Patent Application
20160029575
(1) Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a pant holder for attachment to a rod or tube, wherein the plant holder can be used to hold all kinds of plants, both indoors and outdoors. It is advantageous and important that a wire for supporting the plant can be easily, quickly and safely attached to the plant holder.
(2) Description of Related Art
A plant holder of the aforementioned type is known, for example, from EP 1815734 A2 by the same applicant. The plant holder is attached therein to a rod or a tube by a clamping block and a clamping screw. This type of attachment can have several drawbacks. On the one hand, the screw attachment is too slow to manipulate. On the other hand, the clamping screw is difficult to manipulate with garden gloves.
It is the object of the invention to propose a plant holder with an improved fastening device that can be quickly and easily attached to a rod or a tube. It is another object of the invention to construct the plant holder such that the wire for supporting the plant can be quickly and securely attached to the plant holder
According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the plant holder includes an elongated base body having a plurality of passages that extend transversely to the base body and are configured to receive the wire-shaped fastening means for plants, and a clamping device that is arranged at one end of the base body for affixing the plant holder to a holder to be attached in the ground or on a wall.
According to the invention, the base body has locking projections associated with the passages for detachable attachment of an end of the wire-shaped fastening means that is bent off and extends substantially parallel to the base body.
The wire-shaped fastening means for the plant can thus be easily and quickly attached on the base body and detached again, without requiring a tool or other resources.
Furthermore, with the clamping device, the base body of the plant holder can be quickly attached to a rod or a tube with large holding force and just as easily detached again, also without using tools.
Preferred embodiments and other advantageous features of the plant holder are recited in the dependent claims.
Exemplary embodiments of the invention are illustrated in the drawings. Other features and advantages of the invention will be evident from the drawings and their description.
The drawings show in:
The drawings show the plant holder according to the invention, substantially composed of an elongated base body 1 and a clamping device 2 which is disposed at one end of the base body 1.
The clamping device 2 is composed of two clamping jaws 3, 4 which are biased against each other by a spring force and can be clamped to a rod or tube (not shown) by means of a clamping screw 5. The clamping jaws grip around the rod (tube) and are pressed together with the clamping screw 5, so that they are clamped to the rod (tube). The clamping jaws 3, 4 are pivotally supported on a reinforced clamping block 6. Rods with a diameter of, for example, 8 mm to 28 mm can be clamped. The plant holders can be affixed at any desired position along the rod and detached again.
The base body 1 is preferably formed not of a solid material, but is instead formed with ribs and recesses in order to save material and thus weight without adversely affecting the rigidity. Passages 7-10 that extend transversely to the longitudinal direction of the base body for receiving the wire-shaped fastening means for plants are provided along the elongated base body 1. The fastening means are preferably constructed from one or several wires 11, which are used to attach the plants and hold the plants in position.
The passages 7-10 are preferably formed as bushings or bores which are arranged on or in the base body. Preferably, two mutually associated passages 7, 8 and 9, 10, respectively, are in, each case arranged relatively close to each other. However, they are not arranged in the same plane.
Spring clips 12 for resiliently clamping the wire 11 are arranged between each pair of mutually associated passages 7, 8 and 9, 10, respectively.
The other end of the wire 11 beyond the first side of the passage 9 is routed around the plant to be held and back to the plant holder, where the end can then be pushed through the associated passage 10 and secured by bending the end routed through the passage 10.
Approximately thumb-sized, for example, semi-circular engagement holes 14 are disposed on the top side of the base body 1 approximately opposite and above the passages 8 and 10. The fixed wire 11 can be detached again from the latching engagement at the edge 10a by pressing with the thumb on the wire 11 on the corresponding engagement hole 14.
The abutment surface 15 for the wire 11 routed along the guide groove 13 is preferably not arranged parallel to the longitudinal axis of the base body 1, but instead extends preferably at an angle to the longitudinal axis of the base body 1 Commercially available wire is frequently bent, for example, with a diameter of 1 meter. The sloping abutment surface 15 is then better adapted to the existing curvature of the wire 11. Thus, the wire 11 can make better contact with the abutment surface 15.
In terms of applications and configurations of the plant holder, reference is made in detail to the description of EP 1815734 A2.
