Patent Application
20080052818
The invention relates to an installation unit according to the precharacterizing clause of claim 1. Such installation units are also known as combination showers or are offered, for example, by the applicant under the name “shower panel”.
Of such combination showers, it is known that they have a forefront or profile on the front side, as a rule as an elongate vertically running front face, to which sanitary articles, such as removable hand showers, permanently installed head showers or body showers, are fastened. A flexable shower hose as water supply for a removable hand shower normally emanates at one point from the installation unit and then leads to the hand shower.
The object on which the invention is based is to provide an installation unit mentioned in the introduction, by means of which problems of the prior art can be avoided and, in particular, a possibility is afforded of providing a conduit device, such as a shower hose, from the installation unit to the hand shower in a neat and undisruptive way.
This object is achieved by means of an installation unit having the features of claim 1 or 18. Advantageous and preferred embodiments of the invention are the subject-matter of the further claims and are explained in more detail below. The wording of the claims becomes the content of the description by express reference.
According to the invention, there is provision for a conduit device, such as a shower hose or the like, to be led from a rear side of the profile surface or front side through a laterally open slit in the profile surface and to lead to the sanitary article which is arranged or mounted on the front side. It is thereby possible for the conduit unit to be led to an important part behind the installation unit or behind the profile surface. This is advantageous, above all, for the situation where the sanitary article, together with the conduit unit, is arranged on the installation unit and is not removed. However, so that this can also be removed and used with as high a degree of freedom as possible, the conduit device can as it were be taken out of the slit in such a way that it runs essentially free of the profile surface. Thus, for example in a hand shower, it is possible for this to be used conveniently with the greatest possible freedom. After use, the conduit device can be led again through the laterally open slit for neat stowage, and the sanitary article can be fastened to the profile surface again. The profile surface may also be a front side or a front plate.
Advantageously, the conduit device is fastened behind the profile surface or is fastened behind the front side to the installation unit and in this case, of course, is also connected so as to conduct water. This is particularly advantageous in an installation body arranged behind the front side, in which case the installation body may be a kind of box which forms the rear side of the installation unit and covers various devices, such as mixing valves and changeover valves, on the rear side. The profile surface or front side may be fastened to the installation body or be attached to the latter from the front. To be precise, in a preferred installation unit, this is a prefabricated and as it were largely independent structural unit which is connected only to a hot-water connection and a cold-water connection in a wall and has all the shower functional units, such as mixing valves, changeover valves or the like.
In a refinement of the invention, the lateral slit may be markedly longer than the thickness of the conduit device, so that the latter is led someway in. The slit may be, for example, two to five times longer. Advantageously, however, it does not reach too far into the profile surface, in particular to a lesser extent than half the entire width of the latter.
It is possible to cause the conduit device to emanate from one side of the installation unit and to provide the slit on the other side. In this case, the conduit unit may always run behind the profile surface, but may run beneath the abovementioned installation body from one side to the other. Thus, some freely moveable length of the conduit device is afforded for the largely free moveability of a hand shower connected to it.
It is advantageous if the conduit device is freely suspended between a fixed connection to the installation unit at one end and the connection to the sanitary article at its other end. Freely suspended means here, in particular, that, although it may be partially guided or bears against specific abutments or recesses, it can nevertheless basically be removed from these without any outlay, structural changes or the like.
In a refinement of the invention, there may be provision for the conduit device to be invisible between one end at the installation unit and the lateral slit. For this purpose, it may run in the installation unit or in an installation body behind it. For this purpose, it may, for example, be wound by means of a winding arrangement similar to a drum. However, the abovementioned possibility with the freely suspended conduit device is preferred.
It is advantageous if the lateral slit in the profile surface is bevelled or rounded upwards at the front edge and downwards at the rear edge transversely with respect to its longitudinal extent or in the direction of run of the conduit device, that is to say, advantageously, from the bottom upwards or vertically. This makes it possible for the conduit device to be led from the bottom rear upwards to the front through the profile surface which has a certain thickness, without the conduit device undergoing excessive bending or even kinking. In an advantageous development of the invention, there may be provision for a depression to be provided in the front side of the profile surface at the inner end of the slit, that is to say where the conduit device normally runs, suspended. This depression may correspond approximately to half the thickness of the conduit device, that is to say the conduit device can be to some extent countersunk therein. This, on the one hand, has the advantage that the said conduit device is then arranged securely and permanently in the slit and does not automatically move out. Furthermore, the passage of the conduit device through the profile surface from the rear forwards is then highly uniform, and the conduit device does not project or projects only a little forwards beyond the profile surface. Particularly advantageously, the depression has a depth such that the conduit device can be countersunk therein for a large part or even so as to be essentially flush with the surface.
The conduit device can run freely moveably between the slit in the profile surface and the fastening of the said conduit device to the installation unit. In particular, it is thereby possible that, after the removal of the sanitary article from the installation unit and the extraction of the conduit device from the slit, the entire conduit device is free of the profile surface and a sanitary article, such as, for example, a hand shower, connected to it can be used in the usual way and very conveniently.
According to a further aspect of the invention which, if appropriate, is independent, according to the invention, in an installation unit of the type mentioned in the introduction, a conduit device is led from the rear side of the profile surface through this to the front side to a sanitary article. For this purpose, an above-described slit may be provided in the profile surface. The conduit device is advantageously a flexible hose or shower hose. A depression or groove is provided on the profile surface from the passage of the conduit device through the profile surface or slit at least to just in front of the sanitary article. The conduit device is received at least partially or with the greatest part of its thickness in this depression. Thus, with a conduit device per se running freely or not being fastened, fixing is brought about between the passage and the sanitary article, so that the conduit device is as it were put away and neither projects disruptively nor can run in an unwanted way.
In an advantageous refinement of the invention, the depression runs completely from the passage or slit up to the sanitary article. The depression is preferably of a depth such that the conduit device can be countersunk completely therein. However, even with a conduit device which can be countersunk for a large part, for example by half or three quarters, very good lateral guidance against unwanted movement or misrunning of the conduit device is obtained.
In a refinement of the invention, it is possible to mount or hold the sanitary article moveably on the installation unit or the profile surface. A mounting for this purpose may be moveable, preferably displaceable. Particularly preferably, there may be provision for the mounting to be capable of being displaced parallel to the abovementioned depression. The mounting may itself be arranged displaceably in the depression. Thus, the installation unit can be designed or produced more simply. Furthermore, it is thereby possible for the conduit device to extend from the depression directly to the sanitary article located in the mounting. Such a depression may be in the form of a simple groove. For guiding an abovementioned mounting, it is advantageous if the depression has undercuts or grooves so that the mounting sits in it securely and fixedly in terms of rotation.
In a refinement of the invention, at least one setting or changeover device may be provided on one side or lateral face of the installation unit or of the abovementioned installation body. The slit is then advantageously provided on the other side face. The conduit device advantageously leads away from this side.
These and further features may be gathered from the claims, but also from the description and the drawings, the individual features being capable of being implemented in each case in themselves or severally in the form of subcombinations in an embodiment of the invention and in other fields and being capable of constituting advantageous and independently patentable versions for which protection is claimed here. The subdivision of the application into individual sections and intermediate headings do not restrict the general validity of the statements made under these.
An exemplary embodiment of the invention is illustrated diagrammatically in the drawings and is explained in more detail below. In the drawings:
The installation unit 11 has a profile surface 13 with a front side 14 which may also be considered as a front plate and consists, in particular, of plastic, glass or metal. An installation body 16 is provided as a kind of box or housing on the rear side of the profile surface 13. The essential portion of the technology and also the water connections of the installation unit 11 are located in the said installation body. Changeover devices 17 and temperature controllers 18 having customary known functions project from the right-hand side, not explicitly illustrated, of the installation body 16. Below the temperature controller 18 is located a hose connection 20 from which a shower hose 21 as the conduit device emanates. The shower hose 21 runs first downwards on the right-hand side of the installation body 16 and there has a lower bend 22. It can be seen particularly from
A lateral slit 25 is provided in the profile surface 13 of the front side 14 on the left a little below mid-height of the installation unit 11. The slit 25 is formed in an insert part 26 which is inserted into a corresponding recess in the profile surface 13. It may, however, also be made directly in the profile surface. The shower hose 21 executes an S-bend 27 here and as it were changes from the rear of the profile surface 13 to the front side of the latter.
The region of the lateral slit 25 has an upper projecting length 29 with a rounding 30 which can be seen above all from
The slit 25 merges upwards into a depression start 35 which as it were again forms rearwards an indentation behind the upper projecting length 29, in such a way that the upper projecting length 29 markedly impedes a movement to the left of the shower hose 21. The depression start 35 merges upwards into the depression 36 which is illustrated by dashes in
The depression 36 leads upwards, and advantageously it goes upwards over the entire height of the installation unit 11. The shower hose 21 running therein leads to a hand shower 39. This, in turn, is held in a mounting 40 from which it can be extracted. The mounting 40 is likewise arranged in the depression 36, specifically moveably along the depression. The hand shower 39 can thus be used as a head shower in the position illustrated in
For the free moveability of the hand shower 39, the latter is taken out of the mounting 40. In this case, the shower hose 21 is moved out of the depression 36. In this state, there is free moveability of the shower hose 21 between the slit 25 and the hand shower 39. For a further-extended freedom of movement, the shower hose 21 may be bent to a somewhat greater extent in the region of the slit 25 than with the S-bend 27 in the form according to
After the use of the hand shower 39 with free moveability, the shower hose 21 is again first brought with the lower bend 22 behind the profile surface 13. The shower hose is then introduced with a corresponding bend between the roundings 30 and 33 into the slit 25 again, the said shower hose then slipping virtually automatically into the deep depression start 35 and then, after the hand shower 39 is fastened to the mounting 40, likewise running virtually automatically along the depression 36 and therein again. Since the bend 22 of the shower hose is freely suspended at the bottom, its dead weight holds it downwards to some extent just so that, above all in the region of the depression 36, it is tensioned both straight and very slightly and therefore runs neatly in the depression.
If, in this position corresponding again to
The neat hose routing is thus achieved both by the lateral slit 25 with the roundings 30 and 33 at the projecting lengths 29 and 32 and by interaction with the depression start 35. The neat and put-away run of the shower hose 21 on the front side towards the hand shower 39 is achieved by means of the depression 36 which extends over this length.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 102006042623.1 | Sep 2006 | DE | national |
