Patent Application
20140259384
No cross reference is made to other applications.
No Federal Government support was received in the development of this Invention.
No sequence listing, table, or computer program is attached or accompanies this application.
This Invention relates generally to vessel drains and more particularly to a floor mounted drain for a free standing bath.
Vessels used to contain liquids are an ancient invention, and the concept of a drain to empty said vessels almost equally old. In plumbing, a “bath” or “tub” is a hollow form capable of holding water and allowing the ingress of a person or object for the purposes of bathing. Said “bath” is equipped with a “drain” to allow the drainage of “waste water” when no longer needed. In the simplest embodiment, the bath is supported to allow drainage by gravity through a drain hole in said bath to the ground below. In the next simplest embodiment, the structure of the bath is integrally extruded beneath the bath to form a vertical “tailpiece” tube beneath the bath to which a plurality of plumbing systems may be attached to direct that water away for disposal. “Seals” are critical to leakage free diversion of that water away, particularly when the bath is located inside a building that can be damaged by water leakage. Over history, standards have evolved for the exact external diameter of this tube in order to be able to seal the tube to a plumbing system of a standard internal diameter for drainage downstream to the bath. A definition of a “tube” is a hollow cylinder specified by its external diameter to accord to such a standard. Accordingly, tailpiece tubes are generally thin walled to avoid restriction to flow. Herein “pipe” refers to hollow cylinders of varying length that are manufactured to exact external diameters in order to fit to and be able to fastened and sealed to a “hub”, while maintaining standard internal diameters agreed upon as sufficient for drainage flow of a bath.
Integral tailpieces are challenging to provide, and so the concept of a flanged externally threaded pipe passed through a simple perforation in the bottom of the bath such that the flange rests upon the rim of the perforation allowing the threaded pipe to pass through and hang down was conceived before the existence of patent offices, as was the ability to clamp this threaded pipe to the bath interior using a internally threaded fittings including a nut or an elbow or a tee tightened from the outside surface of the bath. Opportunity is simultaneously provide for the clamping of a plurality of seals between this threaded pair of fittings to prevent leakage from the bath. Accordingly, the external thread of the flanged pipe accords a clamping method for an internally threaded fitting which in turn provides a means to attach to a downstream plumbing system. As referred to above, standards exist for accepted drainage tube and pipe internal diameters and a “pipe” abides to these diameters by providing a guaranteed internal diameter. Pipes are thicker than tubes when providing the same standard nominal drainage internal diameter. A “hub” is a circular aperture in a tee or bushing or elbow that connects pipe. A “tee” is a connector with three apertures, a “bushing” is a connector with two apertures, an “elbow” is a bushing with a turn in it. Tees, bushings, and elbows may adapt pipe diameters as well as connection methods.
Once a threaded pipe emanating downward from, and clamped and sealed to, a bath was achieved, history provided a variety of connection methods to connect a bath to a downstream drain system using “fittings” including nuts, tees, bushings, and elbows. These connection methods include gluing pipes into fitting hubs, soldering pipes into hubs, threading pipes into threaded hubs, and slip joints wherein an annular basket nut threads down upon a seal to clamp it to the top of pipe. There is a diversity and plurality of said fittings and connections, all historical and irrelevant to this application. The only point of interest is the provision of a standard diameter tailpiece tube attached somehow to the bath that may be used to penetrate the floor mounted seal described in this application.
Mounted or otherwise, there has recently been invention in the concept of a penetrating tube being captured permanently by a seal clamped within a drain or fitting. Mulvey (U.S. Pat. No. 5,931,200: Aug. 3, 1999) describes a compression ring clamping an annular seal onto a penetrating tube, Crompton (U.S. Pat. No. 8,205,915: Jun. 26, 2012) describes a split fastening ring and seal achieving the same, and Lai (U.S. Pat. Appln. No. 20110101685: May 5, 2011) describes an internal toothed ring grabbing onto a penetrating tube to hold it to the seal. An extensive library of such patents reveals a shared objective of holding a penetrating tube to a seal.
In contrast, the present Utility Application separates the holding and clamping of the seal to a mounted drain on the floor, and allows the mounted engineered seal to seal by a plurality of methods to the bath tailpiece tube without concern to holding that tube in place. Indeed, this fitting is a rare reversible fitting wherein the tube can be reversibly mounted and unmounted without adjustment or destruction of the drain fitting or tailpiece tube. This functionality is fully explained in the detailed description of the drawings.
Accordingly, it is an objection of this invention to at least partially overcome some of the disadvantages of the prior art.
Reference is made in the title of this application to an “island bath”. An island bath refers to a bath whose only contiguous surface in the bathroom is the floor. Accordingly, no drainage plumbing can be hidden by a wall. Therefore, the drainage must be supplied beneath the bath, in the floor. Island baths usually have no lateral access, therefore, connection of the bath must be done either from above the floor or from below the floor. Below the floor requires access; above the floor requires a connection system that does not require manual connection. That is the challenge to which this Utility responds.
In a preferred embodiment, a bath equipped with a tailpiece tube sized to be able to penetrate a floor mounted drain is mounted by lowering the bath such that its tailpiece concentrically penetrates the drain seal. The tube is sealed by a seal which is in turn has been vertically clamped between a threaded base and top. A mounted annular plate fastened concentrically to a vertical perforation in the floor provides a stable mounting platform for this clamp. The bottom of the clamp is fastened by a plurality of methods to a further plurality of drain systems.
In this Utility, a number of installation disadvantages encountered in prior art are achieved. Prior art required access to the base of the bath to fasten the bath tailpiece to pipes leading to a drainage system. This access is through the bottom of the floor, necessitating installation of the bath prior to finishing the ceiling of the room below, or lateral access in the case where no access is possible from below.
Further, in prior art, said necessity for access determined that the bath must be installed early on in the building process for a new structure. For the case of an existing building, extensive and costly deconstruction is necessary to provide the access necessary to disconnect and remove the old bath and connect a new bath. In both cases this leads to a plurality of challenges when finishing flooring around a bath, including proper support of the bath. As well, baths are expensive and the degree of bath vulnerability to damage is directly proportional to the earlier in the installation process the bath needs to be installed. This utility allows the bath to be installed not as an integral structure but as an appliance.
Further, in prior art, installation must be carried out by a licensed plumber well after the plumbing for the rest of the building has taken place. This presents potential delays and is expensive. In the Utility presented in this application, any person may be involved in the mounting of the bath, saving time, money, and scheduling. For the vendor of the baths, having their own employees deliver and mount the bath may have warranty advantages.
Further, in prior art, replacement of the decorative flooring around a bath is complex. In this Utility, the bath is simply removed, the drain plugged temporarily, and the flooring replaced, whereupon the undamaged bath can be replaced.
Further, in prior art, leakage problems would require complete deconstruction from below to provide access. In this Utility, a limited number of possible leakage loci may be inspected and seals replaced from above the floor with no deconstruction necessary. Although the drainage piping below the mounted drain is not necessarily accessible, it is firmly mounted to the floor rather than to the tub, and therefore less vulnerable to dislocation leading to broken seals.
Further aspects of the invention will become apparent upon reading the following detailed description and drawings, which illustrate the invention and preferred embodiments of the invention.
In the drawings, which illustrate embodiments of the invention:
Referring now to
A floor covering 8 covers subflooring 9 laid atop the support floor 10, for each a plurality of materials being possible. Through this multi-layer floor a vertical perforation is introduced, upon which a circular annular plate 11 is laid concentrically to said perforation. The outer rim of said plate 11 is fastened to said support floor 10 by a plurality of fasteners. The inner rim of said plate 11 comprises a flange through which a flanged externally threaded pipe 13 is passed until the flange of said pipe 13 encounters and hangs on the inner rim of said plate 11. An internally threaded base 14 is threaded onto said flanged pipe from below said plate 11, clamping a seal 15 in between. A drainage pipe 17 leading to a drainage system (not shown) is attached to the bottom hub of said threaded base 14 either directly or using a plurality of diameter reducing adapters 16. The overall utility of this Utility is to allow drainage of bath water without leakage. The seal 15 seals the thread pair of said pipe 13 and said base 14 by the application of pressure on the top of the flange 20 of said seal by the bottom of said pipe 13 forcing the lower flange surface 21 against a horizontal internal flange of said base 14. The perforation of the cylindrical seal is marked by a plurality of sealing features to prevent the leakage of water upward from the drainage system and between said seal 15 and said tailpiece pipe 7, during the drainage process. A diameter 24 is restricted to slightly less than the diameter of the tailpiece pipe 7 to effect seal. Above this are two annular seals 19 and 20 integral to the seal and of slightly diameter less than the diameter prevent water or air leaking upward between said seal 15 and said tailpiece tube 17. An annular gasket 12 discourages lateral movement of said base 14 within the vertical perforation of said plate 11 through a clamping effect when said pipe 13 is threaded into said base 11.
Referring now to
Referring now to
Prevention of liquid or gas egress between said tailpiece tube 7 and said seal 15 is effected by a plurality of sealing features in said seal 15. A diameter 24 is restricted to slightly less than the diameter of the tailpiece pipe 7 to effect seal. Above this are two ring seal 19 and 20 features integral to said seal 15 and of slightly diameter less than the diameter prevent water or air leaking upward between the seal 15 and the tailpiece tube 17. An annular gasket 12 prevents lateral movement of said base 14 within the vertical perforation of said plate 11 through a clamping effect when said pipe 13 is threaded into said base 14.
A drainage pipe 17 leading to a drainage system (not shown) is attached to the bottom hub of said threaded based either directly or using a plurality of diameter reducing adapters 16.
Referring now to
