Patent Application
20190031484
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The embodiments herein generally relate to a beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other additives. Particularly, it is a system that can operate with an existing beer tap and system and provide a manner to add color, flavor or other additives one glass at a time. The present disclosure eliminates the need for buying a whole keg that is colored or from needing to use a complex and expensive system to color or add flavor to beer, wine and other spirits. The present disclosure relates to beverage dispensers, and in particular to alcoholic beverage dispensing equipment that provide for the introduction of additive fluids into alcoholic beverages for coloring and flavoring the original beverage. This disclosure relates generally to a beverage dispenser, and more particularly, to systems and methods for providing both flavor doses and color additives to beverages.
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The consumption of beer and alcoholic spirits is increasing in popularity. Spirits normally have an alcohol content or concentration greater, and often considerably greater, than that of beer. A traditional method of dispensing draft beer is from one or more dedicated beer valves or faucets, each structured to dispense only a single brand of beer. It is known to include an additive in beer, such as green coloring for beer to be served on St. Patrick's Day. An additive can be included in the beer that is supplied to a drink retailer, but that approach increases the number of kegs of beer the retailer must keep on hand. That approach also increases the number of beer faucets required to dispense beer, since a separate faucet must be provided for each type of beer, such as faucets for both colored and uncolored beer. Also, with increasing popularity of spirits consumption, the space required to stock different brands of spirits is demanding on the retailer. Both suppliers of brands and consumers desire new and creative ways to consume beer, wine and spirits. For example, a traditional method of dispensing chilled shots uses a machine that dispenses one brand per faucet. A new, simple and creative way to provide beer and chilled shots would be to include additives at the point of consumption such as color and flavors in brands supplied to a drink retailer. That approach, however, would lower the number of beers with additives and bottles of spirits that the bar and restaurant must keep on hand and therefore decrease the number of dispensing faucets required to dispense various colors and flavors. The new system would have the ability to change the color or flavor with a simple change of an additive container—colors and flavors.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to have a system for optionally and selectively introducing one or more additives into a basic draft beer brand or spirit brand dispensed from a single beer faucet.
In prior art, a few disclosures have been made, many including more complex devices and systems to introduce flavors to beer and spirits. None is as simple and direct to give one colored or flavored beverage at a time like the improved system by Allgood.
In view of the foregoing, an embodiment herein provides a beer tap improvement system for adding an additive to a beer wherein the beer tap improvement system comprises: (a) a three-way connection component to removably connect the component with an additive container to outlet nozzle, wherein the three-way connector is made of durable material and comprises: (1) a three-way tee with threaded apertures; (2) a removable threaded connection from the three-way tee to an to existing common tap outlet nozzle; (3) a removable threaded connection and aperture from the three-way tee to an outlet nozzle for a mixture of additive and beer; (4) a removable threaded connection from the three-way tee to an additive container and an additive nozzle; (b) the outlet nozzle for a mixture of additive and beer; and (c) the additive container and the additive nozzle are further comprised of a waterproof and pliable material wherein the additive can be manually combined with the beer by an operator squeezing the additive container which releases the additive and then by the operator pulling a beer tap handle which allows the beer to mix with the additive in the three-way connection component and results in a mixture of the additive and a single beer.
These and other aspects of the embodiments herein will be better appreciated and understood when considered in conjunction with the following description and the accompanying drawings. It should be understood, however, that the following descriptions, while indicating preferred embodiments and numerous specific details thereof, are given by way of illustration and not of limitation. Many changes and modifications can be made within the scope of the embodiments herein without departing from the spirit thereof, and the embodiments herein include all such modifications.
There are several advantages of the beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other additives. There are currently no known beer tap devices or systems that are effective at providing the advantages and objects of this invention. The overall uniqueness of the system is the additive container and the three-way connector device. Other products either thread onto a beer tap or use complex, multi additive systems with electrical and pneumatic controls. The beer tap improvement for colored beer and other additives uses a simple container that is totally controlled by the operator or bar tender one glass at a time. Likewise the changeover of the color or flavor container is much faster to install than any competitors product. In a table fashion the beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other offers
The embodiments herein will be better understood from the following detailed description with reference to the drawings, in which:
The following numbers refer to the drawings
The present development is a Beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other additives. The embodiments herein generally relate to a beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other additives. Particularly, it is a system that can operate with an existing beer tap and system and provide a manner to add color, flavor or other additives one glass at a time. The present disclosure eliminates the need for buying a whole keg that is colored or from needing to use a complex and expensive system to color or add flavor to beer, wine and other spirits. The present disclosure relates to beverage dispensers, and in particular to alcoholic beverage dispensing equipment that provide for the introduction of additive fluids into alcoholic beverages for coloring and flavoring the original beverage. This disclosure relates generally to a beverage dispenser, and more particularly, to systems and methods for providing both flavor doses and color additives to beverages.
The embodiments herein and the various features and advantageous details thereof are explained more fully with reference to the non-limiting embodiments that are illustrated in the accompanying drawings and detailed in the following description. Descriptions of well-known components and processing techniques are omitted so as to not unnecessarily obscure the embodiments herein. The examples used herein are intended merely to facilitate an understanding of ways in which the embodiments herein may be practiced and to further enable those of skill in the art to practice the embodiments herein. Accordingly, the examples should not be construed as limiting the scope of the embodiments herein.
The advantages for the beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other additives 30 are listed above in the introduction. Succinctly the benefits are that the device:
A. Eliminates the need for pre-colored or pre-flavored beer
B. Saves change over time to pre-colored or pre-flavored beer kegs
C. Saves left-over pre-colored or pre-flavored beer in full kegs after special event
D. Can be installed without tools
E. Is able to be handle a full keg
F. Is ergonomic and saves extra bending and twisting by an installer
Accordingly, it would be desirable to have a system for optionally and selectively introducing one or more additives into a basic draft beer brand or spirit brand dispensed from a single beer faucet. Refer now to the drawings, and more particularly to
The additives 32 can be a coloring agent or a flavoring agent. There are a plethora of both and more coming every year. Therefore as examples and not limitations to the additives that can be used with the system 30: A. Typical flavoring agents can be from a group of chocolate, coconut, hazelnut, ginger, oak essence, peanut butter, caramel, apple, pineapple, strawberry, blueberry, sweet tea, orange and apricot. B. Typical coloring agents can be from a group of green, blue, red, yellow, orange and violet. One skilled in additives can continue to increase these lists.
The details mentioned here are exemplary and not limiting. Other specific components and manners specific to describing a beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other additives 30 may be added as a person having ordinary skill in the field of beer dispensing systems, devices and their uses.
The beer tap improvement system 30 for colored beer and other additives has been described in the above embodiment. The manner of how the system operates is described below. One notes well that the description above and the operation described here must be taken together to fully illustrate the concept of the improvement system 30. The preferred embodiment of the beer tap improvement system for colored beer and other additives is comprised of: (a) a three-way connection component to removably connect the component with an additive container to outlet nozzle, wherein the three-way connector is made of durable material and comprises: (1) a three-way tee with threaded apertures; (2) a removable threaded connection from the three-way tee to an to existing common tap outlet nozzle; (3) a removable threaded connection and aperture from the three-way tee to an outlet nozzle for a mixture of additive and beer; (4) a removable threaded connection from the three-way tee to an additive container and an additive nozzle; (b) the outlet nozzle for a mixture of additive and beer; and (c) the additive container and the additive nozzle further comprised of a waterproof and pliable material wherein additive can be manually combined with the beer by an operator squeezing the additive container which releases the additive and then by the operator pulling a beer tap handle which allows the beer to mix with the additive in the three-way connection component and results in a mixture of the additive and a single beer.
With this description it is to be understood that the beer tap improvement system 30 for colored beer and other additives is not to be limited to only the disclosed embodiment of product. The features of the improvement system 30 are intended to cover various modifications and equivalent arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the description.
Unless it is defined otherwise, all technical and scientific terms used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skill in the art to which these inventions belong. Although any methods and materials similar or equivalent to those described herein can also be used in the practice or testing of the present inventions, the preferred methods and materials are now described. All patents and publications mentioned herein, including those cited in the Background of the application, are hereby incorporated by reference to disclose and described the methods and/or materials in connection with which the publications are cited.
Other embodiments of the invention are possible. Although the description above contains much specificity, these should not be construed as limiting the scope of the invention, but as merely providing illustrations of some of the presently preferred embodiments of this invention. It is also contemplated that various combinations or sub-combinations of the specific features and aspects of the embodiments may be made and still fall within the scope of the inventions. It should be understood that various features and aspects of the disclosed embodiments can be combined with or substituted for one another in order to form varying modes of the disclosed inventions. Thus, it is intended that the scope of at least some of the present inventions herein disclosed should not be limited by the particular disclosed embodiments described above.
Thus the scope of this invention should be determined by the appended claims and their legal equivalents. Therefore, it will be appreciated that the scope of the present invention fully encompasses other embodiments which may become obvious to those skilled in the art and that the scope of the present invention is accordingly to be limited by nothing other than the appended claims, in which reference to an element in the singular is not intended to mean “one and only one” unless explicitly so stated, but rather “one or more.” All structural, chemical, and functional equivalents to the elements of the above-described preferred embodiment that are known to those of ordinary skill in the art are expressly incorporated herein by reference and are intended to be encompassed by the present claims. Moreover, it is not necessary for a device or method to address each and every problem sought to be solved by the present invention for it to be encompassed by the present claims. Furthermore, no element, component, or method step in the present disclosure is intended to be dedicated to the public regardless of whether the element, component, or method step is explicitly recited in the claims.
The terms recited in the claims should be given their ordinary and customary meaning as determined by reference to relevant entries (e.g., definition of “plane” as a carpenter's tool would not be relevant to the use of the term “plane” when used to refer to an airplane, etc.) in dictionaries (e.g., widely used general reference dictionaries and/or relevant technical dictionaries), commonly understood meanings by those in the art, etc., with the understanding that the broadest meaning imparted by any one or combination of these sources should be given to the claim terms (e.g., two or more relevant dictionary entries should be combined to provide the broadest meaning of the combination of entries, etc.) subject only to the following exceptions: (a) if a term is used herein in a manner more expansive than its ordinary and customary meaning, the term should be given its ordinary and customary meaning plus the additional expansive meaning, or (b) if a term has been explicitly defined to have a different meaning by reciting the term followed by the phrase “as used herein shall mean” or similar language (e.g., “herein this term means,” “as defined herein,” “for the purposes of this disclosure [the term] shall mean,” etc.). References to specific examples, use of “i.e.,” use of the word “invention,” etc., are not meant to invoke exception (b) or otherwise restrict the scope of the recited claim terms. Other than situations where exception (b) applies, nothing contained herein should be considered a disclaimer or disavowal of claim scope. Accordingly, the subject matter recited in the claims is not coextensive with and should not be interpreted to be coextensive with any particular embodiment, feature, or combination of features shown herein. This is true even if only a single embodiment of the particular feature or combination of features is illustrated and described herein. Thus, the appended claims should be read to be given their broadest interpretation in view of the prior art and the ordinary meaning of the claim terms.
As used herein, spatial or directional terms, such as “left,” “right,” “front,” “back,” and the like, relate to the subject matter as it is shown in the drawing FIGS. However, it is to be understood that the subject matter described herein may assume various alternative orientations and, accordingly, such terms are not to be considered as limiting. Furthermore, as used herein (i.e., in the claims and the specification), articles such as “the,” “a,” and “an” can connote the singular or plural. Also, as used herein, the word “or” when used without a preceding “either” (or other similar language indicating that “or” is unequivocally meant to be exclusive—e.g., only one of x or y, etc.) shall be interpreted to be inclusive (e.g., “x or y” means one or both x or y) Likewise, as used herein, the term “and/or” shall also be interpreted to be inclusive (e.g., “x and/or y” means one or both x or y). In situations where “and/or” or “or” are used as a conjunction for a group of three or more items, the group should be interpreted to include one item alone, all of the items together, or any combination or number of the items. Moreover, terms used in the specification and claims such as have, having, include, and including should be construed to be synonymous with the terms comprise and comprising.
Unless otherwise indicated, all numbers or expressions, such as those expressing dimensions, physical characteristics, etc. used in the specification (other than the claims) are understood as modified in all instances by the term “approximately.” At the very least, and not as an attempt to limit the application of the doctrine of equivalents to the claims, each numerical parameter recited in the specification or claims which is modified by the term “approximately” should at least be construed in light of the number of recited significant digits and by applying ordinary rounding techniques.
