Patent Application
20190203525
The present disclosure generally relates to the field of temporary flood protection devices and, more specifically, to methods, devices and kits for forming a temporary seal to prevent water from entering a home or a building.
Municipalities and federal and state governments go to great lengths and spend enormous sums of money in an effort to protect residences and commercial properties from flooding. For example, infrastructures such as dams, underground water drainage systems and drainage canals are formed in an effort to control the flow of rain water and rivers, and to try to keep water in lakes or reservoirs from overflowing. However, in some cases, despite the best efforts of all involved, systems may fail or weather conditions may be so bad as to simply overwhelm the infrastructure in place for water control. As a result, flooding of residences and/or businesses may occur. Flooding can cause a great deal of monetary damage and emotional anguish to those that are adversely impacted. Even a few inches of flood water in a residence can cause extensive damage, disrupt family's lives for months and take months to repair. Similar problems can arise in the context of business operations as well and can result in loss of significant revenues.
Thus, in some situations, residents and business owners have undertaken measures to try to form some sort of temporary means of preventing flood damage to their properties when there is danger that flooding may occur. One common technique involves placing sandbags around the area to be protected. While this technique can be effective in certain situations, it is very labor-intensive, very time-consuming and typically must be done several days in advance of the anticipated flooding event, at or near the time of an actual flooding event it may be difficult to obtain the necessary manpower and supplies to produce the required number of sandbags.
What is needed is a relatively inexpensive, effective and non-labor-intensive means of providing a temporary seal that may be used by homeowners and business owners to prevent or at least reduce the chances of water entering a residence or place of business during a flooding event.
The following presents a simplified summary of the invention in order to provide a basic understanding of some aspects of the invention. This summary is not an exhaustive overview of the invention. It is not intended to identify key or critical elements of the invention or to delineate the scope of the invention. Its sole purpose is to present some concepts in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description that is discussed later.
Generally, the present disclosure is directed to various novel embodiments of methods, devices and kits for forming a temporary seal to prevent water from entering a structure, such as a home or a building. One illustrative method disclosed herein includes positioning a plurality of individual sections of a moldable material adjacent one another and adjacent a structure to be sealed, and forcing the individual sections against one another and at least the structure so as to deform the plurality of individual sections and thereby form a substantially contiguous temporary seal comprised of the moldable material between the structure and at least a portion of the opening in which the structure is positioned.
One illustrative device disclosed herein includes a substantially contiguous seal comprised of a plurality of individual sections of moldable material that are adapted to be positioned against a surface of a structure and a surface of an opening in which the structure is adapted to be positioned, at least some of the moldable material adapted to be positioned between at least a portion of the structure and at least a portion of the opening.
One illustrative kit disclosed herein includes a package and a plurality of individual sections of moldable material positioned within the package, each of the plurality of individual sections of moldable material being separated from one another by at least one layer of material. In this example, the kit also includes instructions for forming a substantially contiguous seal between a structure and an opening in which the structure is positioned by deforming the plurality of individual sections of the moldable material, wherein the instructions are included in or part of the package.
Yet another illustrative device disclosed herein includes a package and a plurality of individual sections of a moldable material positioned within the package, wherein the plurality of individual sections of the moldable material are adapted to be deformed into a substantially contiguous seal between a first structure and a second structure and wherein the number of the individual sections of the moldable material within the package is selected so as to provide the necessary quantity of the plurality of individual sections of the moldable material so as to form the substantially contiguous seal.
The disclosure may be understood by reference to the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like reference numerals identify like elements, and in which:
While the subject matter disclosed herein is susceptible to various modifications and alternative forms, specific embodiments thereof have been shown by way of example in the drawings and are herein described in detail. It should be understood, however, that the description herein of specific embodiments is not intended to limit the invention to the particular forms disclosed, but on the contrary, the intention is to cover all modifications, equivalents, and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.
Various illustrative embodiments of the invention are described below. In the interest of clarity, not all features of an actual implementation are described in this specification. It will of course be appreciated that in the development of any such actual embodiment, numerous implementation-specific decisions must be made to achieve the developers' specific goals, such as compliance with system-related and business-related constraints, which will vary from one implementation to another. Moreover, it will be appreciated that such a development effort might be complex and time-consuming, but would nevertheless be a routine undertaking for those of ordinary skill in the art after having the benefit of this disclosure.
The present subject matter will now be described with reference to the attached figures. Various structures, systems and devices are schematically depicted in the drawings for purposes of explanation only and so as to not obscure the present disclosure with details that are well known to those skilled in the art. Nevertheless, the attached drawings are included to describe and explain illustrative examples of the present disclosure. The words and phrases used herein should be understood and interpreted to have a meaning consistent with the understanding of those words and phrases by those skilled in the relevant art. No special definition of a term or phrase, i.e., a definition that is different from the ordinary and customary meaning as understood by those skilled in the art, is intended to be implied by consistent usage of the term or phrase herein. To the extent that a term or phrase is intended to have a special meaning, i.e., a meaning other than that understood by skilled artisans, such a special definition will be expressly set forth in the specification in a definitional manner that directly and unequivocally provides the special definition for the term or phrase.
The overall size and configuration of the individual sections 12 of moldable material may vary depending upon the particular application and as a matter of design choice. In one illustrative example, the individual sections 12 of moldable material take the form of a substantially rectangular shaped block of material having a length 12L, a width 12W and a thickness 12T, the dimensions of which may vary depending upon the particular application. In one illustrative example, the length 12L may be about 10 inches, the width 12W may be about 3 inches, and the thickness 12T may be about 0.5 inches. In one illustrative embodiment, the individual sections 12 of moldable material may be made of a hand-moldable material such as, for example, modeling compound, which in some cases may be known as plastilina/plastalina clay. In one particular embodiment, the moldable material may comprise an oil-based or wax-based material so as to enhance the ability of the moldable material to form a seal against water intrusion into a building or home. This type of material typically remains pliable and it is typically designed not to harden.
The size and number of individual sections 12 of moldable material provided in the kit 10 may vary depending upon the particular application. In one illustrative example, the kit 10 may contain a sufficient number of individual sections 12 of moldable material so as to permit formation of a substantially contiguous temporary seal 30 disclosed herein on a standard single door, having a width of about 36 inches. In such an application, if a consumer needs to form a temporary seal on a set of double doors, the consumer would simply purchase two of the kits 10. In other cases, the kit 10 may contain a sufficient number of individual sections 12 of moldable material so as to permit the formation of the substantially contiguous temporary seal 30 disclosed herein on a set of French doors (of a specified width) or on a garage door (of a specified width). The kit 10 also comprises instructions (not shown) in the form or text and/or drawings on how to form the substantially contiguous temporary seal 30 disclosed herein. In one example, the instructions may be printed on the outside of the package 11 or the instructions may be written on one or more sheets of paper that are included within the package 11. Such instructions may also include text and/or pictures that instruct a consumer as to how to form the individual sections 12 of moldable material to plug or block other potential paths of water ingress into a home or building, such as weep holes, as described more fully below.
One illustrative method for forming the novel substantially contiguous temporary seal 30 disclosed herein will now be discussed. In general, in one illustrative embodiment, the methods disclosed herein involve forming a substantially contiguous, substantially water-tight seal 30 comprised of the moldable material between a structure that is to be sealed (such as a door, a window or a garage door) and at least a portion of the opening (e.g., a door frame, a floor, a window sill, etc.) in which the structure is positioned. In one particular example, this is accomplished by forcing a plurality of the individual sections 12 of moldable material against one another and at least the structure that is to be sealed so as to deform the plurality of individual sections 12 of moldable material and thereby form the substantially contiguous seal 30 comprised of the moldable material between the structure to be sealed and at least a portion of the opening (in which the structure is positioned). The moldable material has a composition and consistency so as to permit an individual to mold, deform and force the moldable material by hand so as to form the desired seal 30. As used herein and in the claims, the term “moldable material” shall be understood to be a material that is capable of being deformed by application of a force supplied by an adult human being of average strength. Typically, a user may physically deform the sections 12 of moldable material to achieve the seal 30 by applying force with the user's fingers and thumbs, i.e., deforming the moldable material via direct contact with human hands. In other cases, a human may use a relatively blunt object or “tool,” such as the handle of an ordinary hammer, the end of a broom, a wooden spoon, etc., during some or all of the process of deforming the sections 12 of moldable material to achieve the desired seal 30.
At the point of operations shown in
With reference to
As noted above, the seal disclosed herein is temporary in nature. Once the danger of water entering the building or residence has passed, the novel seal 30 disclosed herein may be readily removed by simply pulling the seal 30 apart by hand, as shown in
As noted above, the novel seal 30 disclosed herein may be used to form a temporary seal on a variety of different structures. For example,
The methods and materials disclosed herein may also be employed to temporarily plug other potential paths or holes for water ingress into a building during flooding conditions. As used herein, the term “building” shall be understood to include any type of structure, such as a commercial building or a residential structure (e.g., single family home, a townhouse, etc.).
However, as shown in
The instructions included with the kit 10 may include all or portions of the text above (or equivalent text) describing how to position the sections 12 of moldable material adjacent a structure to be sealed and how to deform the moldable material so as to form the temporary seal 30 and/or plug 30C. The instructions may also include one or more of the drawings in this application, such as
The particular embodiments disclosed above are illustrative only, as the invention may be modified and practiced in different but equivalent manners apparent to those skilled in the art having the benefit of the teachings herein. For example, the process steps set forth above may be performed in a different order. Furthermore, no limitations are intended to the details of construction or design herein shown, other than as described in the claims below. It is therefore evident that the particular embodiments disclosed above may be altered or modified and all such variations are considered within the scope and spirit of the invention. Note that the use of terms, such as “first,” “second,” “third” or “fourth” to describe various processes or structures in this specification and in the attached claims is only used as a shorthand reference to such steps/structures and does not necessarily imply that such steps/structures are performed/formed in that ordered sequence. Of course, depending upon the exact claim language, an ordered sequence of such processes may or may not be required. Accordingly, the protection sought herein is as set forth in the claims below.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 15860179 | Jan 2018 | US |
| Child | 16296978 | US |
