Patent Application
20080256730
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a music or other audio-playing toothbrush especially suited to motivating children to brush their teeth. The invention herein pertains more specifically to such a child's toothbrush having a handle exterior that provides a relatively uninterrupted surface for displaying graphics related to such music or other audio. The invention also provides a unique handle interior design which provides a speaker enclosure for improving sound quality.
2. Background Art
The general concept of a toothbrush having a handle for producing sound is not new. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,339,479 to Lyman; U.S. Pat. No. 5,572,762 to Scheimer; U.S. Pat. No. 6,202,245 to Khodadadi; and Published Patent Application No. 2005/0278882 to Drzewiecki et al; all disclose such toothbrushes. All of these prior art toothbrushes have the same general purpose of motivating daily extended brushing of the teeth, especially by children who would be most attracted and influenced by a toothbrush that plays a recognizable musical tune and has compatible graphics such as related cartoon characters and the like. Unfortunately, none of the aforementioned patents and applications disclose configurations which provide a suitable handle surface for displaying such graphics or disclose or suggest a handle capable of producing superior sound fidelity.
In regard to a suitable handle surface for displaying graphics, handles which are generally of round cylindrical shape are not preferred because they are more difficult to apply graphics or print on, they tend to distort the images and the curved surface does not permit all of the graphics to be directed uniformly in a packaged configuration. Moreover, toothbrush handles that have interrupted surfaces to accommodate electric switches or other functional elements such as removable compartments, do not provide suitable surfaces for receiving graphics. Furthermore, conventional size, narrow handle surfaces do not afford sufficient surface area to place meaningful or appropriate size graphics.
The sound quality in such prior art sound producing toothbrushes, has not been adequately addressed either. Simply providing a tiny sound transducer that is sufficiently small to be received inside the toothbrush handle will not produce good quality sound to provide an attractive and recognizable tune sufficient to motivate a child to brush his or her teeth. Poor quality sound can become more of an annoyance and a deterrence than no sound at all.
Thus, despite the prior art attempts to teach a motivational music-playing toothbrush, there is still an ongoing need for such an invention that overcomes the noted deficiencies.
The present invention is specifically designed to overcome the noted deficiencies of the prior art. It provides in its preferred embodiment described herein, a music-playing toothbrush having a hollow handle housing containing suitable solid state electronic components for selectively playing a musical tune with improved sound quality. The sound quality is expressly addressed in the handle design with an interior sealed speaker enclosure configured to direct the sound toward the listener with little internal leakage and with an undulating violin-like cavity shape that suppresses internal standing waves. Moreover, the handle provides a relatively large, relatively flat, substantially uninterrupted surface for receiving attractive and motivational graphics such as licensed cartoon characters, which may be compatible with the musical selection.
The aforementioned objects and advantages of the present invention, as well as additional objects and advantages thereof, will be more fully understood herein after as a result of a detailed description of a preferred embodiment when taken in conjunction with the following drawings in which:
Referring to the accompanying drawings and initially to
The handle portion 12 is characterized by a graphics surface cover 15 which as can be seen best in
As seen in
Referring now to
In this way, speaker 20 is effectively provided with its own segregated enclosure much like a conventional size speaker enclosure used in stereo systems and other high fidelity audio environments. The result is a much improved level of audio quality as compared to simply including speaker 20 within the same general interior chamber 26 that holds PCB 18 within the handle portion 12.
The sound transducer has been mounted in such a way as to acoustically embody an infinite baffle design to prevent sound wave phase cancellation at the listener's ear by elimination of the forward projected portion of the transducer's rearward radiated sound by means of a peripheral sealing of the transducer to the exterior graphic bearing faceplate. This is accomplished through the use of an “O” ring to facilitate manufacturing process, but also includes all other means to carry out the same function including, but not limited to the use of an adhesive bead, sealing compound bead or through clamping of the periphery of the transducer by the means of either the case/lid interface or another separate ring (but not necessarily a generic “O” ring) shaped part. The advantage of the “O” ring sealing is that its resilience takes up or relieves manufacturing tolerance inconsistencies from using different third party transducer purchases that would impose a retooling requirement for any batch changes in commercially available transducer dimensions if clamping/sealing were to be accomplished through the use of incorporating an injection molded clamp/seal design being part of the case and lid interface. The “O” ring also has the advantage of providing some shock resistance for the transducer during the inevitable drops and impacts that the invention will suffer at the hand of children in use.
Another advantage that the transducer installation relates more to the assembled case/enclosure; the rear porting of the small transducer mounting cavity (through the slotted openings which accommodate the electrical wiring to the transducer from the pc board) to acoustically couple with the shaped cavity (handle) which also encloses the pc board. The inclusion of the internally rear-ported resonant cavity design enhances and reinforces the listener received sound by means of changing the rearward acoustical impedance experienced by the transducer.
The design of the internal resonant cavity containing the pc board which can be viewed as accommodation for the necessary exterior shell finger relief/hand palm shape comfort, includes an intrinsic acoustical design. The internal cavity shape incorporates sound enhancing features that are unique and result in a purity and diffusion of sound that counteracts standing wave amplification of specific tones. This sound enhancement is obtained by means of an undulating, non-parallel walled cavity design. While the top of the cavity is formed by the flat cover, all the rest of the interior incorporates a violin shape design that suppresses internal standing waves and results in a more pleasing radiated sound, free from specific resonant peaks that would be heard as harshness and a lack of musical quality.
Thus it will be seen that the present music-playing child's toothbrush has at least two unique and highly advantageous features that relate to motivating a child to use the toothbrush hereof and thus promotes a healthy habit of frequent brushing of the teeth. One such feature is the unique graphics receiving surface provided by cover 15. This surface is sufficiently large in area and sufficiently flat in shape and uninterrupted in structure to provide a graphics receiving surface which can be big, bright and colorful enough to attract a child. Moreover, it is easy to apply and adhere or print graphics to such a surface making it less costly to fabricate and more likely to attract licensors of copyrighted cartoon characters that would be recognized by children.
The other such feature is a unique speaker enclosure within the handle portion interior and which serves to improve the sound quality, loudness and fidelity of the music so that it is more likely to be recognized and pleasantly received by a child. Moreover, by improving the quality of the sound emanating from the interior of the music-playing toothbrush of the invention, it becomes more feasible to make the graphics and music more compatible and thus more likely to relate to a recognizable common theme that will attract and thus motivate a child to brush his or her teeth.
Having thus disclosed a preferred embodiment of the present invention, it will now be understood that many additions and modifications may be made to the described embodiment. Therefore, it will be understood that the scope hereof is not necessarily limited by the particular version shown herein, but should instead be deemed more broadly defined by the appended claims and their equivalents.
