which the sanitary agent is to be applied. The edges of the dispensing opening can also have any shape, for example beveled or be provided with a concave or convex curvature.

Claims

Patent claims

1 . Dispensing device for a sanitary agent for cleaning and / or disinfecting and / or for fragrance dispensing, preferably for use in

Sanitary articles, such as toilets and sinks, with a container for receiving the sanitary agent, which has a receiving space (5) delimited with a housing (1), characterized in that a manually operable discharge device (9, 13) is provided, which has a discharge plunger (9) arranged in the receiving space (5), which pushes the sanitary agent out of the receiving space (5) of the container in the direction of a discharge opening (7) of the container in order to apply the sanitary agent to the sanitary object.

2. Dispensing device according to claim 1, characterized in that the housing (1) of the container has a receiving space (5) forming a cylindrical tube (3) in which the discharge piston (9) is guided on the outer circumferential side, and in that the discharge device has a plunger (13 ) which can be inserted manually into the cylinder tube (3) in order to move the piston (9) in the direction of the dispensing opening (7).

3. Output device according to claim 2, characterized in that a tubular body is provided as the tappet (13), which is open at its end provided for bearing against the piston (33) and is closed at the other end (15) provided for manual actuation.

4. Dispensing device according to claim 3, characterized in that the plunger (13) with a part (25) of the outer circumferential surface of its tubular body on the inner surface of the cylinder tube (3) of the receiving space guided displaceably and on another part of the lateral surface has a concavity (27) which extends continuously in the longitudinal direction and forms a concavely curved outer surface on the tubular body, the radius of curvature of which corresponds to the radius of the outer surface of the cylindrical tube (3) of the housing (1) of the container is adjusted.

5. Dispensing device according to claim 4, characterized in that the housing (1) of the container has a releasable holding device (23, 31) by means of which the plunger (13) on the outside of the housing (1) can be removably attached in such a position, that the plunger (13) with the concave curvature (27) of its outer surface nestles against the outside of the housing (1).

6. Dispensing device according to claim 5, characterized in that the plunger (13) on its intended for contact with the piston (9) open

End (33) within the arch (27) has an open end, longitudinal slot opening (29), the edges of which can be plugged onto a dovetail-like projection (23) forming part of the holding device on the outside of the housing (1).

7. Dispensing device according to claim 7, characterized in that the housing (1) of the container at the entry for the tappet (13) open end (1 1) of the cylinder tube (3) has a radially projecting end flange (19), on the of which Dispensing opening (7) facing flange surface (21) adjoins the dovetail-like projection (23) in the form of a radially projecting rib which extends in the axial direction and whose axial length is less than that of the length of the slot opening (29) of the end to be plugged onto the rib (33) of the tubular body of the plunger (13).

8. Dispensing device according to claim 7, characterized in that the on the dovetail-like projection (23) -flanking flange surface (21) has a groove-like recess (31), the course of the shape of the tubular body of the plunger (13) in which by means of the holding device the peripheral area which can be attached to the housing (1) of the container is adapted such that the associated end edge (33) of the tubular body of the tappet (13) can be inserted into the recess (31).

9. Dispenser according to one of claims 1 to 8, characterized in that the housing (5) forming the housing (1) together with the discharge opening (7) is molded in one piece from plastic.

10. Dispensing device according to claim 9, characterized in that the dispensing opening (7) is designed as a metering aid and is delimited by an elongated dispensing slot which allows a flat application of the sanitary agent on the respective sanitary object.

1 1 .Delivery device according to one of claims 1 to 10, characterized in that the sanitary agent to be dispensed with it has an adhesion promoter, the adhesion promoter being selected from the group of longer- or long-chain organic molecules, which are at least partially hydrophilic, and the hydrophilic Part of the coupling agent in the presence of water interacts at least partially with the water molecules and becomes so sticky that the agent can be applied directly to the sanitary article in the presence of small amounts of water and adheres there in such a way that the Medium can only be completely rinsed off after a large number of rinsing processes.