Patent Application
20190203164
This invention relates generally to the dispensing or other extraction of fluids from within a container, e.g., the dispensing of wine from a wine bottle.
One or more embodiments in accordance with aspects of the invention allow a user to dispense or otherwise extract a beverage, such as wine, from within a bottle that is sealed by a cork, plug, elastomeric septum or other closure without removing the closure. In some cases, removal of liquid from such a bottle may be performed one or more times, yet the closure may remain in place during and after each beverage extraction to maintain a seal for the bottle. Thus, the beverage may be dispensed from the bottle multiple times and stored for extended periods between each extraction with little or no effect on beverage quality. In some embodiments, little or no gas, such as air, which is reactive with the beverage may be introduced into the bottle either during or after extraction of beverage from within the bottle. Thus, in some embodiments, a user may withdraw wine from a wine bottle without removal of, or damage to, the cork, and without allowing air or other potentially damaging gasses or liquids entry into the bottle.
Some beverages, such as wines and other alcoholic beverages, contain sulfites and/or histamines that are produced in or otherwise picked up by the beverage during fermentation, aging or other processes. Since some people are sensitive or otherwise react to these compounds, it can be beneficial to remove or otherwise reduce their presence in a beverage.
In one illustrative embodiment, a beverage dispensing device includes a conduit arranged to provide a flow of beverage under pressure to a distal end of the conduit. The conduit may be arranged as a tube or other structure that conducts flow of the beverage. A nozzle housing having an inlet may be fluidly coupled to the distal end of the conduit and a flowpath of the housing may extend from the inlet. The housing may engage the conduit by a friction fit, e.g., a seal of the housing may engage the conduit to provide a fluid seal and physical connection, although other arrangements such as a threaded engagement are possible. The housing may contain a removal material that is arranged to remove or otherwise reduce the presence of histamines and/or sulfites from a flow of pressurized beverage, such as wine, through the removal material. After passage through the removal material, the beverage may be dispensed. In some cases, the removal material may be contained in a cartridge that can be replaced, e.g., by opening the housing and replacing a cartridge held inside the housing. In other embodiments, the housing and its removal material may be used to dispense a certain number of beverages, or a volume of beverage, and the entire housing and its removal material may be replaced for subsequent dispensing.
In some embodiments wine that is dispensed so that not only are histamines and/or sulfites reduce, the beverage may be aerated as well. For example, the beverage may be dispensed from the housing in multiple jets that have a relatively high surface area to cross-sectional area ratio so as to permit ambient air to be dissolved in or otherwise interact with the beverage. Such interaction between wine and air is desirable in certain instances, and an aeration device may speed air/wine interaction that would otherwise occur. Such aeration may also aid in reducing the presence of histamines and/or sulfites as well.
Various exemplary embodiments of the device are further depicted and described below.
Aspects of the invention are described with reference to various embodiments, and to the figures, which include:
Aspects of the invention are described below with reference to illustrative embodiments, but it should be understood that aspects of the invention are not to be construed narrowly in view of the specific embodiments described. Thus, aspects of the invention are not limited to the embodiments described herein. For example, embodiments of a removal nozzle are described as used with a beverage extractor that inserts a needle through a container closure to inject gas into the container and conduct pressurized beverage from the container. However, removal nozzles are not limited to such applications, and may be used with any type of beverage dispenser. For example, a beverage dispenser need not use a needle that is inserted through a cork, but may instead employ a conduit that is passed through a bottle opening after the cork is removed. This is but one alternative, and other dispensing arrangements may be used with a removal nozzle. It should also be understood that various aspects of the invention may be used alone and/or in any suitable combination with each other, and thus various embodiments should not be interpreted as requiring any particular combination or combinations of features. Instead, one or more features of the embodiments described may be combined with any other suitable features of other embodiments.
In this embodiment, the body 3 also includes a valve 300 operable to control the flow of gas from the regulator 600. The valve 300 may be a 3-way toggle valve that includes a single operation button and functions to selectively introduce pressurized gas into the bottle 700 and extract beverage 710 (such as wine) from the bottle 700 via a needle 200. Details regarding the operation of such a valve 300 are provided in U.S. Pat. No. 8,225,959, which is incorporated by reference in its entirety. Of course, other valve arrangements for controlling pressurized gas and beverage flow are possible. For example, the 3-way valve 300 could be replaced with a pair of on/off valves, one for controlling gas introduction to the bottle 700, and another for controlling flow of beverage from the bottle 700. Each valve could have its own actuator, allowing a user to selectively open and close the valves, whether individually or simultaneously. In short, details regarding the operation of the regulator 600 and valve 300 or other mechanisms for introducing gas into a bottle, and removing beverage from the bottle 700 are not necessarily limitations on aspects of the invention and may be modified as suitable.
To introduce gas into the bottle 700 and extract beverage, a needle 200 attached to the body 3 is inserted through a cork or other closure 730 that seals an opening at a neck of the bottle 700. This illustrative device 1 uses a pencil-tip non-coring needle 200 with a needle opening 220 along a sidewall of the needle near the needle tip. While the needle 200 may be inserted into the cork or other closure 730 in different ways, in this embodiment, the device 1 includes a base 2 with a pair of channels 21 that receive and guide movement of respective rails 31 of the body 3. Thus, movement of the body 3 and attached needle 200 relative to the bottle closure 730 may be guided by the base 2, e.g., the body 3 may slide relative to the base 2 to move the needle 200 into/out of the closure 730. In addition, movement of the needle 200 may be guided by a needle guide 202 that is attached to the base 2 and positioned over the closure 730. Other arrangements for guiding movement of the body 3 relative to the base 2 are possible, such as providing one or more rails on the base 2 which engage with a channel or other receiver of the body 3, providing an elongated slot, channel or groove on the body or base which engages with a corresponding feature (e.g., a tab) on the other of the body or base and allows for sliding movement, a linkage that connects the body and base together and allows for movement of the body to insert the needle into the closure, and others. Alternatively, the needle could be inserted without guidance, but rather by the hand of the user through the cork.
In some embodiments, the base 2 may be fixed or otherwise held in place relative to the bottle 700, e.g., by a clamp arm, sleeve, strap or other device that engages with the bottle 700. By restraining movement of the base 2 relative to the bottle 700, such an arrangement may help guide motion of a needle 200 relative to the bottle 700 when penetrating a closure 730, or when being withdrawn from the closure 730. Alternately, the bottle 700 may be manipulated by grasping and manipulating the device 1 since the clamp engaging the device 1 to the bottle 700 may securely hold the device 1 and bottle 700 together.
To insert the needle 200 through the closure 730, a user may push downwardly on the body 3 while maintaining the base 2 and the bottle 700 at least somewhat stationary relative to each other. The needle 200 will pass through the closure 730, guided in its motion, at least in part, by the guided motion of the body 3 relative to the base 2 (e.g., by the rails 31 and channels 21). With the needle 200 suitably inserted as shown in
As discussed above, in one aspect of the invention, beverage may be dispensed using a removal nozzle, such as a device that dispenses beverage so as to remove or otherwise reduce the presence of histamines and/or sulfites in the beverage. In some embodiments, the removal nozzle may also help aerate the beverage, i.e., expose a relatively large surface area per unit volume of beverage to ambient air or other gas and/or a device that actively mixes air or other gas with beverage in the dispensing process. For example, some wines are believed to improve in taste or other characteristics with suitable exposure to air after opening the wine bottle. As used herein, aeration refers to exposure of a beverage to air or other gas (carbon dioxide, oxygen, nitrogen, mixtures of gases, etc.) in such a way that gas reacts in some way with at least portions of the beverage and/or that gas is dissolved in the beverage and/or that gas or other compounds are released from the beverage to the air or other ambient gas environment.
In the illustrative embodiment of
In this embodiment, the nozzle housing 8 includes an inlet opening that defines an inlet 81 that is fluidly coupled to the distal end of the conduit 301. The nozzle inlet 81 may be coupled to the conduit 301 in different ways, such as by screw thread, interference or friction fit, a bayonet connection, leur-type connection, etc., but in this embodiment engages with the conduit 301 by a friction fit. A seal 87, such as an o-ring or other element, may be provided at the inlet 81 to provide a fluid seal between the housing 8 and the conduit 301, as well as to provide a frictional engagement between the housing 8 and the conduit 301. Alternatively, housing 8 may be at least partially comprised of an elastic material and inlet 81 may be of a slightly smaller diameter than conduit 301, therefore causing a seal between housing 8 and conduit 301 due to compression of housing 8 about conduit 301. Although the housing 8 is shown engaging an exterior of the conduit 301, the housing 8 may engage an interior of the conduit 301 or engage with a butt-type connection.
The nozzle housing 8 includes a flowpath 82 that extends from the inlet 81 to an outlet 83. In this embodiment, the flowpath 82 includes a portion with an increasing cross-sectional area in a direction from the inlet 81 to a plurality of flow channels that define the outlet 83. For example, the flowpath 82 may taper outwardly such that a portion nearer the inlet 81 has a smaller cross-sectional area than a portion nearer the plurality of flow channels at the outlet 83. This may decrease a flow speed and increase a pressure of beverage at a location where the beverage begins to flow through a removal material 84. In this embodiment, the removal material 84 is sandwiched between inlet and outlet screens 85, 86, e.g., because the removal material 84 may be granular and the inlet and outlet screens 85, 86 may help keep the removal material 84 in place. While such screens 85, 86 are not necessary, the screens 85, 86 or other similar element may perform a filtering function, e.g., to remove particles over a threshold size from the dispensed beverage. For example, one or more of the screens 85, 86 or other filter structure may remove sediment or other particles from the dispensed beverage. A screen or other filter may include any suitable arrangement, such as a metal, plastic or other mesh, porous element, non-woven fibrous structure, and other filter arrangements. The removal material 84 may include any suitable compound or compounds, materials, etc., to reduce histamines and/or sulfites in a beverage such as wine. Such materials are known, such as ion exchange materials, oxidizers (such as hydrogen peroxide), and others. In short, any suitable removal material 84 may be employed to provide a desired level of histamine and/or sulfite level reduction. The removal material 84 may be provided in loose, granular form, a liquid form, a gas form, a solid block form, or combinations of such forms. For removal materials 84 in a liquid or gas form, other arrangements may be required to direct beverage through the material 84 than that shown in
After flowing through the removal material 84, the beverage may exit the housing via the outlet 83. In this illustrative embodiment, the outlet 83 includes a plurality of flow channels that serve to create multiple jets of beverage. In the embodiment of
As will be understood, many removal materials 84 may only be capable of removing histamines and/or sulfites for a limited volume of beverage. The removal material 84 may be replaced, e.g., after being used to dispense a volume of beverage, or may be discarded and replaced by another removal nozzle housing 8 containing fresh removal material 84.
While aspects of the invention have been shown and described with reference to illustrative embodiments, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be made therein without departing from the scope of the invention encompassed by the appended claims.
This application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. § 119(e) to U.S. Provisional Application Ser. No. 62/611,943, filed Dec. 29, 2017, which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 62611943 | Dec 2017 | US |
