Patent Application
20220022699
This invention is generally related to the field of hand-washing stations and, more particularly, to portable hand-wash sink-station devices of the sort that provide two sinks to accommodate two concurrent users.
The invention disclosed herein is portable sink apparatus of the kind that includes two separate sinks in a compact space. There are a number of instances in which portable hand-washing stations provide important and often essential functionality. These include, among other things, usage at temporary events/locations (both indoors and outdoors) in which large crowds are gathered (e.g., fairs, musical events, sporting events, and the like) and also at sites for construction, renovation, and other similar work sites. Often such uses require a large number of such devices to be temporarily installed and serviced; thus, compact units which are conveniently portable and periodically easily serviced are highly desirable.
Because of the nature of such devices, the sinks they provide tend to be fairly small and not nearly as accommodative as permanently-installed sinks such as in homes and public buildings. To be specific, there tends to be lesser-than-normal space to facilitate scrubbing of two hands together, particularly the vigorous hand-scrubbing desired and helpful to construction workers and the like. And, in many instances, more than simple hand-washing is desirable. For example, the scrubbing of a user's forearm can be constrained by the typically fairly small and non-accommodative nature of sinks of such portable sink stations.
It would be highly desirable in sinks of portable hand-washing stations to provide sinks with increased clearance for hand-scrubbing. It would even be more desirable to provide sinks in portable hand-washing stations with sink dimensions of increased length to accommodate and facilitate forearm-scrubbing, as is frequently desired, for example, by construction workers and the like. Yet, because of practical considerations, achieving these advantages and capabilities can be challenging, particularly for dual-sink hand-washing stations, the sorts of stations to which the present invention pertains.
Some of the practical considerations relate to the size, shape and footprint of such portable hand-washing stations. More specifically, because companies or departments that typically own and provide such stations are often transporting (by truck) several, often even a great number, of such stations for temporary set up at a site, it is important that many of such stations be placed on a truck-bed or the like without taking too much room. And, it is typically quite important that each hand-washing station take minimal ground space or floor space when installed and ready for use, so that a good number of such stations can be placed for use without taking any more floor or ground space than necessary.
Moreover, each of such stations, once installed, must readily accommodate the frequent servicing which is necessary at a site. Servicing of such a portable hand-washing station requires cleaning the station, reprovisioning consumables such as soap and towels, filling of the station's fresh-water storage tank, and emptying grey water (i.e., dirty water that drained from the sinks) from the station's grey-water collection tank. For events having large crowds over extended periods, the scale of the periodic servicing function both during and after the extended period of use can be substantial.
Furthermore, considerations involving site usage by plural portable hand-washing stations are important when it come to servicing, because proximity of a service vehicle to plural stations, allowing concurrent servicing from one vehicle position, is considered very desirable.
Given all the above considerations, it can be seen that shape, footprint and size of portable dual-sink hand-washing stations are a matter of practical importance and value. It would be highly desirable to have portable dual-sink hand-washing stations with configurational characteristics providing sinks having increased clearance for hand-scrubbing, and even sink dimensions of increased length to accommodate and facilitate forearm-scrubbing, but doing so while still having minimal station footprint.
The dual-sink portable hand-washing stations of the prior art have failed to provide such characteristics and advantages, and it is to providing these characteristics and advantages that this invention is directed. And these are provided while facilitating efficient transportation of plural stations, efficient site arrangement of plural stations, and convenient station servicing.
This invention is a portable dual-sink hand-washing station including: a base; a sink structure above and supported by the base, the sink structure defining a substantially-horizontal upper surface area; a station top supported above the sink structure and including vertical support structure which defines a diagonal divide of the horizontal upper surface area into two sections, each of which has a sink opening with a rear edge along the vertical support structure such that each sink opening has a larger end and a smaller end, whereby the larger end of each sink provides increased clearance for hand-scrubbing within the sink. At least one of the sink openings preferably has an increased maximum length to accommodate forearm-scrubbing.
In highly preferred embodiments, at least one of the sink openings is quadrilateral in shape. In highly preferred embodiments, the two sections of the horizontal upper surface area defined by the sink structure are quadrilateral sections each having at least one pair of opposite sides of unequal length. And in such situations, it is preferred that at least one of the sink openings is quadrilateral in shape.
In certain preferred embodiments, the station top includes one or more hang-members configured to hold user accessories. In such embodiments, the station top preferably includes one or more vertical post structures each at an opposite end of the diagonal vertical support structure and each having a post distal end which forms one of the hang-members. Positioning hang-members in this manner allows a user's bag, coat or other hanging object to be further back and removed from a hand-scrubbing area, a helpful convenience. Such hang-member(s) is/are preferably integrally-formed with the vertical support structure.
Certain embodiments of the portable dual-sink hand-washing station of this invention further include features to prevent leakage or spillage during and before the process of removing grey water by suction from the grey-water storage tank in the base of the hand-washing station. Such embodiments, which include a suction tube extending from an inlet end thereof within the grey-water storage tank upwardly and from there downwardly to an outlet end thereof at a bottom portion of the base, have a check valve in the suction tube. The check valve has a cracking pressure sufficient to prevent flow of grey water from the grey-water storage tank through the suction tube without application of sufficient suction at the outlet to overcome the cracking pressure.
In certain of such embodiments, the check valve is preferably at the inlet end. In certain other embodiments, the check valve is positioned outside the grey-water storage tank. In some embodiments, the suction tube has a highest point positioned above a highest level of grey-water storage, and in certain of such embodiments the check valve is positioned in the tube above the highest level of grey-water storage. Regardless of the location of the check valve, some embodiments may also have an outlet valve at the outlet end of the suction tube.
Certain embodiments of the portable hand-washing station have a very practical feature, namely, the base of the unit including four handles spaced therearound. This facilitates movement, installation, and position adjustment of the portable hand-washing stations, including facilitating arranging plural portable hand-washing stations with their diagonal vertical support structures parallel to one another and in parallel alignment for visual orderliness at a site.
The portable dual-sink hand-washing station of this invention will include a fresh-water storage tank and, for each sink, a spigot above the sink and a foot-pedal-actuated pump unit for user actuation of fresh-water flow to the spigots. Preferred embodiments of the base of the portable hand-washing station preferably include a main upper structure and a ground-engaging lower structure. The ground-engaging lower structure is the portion of the apparatus in contact with the ground, a parking-lot surface, a floor, or whatever surface supports the hand-washing station. Typically, the main upper structure is or encloses the grey-water storage-tank and is or encloses the fresh-water storage tank.
In preferred embodiments, the pedal-actuated pump units are attached to the lower structure, with each pump unit having a plurality of attachments to the lower structure, one or more of which are fastener-free attachments. This feature facilitates pump-unit installation as well as pump-unit removal and replacement or re-installation after repair of a pump unit. The fastener-free attachments each engage a complementary receptor on the lower structure. In preferred embodiments, each fastener-free attachment is a tab on a pump unit and each complementary receptor is a tab-receiving pocket on the lower structure, preferably on the upper surface of the lower structure.
The term “quadrilateral” as used herein (1) with respect to the “sections” of certain preferred embodiments resulting from diagonal division of the horizontal upper surface area of the sink structure and (2) with respect to sink openings in certain preferred embodiments, allows the four sides of such sections or such openings to be straight or non-straight or even irregular while still being identifiable as sides; moreover, rounding of corners and/or gentle rounding of sides retains the characteristic of being quadrilateral.
The term “along” as used herein in describing the relationship of the rear edge of a sink opening with respect to the diagonal vertical support structure includes both parallel and non-parallel relationships.
The term “clearance” as used herein with respect to hand-scrubbing refers to the distance or possible distance of the user's hands from the inner walls of the sink. The term “increased clearance” as used herein with respect to such clearances means a clearance which is increased over whatever clearance would be possible if the claimed invention were not used in a portable dual-sink hand-washing station of comparable size and footprint.
The term “maximum length” with respect to accommodating forearm scrubbing refers to the longest cross-dimension (i.e., inner wall to inner wall) of a sink, and the term “increased maximum length” as used herein with respect to such maximum lengths means a maximum length which is increased over whatever maximum length would be possible if the claimed invention were not used in a portable dual-sink hand-washing station of comparable size and footprint.
The term “grey water” as used herein refers to the waste water which has drained from the sinks of a portable hand-washing station.
Base 12 of station 10 includes a main upper structure 14 which in embodiment 10 is also a grey-water storage tank 14. Base 12 also includes a bottom portion 16 which is also referred to as a ground-engaging lower structure 16. Ground-engaging lower structure 16 includes two pump units 36, one for each sink 20 of station 10. Pumps 36 may be actuated by a user's foot and provide a flow of fresh water from a fresh-water storage tank 40 (see
Sink structure 18 also includes a fresh-water fill port 40F through which fresh-water storage tank 40 may be filled. Again referring to
A check valve is included in the drain line of the grey-water storage tank in order to prevent unwanted drainage/leakage from the tank and to provide a simple, suction-enabled drain connection to the storage tank.
In embodiment 10, check valve 52 is positioned in suction tube 50 at an inlet end 58 of suction tube 50. Check valve 52 is configured to have a cracking pressure sufficient to prevent flow from the grey-water storage tank through the suction tube without application of suction at the outlet to overcome the cracking pressure. In other words, check valve 52 prevents any siphoning flow from grey-water storage tank 14 from occurring in station 10. Thus, a suction force applied at suction-tube outlet end 56 which is sufficient to overcome the cracking pressure is necessary for removal of grey-water from tank 14; no flow of grey-water from station 10 will occur without such level of suction.
As described above, station 10 includes two pedal-actuated pump units 36, one for each sink 20.
Fastener-free attachments 36F each engage a complementary receptor 16R on lower structure 16. In station 10, each fastener-free attachment 36F is a tab (also 36F) on pump unit 36, and each complementary receptor 16R is a tab-receiving pocket (also 16R) on the upper surface of lower structure 16.
While the principles of this invention have been described in connection with specific embodiments, it should be understood clearly that these descriptions are made only by way of example and are not intended to limit the scope of the invention.
