Patent Application
20230016197
This application relates in general to an article of manufacture for providing water treatment, and more specifically, to an article of manufacture providing a water salinizer to add salt to pool water.
The water treatment business, both in private systems as well as municipal systems, produce upwards of 80 million gallons of water a day at a single facility. Upwards of a dozen chemicals in granular and powder form are necessary to be added to water for producing good drinking water. The same may be said for swimming pools. The municipal systems have huge mixing tanks where multiple products are mechanically mixed for ease in release after dissolving into water being treated. In contrast, a homeowner of a swimming pool does not have access to a mixing tank option. Currently, these homeowners must manually mix all their granular and powder products by hand and dissolve them in the pool water.
All pool owners must either hand stir the products in a bucket to dissolve and then poor into the pool. When it comes to salt, you have 2 options. First, a homeowner may dump a 40-pound hag of salt into their pool and step on the salt for 2 or more days until it slowly dissolves. Alternatively, the homeowner may dump the same 40 lb. bag of salt into the pool and take a scrub brush for 20 to 30 minutes of hard manual labor to scrub the salt against the pool floor to assist the salt to dissolve in a timely manner. The homeowner may need to dissolve 2 or more 40 lb. bags of salt each week or more depending on your chemistry testing of the pool water which determines how much salt is needed per application.
Therefore, a need exists for an article of manufacture for providing a water salinizer to add salt to pool water without need for a significant amount of effort. The present invention attempts to address the limitations and deficiencies in prior solutions according to the principles and example embodiments disclosed herein.
In accordance with the present invention, the above and other problems are solved by providing an article of manufacture for a water salinizer to add salt to pool water according to the principles and example embodiments disclosed herein.
In one embodiment, the present invention is an article of manufacture for providing a water salinizer to add salt to pool water. The water salinizer includes a barrel having a sidewall, a convex bottom, an angled sidewall between the convex bottom and the side wall, designed to direct the granular salt into path of water flow, and an opening is a top surface for dissolving material into water, an input port coupled to the angled sidewall and being configured to direct an incoming pressurized water stream around the convex bottom of the barrel and along the angled sidewall, and a discharge port coupled to the sidewall about the opening in the top surface on an opposite side of the barrel from the input port.
In another aspect of the present invention, the input port comprises intake directional port having a female hose fitting in an end extending to a location outside of the barrel, a curved top surface located within the barrel, a directional output is positioned about the middle of the top surface, and a channel connecting the female hose fitting to the directional output.
In another aspect of the present invention, the discharge port comprises a wall-mating surface, a threaded hose connection on an output side of a wall-mating surface, an inner barrel port on the barrel side of the wall-mating surface, and a discharge channel connecting the inner barrel port to the threaded hose connection.
In another aspect of the present invention, the barrel is an 8-gallon barrel capable of containing 40 pounds of salt granules to be dissolved when pressurize water enters the barrel through the input port with the dissolved salt and water exiting the barrel through the discharge port.
In another aspect of the present invention, the water salinizer according to claim 4, wherein barrel is further configured to generate a centrifugal flow pattern as the pressurized water flows from the input port and out of the discharge port.
In another embodiment, the present invention is a method of salinizing water in a barrel. The barrel has a sidewall, a convex bottom, an angled sidewall between the convex bottom and the side wall, designed to help direct granular salt into path of water flow, and an opening is a top surface for dissolving material into water, an input port coupled to the angled sidewall and being configured to direct an incoming pressurized water stream around the convex bottom of the barrel along the angled sidewall, and a discharge port coupled to the sidewall about the opening in the top surface on an opposite side of the barrel from the input port. The method adds granular salt into the barrel, connects an input water hose to the pressurized water inlet, connects a drainage hose to the discharge port, introduces fresh water into the barrel through the pressurized water inlet, and directs salinized water outflowing from the discharge port once the barrel has filled with water.
The foregoing has outlined rather broadly the features and technical advantages of the present invention in order that the detailed description of the invention that follows may be better understood. Additional features and advantages of the invention will be described hereinafter that form the subject of the claims of the invention.
It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that the conception and specific embodiment disclosed may be readily utilized as a basis for modifying or designing other structures for carrying out the same purposes of the present invention. It should also be realized by those skilled in the art that such equivalent constructions do not depart from the spirit and scope of the invention as set forth in the appended claims. The novel features that are believed to be characteristic of the invention, both as to its organization and method of operation, together with further objects and advantages will be better understood from the following description when considered in connection with the accompanying figures. It is to be expressly understood, however, that each of the figures is provided for the purpose of illustration and description only and is not intended as a definition of the limits of the present invention.
Referring now to the drawings in which like reference numbers represent corresponding parts throughout:
This application relates in general to an article of manufacture for providing water treatment, and more specifically, to an article of manufacture for providing a water salinizer to add salt to pool water according to the present invention.
Various embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings, wherein like reference numerals represent like parts and assemblies throughout the several views. Reference to various embodiments does not limit the scope of the invention, which is limited only by the scope of the claims attached hereto. Additionally, any examples set forth in this specification are not intended to be limiting and merely set forth some of the many possible embodiments for the claimed invention.
In describing embodiments of the present invention, the following terminology will be used. The singular forms “a,” “an,” and “the” include plural referents unless the context clearly dictates otherwise. As used herein, a plurality of items, structural elements, compositional elements, and/or materials may be presented in a common list for convenience. However, these lists should be construed as though each member of the list is individually identified as a separate and unique member. Thus, no individual member of such list should be construed as a de facto equivalent of any other member of the same list solely based on their presentation in a common group without indications to the contrary. As used herein, the singular forms “a,” “an,” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise.
It further will be understood that the terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “includes,” and “including” specify the presence of stated features, steps, or components, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, steps, or components. It also should be noted that in some alternative implementations, the functions and acts noted may occur out of the order noted in the figures. For example, two figures shown in succession may in fact be executed substantially concurrently or may sometimes be executed in the reverse order, depending upon the functionality and acts involved.
The terms “individual” and “user” refer to an entity, e.g., a human, using an article of manufacture providing a water salinizer to add salt to pool water associated with the invention. The term user herein refers to one or more users.
The term “invention” or “present invention” refers to the invention being applied for via the patent application with the title “Water Salinizer.” Invention may be used interchangeably with salinizer.
In general, the present disclosure relates to an article of manufacture providing a water salinizer to add salt to pool water according to the present invention. To better understand the present invention,
As shown in
Due to the location of the pressurized water inlet 202, and the pressure of the water supply, the water 403, as shown in
The water salinizer 100 dissolves all of the salt granules 201 when the water passes through the barrel 101 and out of the discharge port 102 and into a pool or similar destination. A user may control how much of the salt is added to the water in the pool by running the water salinizer 100 until a desired amount of salt has been dissolved. Other minerals and water treatment additives may be dissolved in a similar manner using the water salinizer 100 as described herein.
In a preferred embodiment, the barrel 101 is an 8-gallon drum. The inflow port 202 comprises a 0.750-inch inlet housing 400, shown in detail in
A directional output 411 of the intake directional port 400 is positioned about the middle of the top surface 413. The directional output 411 is connected to the female hose connector 412 by a channel 414 through the intake directional port 400. This curved shape directs the pressurized fresh water to circulate about the barrel along the sidewall as the water flows through the granular salt. The top surface is sloped downward having a radius of 4.52 inches along the barrel sidewall side 403 and a radius of 5.27 inches the inner barrel side 406. The intake directional port 400 is secured to the sidewall of the barrel using PVC glue or similar adhesive in the preferred embodiment. Locator projections 421a-d are little nubs that stick out from the fitting which align exactly with dimples or indentions that will be placed on the bottom side of the barrel 101 for perfect alignment for affixing with PVC glue.
The ¾″ (0.75″) threads 412 start out straight into the block but with the shape turning into and angular/radius/form, now it is exiting in an angular fashion to mate with the curvature of the barrel 101. The same angular exiting shape with be drilled through the side angle of the barrel 101 but does not need to be threaded as the only threads 412 needed are in the inlet assembly 400 to screw in a ¾″garden hose fitting.
Once configured, fresh water is introduced through the pressurized water inlet 202 into the barrel 101 about its bottom surface in step 514. The barrel 101 becomes full with water that has passed through the granular salt added to the barrel in step 515 causing salinized water to flow out of the discharge port.
Test step 516 determines whether the salt granules have dissolved within the barrel, and if not, the process 500 returns to step 514 to continue to add fresh water to the barrel 101. When all of the test step 516 determines that all of the salt granules have been dissolved, the process 500 ends 502.
Even though particular combinations of features are recited in the present application, these combinations are not intended to limit the disclosure of the invention. In fact, many of these features may be combined in ways not specifically recited in this application. In other words, any of the features mentioned in this application may be included in this new invention in any combination or combinations to allow the functionality required for the desired operations.
No element, act, or instruction used in the present application should be construed as critical or essential to the invention unless explicitly described as such. Further, the phrase “based on” is intended to mean “based, at least in part, on” unless explicitly stated otherwise.
