EP0187106B1 - Closing device for containers, provided with a valve for automatically eliminating overpressure - Google Patents

Abstract

A sealing device for containers which forms a valve for automatic elimination of overpressurized gases that may form with the container is provided. The device is composed of a rigid cap having a flat crown and depending skirt, an elastic disk sector in contact with the underside of the flat crown and an inner cap having a circular crown with a circular cutout and raised circular rim on an upperside thereof. A flat circular protuberance on the underside surface of the disk sector, when the device is in use fits into and is surrounded by the circular crown portion, both of which are adapted to fit vertically over the orifice of the container. When in use, the circular crown exerts a crushing pressure on the upper portion of the elastic disk sector while at the same time the flat circular protuberance remains sufficiently elastic to allow gases overpressurized to vent from the container.

Description

The present invention relates to closing containers by means of a device ensuring a vent.

The invention relates more particularly to a device for closing containers which, once properly placed on the container to be closed, makes it possible to practically avoid any leakage of liquid or solid matter from said container and also to ensure elimination automatic overpressure gases existing or formed in the same container.

Although the invention is not limited to a particular type of container, nor to a field of application more than others, it seems simpler for the description which follows to describe the invention, and the prior art from which it stands out, with reference to a particular application and to a container of the bottle type with a threaded neck and a screw cap. It is clear that, the invention not applying only to this case, what is said below can be transposed mutatis mutandis to other categories of containers and / or applications, without going out of as much of the scope of the claimed invention.

The field of application thus retained by way of illustration in what follows is the closure of bottles containing a liquid cleaning product containing a hypochlorite, in particular sodium hypochlorite having a high chlorometric titer.

It is known that liquid cleaning compositions containing hypochlorite having a high chlorometric titer release during storage oxygen gas produced by the slow decomposition of hypochlorite.

If the container containing these compositions has a perfectly gas-tight stopper, the overpressure of the gases can cause the container to swell and make it leaky.

• - qu'ils laissent s'échapper du récipient, non seulement le gaz surpression, mais aussi du mélange liquide-gaz sous forme d'une mousse qui suinte et forme des dépôts cristallisés autour du système de bouchage; et
• - qu'ils ne peuvent fonctionner que si leur serrage sur le col fileté du récipient demeure suffisamment lâche pour laisser subsister un degré de liberté pour la pièce d'étanchéification circulaire, mais n'est cependant pas trop lâche pour que n'apparaisse pas une absence totale d'étanchéité aux liquides.

There are currently closure systems arranged so as to provide a valve effect the triggering of which is automatic from a more or less predetermined overpressure of gas in the container. These systems, the operation of which is based on displacement by deformation of a circular sealing part - this displacement being permitted by an appropriate profile of the plug bottom in which this circular part is inserted -, have the disadvantages, however:

• - they let escape from the container, not only the overpressure gas, but also from the liquid-gas mixture in the form of a foam which seeps and forms crystallized deposits around the closure system; and
• - They can only work if their tightening on the threaded neck of the container remains sufficiently loose to allow a degree of freedom to remain for the circular sealing part, but is not, however, too loose so that a total lack of liquid tightness.

The patent US-A-3 114467 relates to a closure system of this type, comprising a circular sealing part, mounted between the neck of the closure container, and the bottom of the stopper which has protuberances regularly distributed around its periphery, the hollow areas, formed between the protrusions, allowing the deformation of the sealing part under the action of an overpressure of the fluid contained in the container.

The present invention aims to remedy these drawbacks.

• - une pièce d'obturation ou bouchon à fond plat,
• - un secteur de disque de matière élastique venant s'insérer sur le fond plat du bouchon et tel que le secteur de disque couvre plus de la moitié du secteur circulaire complet correspondant de même diamètre, et
• - une pièce comportant une couronne circulaire et exerçant, lorsque le dispositif est en position d'obturation de l'orifice du récipient, une pression d'écrasement sur le pourtour du secteur de disque élastique correspondant à cette couronne circulaire, tandis que la partie dudit secteur de disque élastique située à l'intérieur de cette couronne circulaire demeure non écrasée ou écrasée seulement partiellement et conserve une élasticité propre pour fléchir sous l'effet d'une surpression de gaz et revenir ensuite à sa position de bouchage étanche normal.

To this end, the device for closing a container with valve for the automatic elimination of the overpressure gases, which it relates to, comprises:

• - a blanking plug or plug with a flat bottom,
• a disc sector of elastic material which is inserted on the flat bottom of the stopper and such that the disc sector covers more than half of the corresponding complete circular sector of the same diameter, and
• - A part comprising a circular crown and exerting, when the device is in the closed position of the container orifice, a crushing pressure on the periphery of the elastic disc sector corresponding to this circular crown, while the part of said elastic disc sector located inside this circular crown remains unpressed or only partially crushed and retains its own elasticity to flex under the effect of an overpressure of gas and then return to its normal sealed closure position.

This device practically does not leak liquid or solid matter, under normal conditions of use, and does not need to be adjusted at an incomplete tightening stage.

This device is, in principle, as described in Figures 1 and 2 of the single sheet of drawings attached.

Figure 1 shows a schematic longitudinal sectional side view of the upper part of a threaded neck bottle provided with an embodiment of a device according to the invention.

Figure 2 shows a top view, in schematic partial section along line A - A, of the device according to the invention corresponding to the same embodiment.

• - une pièce d'obturation 1 ou bouchon à fond plat,
• - un secteur de disque de matière élastique 2 venant s'insérer sur le fond plat du bouchon et tel que le secteur de disque couvre plus de la moitié du secteur circulaire complet correspondant de même diamètre, et
• - une pièce 3 comportant une couronne circulaire et exerçant, lorsque le dispositif est en position d'obturation de l'orifice du récipient, une pression d'écrasement sur le pourtour du secteur de disque élastique correspondant à cette couronne circulaire, tandis que la partie dudit secteur de disque élastique, située à l'intérieur de cette couronne circulaire, demeure non écrasée ou écrasée seulement partiellement et conserve une élasticité propre pour fléchir sous l'effet d'une surpression de gaz et revenir ensuite à sa position de bouchage étanche normal.

In general, this device essentially comprises:

• - a sealing piece 1 or flat-bottomed plug,
• a disk sector of elastic material 2 which is inserted on the flat bottom of the cap and such that the disk sector covers more than half of the corresponding complete circular sector of the same diameter, and
• - A part 3 comprising a circular crown and exerting, when the device is in the closed position of the container orifice, a crushing pressure on the periphery of the sector of elastic disc corresponding to this circular ring, while the part of said sector of elastic disc, located inside this circular ring, remains not crushed or only partially crushed and retains its own elasticity to flex under the effect of a gas overpressure and then return to its normal sealed closure position.

According to one embodiment, the aforementioned part 3, comprising a circular crown, can be constituted directly by the raised circular crown of the orifice, such as for example a neck of the container concerned, which therefore reduces the number of parts to two of the device according to the invention.

As a variant, the part 3, comprising a circular crown, can be (see FIG. 1) a part which ensures, in a conventional manner, a reduction in the opening diameter of the orifice of the container, which is inserted forcefully into said orifice and which has, on the periphery of its upper surface, an area forming a raised circular crown. The part 3 exerts, when the device is in the closed position of the container orifice, a crushing pressure on the circular crown of the elastic disc sector corresponding to this raised circular crown, while the part of said disc sector elastic, located inside this circular crown, behaves as indicated above.

As shown in the attached figures, the part 2 is constituted by a disk sector whose surface is greater than that of the circular semi-sector of the same diameter, so as to cover the orifice of the container on which the device finds its place or the orifice 4 of the part 3.

The edge line 5 of the part 2 can be located at any level, a priori, within the limit indicated above; moreover, this edge line can have any profile in its inner part between the two ends of the circular perimeter line. The abovementioned edge line is preferably constituted by a straight line and it has appeared advantageous that it is situated so as to be practically tangent to the internal perimeter of the orifice of the container or of the raised part of the part 3 having a circular crown.

Of course, it is also possible, in accordance with the invention, to provide the part 2 with several edge lines such as that described above and bearing on the diagrams the reference 5; by way of nonlimiting examples, it is thus possible to produce a part 2 in which two edge lines are present, in any respective arrangements and, preferably, parallel to one another and diametrically opposite, or else part 2 may receive, by appropriate cutouts or manufacture, three edge lines, each of which meets the definition given above for edge line 5 and which are preferably arranged so as to form an angle of 120 ° between them , taken two by two.

A person skilled in the art is able to choose the materials constituting each of the aforementioned parts at will. By way of nonlimiting examples, the part 1 and the part 3 or the part of the container constituting the circular crown surrounding the orifice can be chosen independently of one another, from rigid or semi-rigid plastics, such as polyethylene, polypropylene or the like, ebonite, metallic or composite materials; the part 2 can be constituted by any suitable material having its own elasticity, such as for example expanded polyethylene, natural or synthetic rubber, cork and the like. The elasticity of the material of the part 2 must be such that, under the gas overpressures at which it is desired that there is a substantial evacuation of the gas under pressure without significant leakage of the liquid or solid content of the container provided with the device according to the invention , part 2 of the latter undergoes a partial crushing just allowing to release along the above edge line a secondary orifice or gas exhaust zone.

The dimensional characteristics of the various elements of the device can also be established at will by the person skilled in the art, who simply has the tasks of fixing or taking into account technical, dimensional or other constraints, and of carrying out routine tests, necessary for the development of a prototype in each specific application case. However, a data common to all the cases of applications is that, on the one hand, the compressibility of the material of the part 2 and, on the other hand, the level of the circular crown of the part 3 are such that, in position of use, the compression of the part 2 under the effect of a gas overpressure can release, at the edge line 5 an exhaust zone for the gases of the container responsible for this overpressure.

So that the evacuated gases can effectively escape into the atmosphere, it is important that there is, in room 1 of the device according to the invention or between room 1 and the periphery of the orifice of the container to which s' adapts this device, suitable orifices or paths, able to be followed by gases and opening into the surrounding atmosphere. Preferably, the gas is evacuated into the atmosphere without any special opening or path, but simply by using the path left by the tolerance of the dimensions between the thread of part 1 of the device and the corresponding thread of the neck of a threaded neck container.

Of course, the aforementioned invention applies in all fields, subject to the necessary adaptations which are within the reach of those skilled in the art and do not, however, depart from the scope of the claimed invention.

Claims (5)

1. A device for the sealing of containers, having a valve to allow the automatic escape of gases under excess pressure and comprising:

- a sealing member (1) or plug having a flat base,

- a disc segment (2) of resilient material adapted for insertion on the flat base of the plug, so that the disc segment covers more than half the corresponding complete circle of the same diameter, and

- a component (3) having a circular crown and exerting a compressive force on the periphery of the resilient disc segment corresponding to the said circular crown when the device is disposed in a sealing position on the mouth of the container, while the part of the said disc segment lying within this circular crown remains uncompressed or only partially compressed and retains the intrinsic resilience required for it to yield under the action of gases under excess pressure and thereafter return to its normal mouth sealing position.

2. A device as in Claim 1, characterised in that the component (3) having a circular crown is directly constituted by the raised circular crown of the orifice, more particularly the mouth, of the container.

3. A device as in Claim 1, characterised in that the component (3) having a circular crown is a component:

- which brings about a reduction of the internal diameter of the orifice of the container,

- which requires force to insert it in the said orifice,
and

- which has, on the periphery of its top face, a zone forming a raised circular crown.

4. A device as in any of Claims 1 to 3, characterised in that the edge line (5) of the resilient disc segment (2) is a right secant.

5. A device as in Claim 4, characterised in that the edge line is substantially tangential to the inside periphery of the container orifice or the raised portion of the component (3) having a circular crown.

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