EP2397625A2

EP2397625A2 - Accessory for finishing raised floors

Info

Publication number: EP2397625A2
Application number: EP11169697A
Authority: EP
Inventors: Valter Nazario Somaschini
Original assignee: Soweg Srl
Current assignee: SOMASCHINI WALTER E F.LLI S.N.C. DI SOMASCHINI VAL
Priority date: 2010-06-16
Filing date: 2011-06-13
Publication date: 2011-12-21
Also published as: ITMI20100202U1; EP2397625A3

Abstract

An accessory for finishing raised floors, comprising a plate-like body for laterally containing panels of a raised floor intended, in conditions of use, to make contact with the side of two adjacent panels, or their portions, at their joint and provided with means for coupling with the load-bearing structure of a raised floor.

Description

The present invention refers to an accessory for finishing raised floors.
In the building sector it has been known for a long time to make raised floors, also called "elevated" or "floating" floors, in which the ground surface is supported at a certain height from the floor slab or floor, so that between the intrados of the ground surface and the extrados of the floor slab or floor is defined an interspace.
Such an interspace, also known in the field as "technical area", is used for receiving services and/or plants.
A raised floor is made up of a series of modular panels that rest on a load-bearing structure that has a certain height, generally adjustable, and that, in turn, rests on the slab floor or floor. The panels simply rest on the load-bearing structure so as to be able to be removed by lifting, for example with the aid of suction cups, so as to access the "technical area" or to provide for their replacement.
The load-bearing structure, which transmits the loads from the panels to the slab floor, is made up of a plurality of columns and of possible cross-members or stringers that connect the columns two by two.
Typically, the cross-members are applied to the head of the columns with the interposition of special gaskets.
As known, the installation of a raised floor occurs by arranging on the floor slab the columns to the nodes of a lattice the mesh of which have dimensions that are equivalent to those of the panels, i.e. typically of 600 x 600 mm. After having adjusted the height of the columns and fixed, if provided, the cross-members with the interposition of the provided gaskets, the single panels are thus installed, said panels being rested on the head of the columns and on the cross-members so as to close the mesh of the lattice. Each panel, except for the perimetrical ones, thus rests, directly or indirectly, on four columns placed at the vertices thereof.
As already mentioned above, in raised floors, the panels are simply rested down in order to facilitate their removal and, therefore, the access to the technical space. In order to ensure their stability in conditions of use, therefore, they must be arranged in close contact with one another, i.e., without gaps, and must be delimited and counteracted along the sides of the perimeter of the floor. Such a contrast is normally carried out by the walls that delimit the space in which the floor itself is made.
However, there are cases in which one or more sides of a raised floor are not or cannot be delimited and counteracted by a wall. This is the case, for example, of ventilated walls or floors made in fair exhibition spaces (stands).
In the case of ventilated walls, indeed, both the slab floor, and the side of the floor that face the wall are kept away from it.
In the case of fair stands, it is often necessary to make raised flooring in areas circumscribed by a stand that are not delimited on all sides by a corresponding wall; even in such a case, therefore, there is the problem of how to contain and counteract the corresponding sides of the raised floor.
The solutions currently adopted consist, for example, of fixing the perimetrical panels of the floor to the corresponding columns and, where possible, of closing the corresponding side of the technical space with a slab or a partition.
Such solutions, however, besides being industrious and requiring time, cannot always and easily be adopted due, for example, to installation and intervention difficulties near to the ventilated walls or to the prohibitions imposed by fair organisations concerning fixing elements on the ground in order to protect the integrity of the latter.
The purpose of the present invention is that of avoiding the drawbacks of the prior art.
In particular, the purpose of the present invention is that of providing an accessory for finishing raised floors that makes it possible to simplify and reduce the installation time of raised flooring and that makes it possible to obtain raised flooring that is effectively delimited and counteracted along all their sides, even where it is not possible to directly rest the panels to the walls that delimit the floor and even where there are no counteraction walls (fair stands).
These and other purposes according to the present invention are achieved by making an accessory for finishing raised floors as outlined in claim 1.
Further characteristics of an accessory for finishing raised floors are object of the dependent claims.
The characteristics and advantages of an accessory for finishing raised floors according to the present invention shall become clearer from the following description, given as an example and not for limiting purposes, with reference to the attached schematic drawings, in which:

figure 1 schematically shows a perspective view of an accessory for finishing raised flooring according to the present invention;
figures 2 and 3 schematically show respectively, a top plan view and a section view along the plane III-III, of a possible application of the accessory according to the present invention for making raised flooring in presence of ventilated walls.

With particular reference to the attached figures, an accessory for finishing raised floors is wholly indicated with reference numeral 1.
As schematically illustrated in figures 2 and 3, a raised floor generally comprises a load-bearing structure 10 made up of a plurality of columns 11, usefully having an adjustable height, which have, at the lower end, a base for resting on the ground or on the slab floor 12 and, at the upper end, a head for resting panels 13, after interposition of a special gasket 14.
In particular, the columns 11 are connected two by two by cross-members 15 which have their opposite ends housed in corresponding seats 16 of the gaskets 14 placed at the heads of the two columns 11 respectively connected by them.
The gaskets 14' at the head of the perimeter columns 11' have a cross channel 17 which is crossed by the end of the end cross-members 15', so that these can extend beyond the perimeter columns 11'.
The columns, the cross-members, the gaskets and the panels are for example of the type described in utility model application n° MI2010U000074 filed on 18.03.2010 to the same Applicant.
The accessory 1 according to the present invention comprises a plate-like body 2 for laterally containing panels 13 intended, in conditions of use, to make contact with the sides of two adjacent panels 13, or portions of adjacent panels 13, at their joint and provided with means for coupling 3 with the load-bearing structure 10 of the raised floor. In practice the plate-like body 2 acts as a containment and confinement edge of the panels 13 to which, thanks to the connection with the load-bearing structure 10, offers the counteraction necessary so as to ensure their stability.
The coupling means comprise a tubular element 4 that projects at 90° from one of the two opposing faces of the plate-like body 2 and that, in conditions of use, can be coupled in a telescopic manner with the free end of an end cross-member 15' of the load-bearing structure 10.
Usefully, the tubular element 4 has a quadrangular cross-section just like the cross-members 15, 15'.
It is moreover provided for there to be means for fixing the tubular element 4 to the corresponding cross-member 15', of the type with threaded members such as screws schematically indicated by the lines 5. Different embodiments of such fixing means, for example of the snap-in type, however, are not excluded.
Advantageously, the plate-like body 2 has a useful height h at most equal to 50 mm, meaning by useful height h the height of the plate-like body 2 intended to contact the side of the panels 13, so that, bearing in mind that the average thickness of the panels 13 is typically of between 10 mm and 60 mm, in assembly conditions, the plate-like body 2 does not project with respect to the upper surface of the raised floor.
Furthermore, usefully, the plate-like body 2 has a thickness of between 2 mm and 5 mm and a width that is greater than the useful height h, typically in the order of 40-80 mm, so as to adhere to a portion of the side of each of the two adjacent panels 13 contacted by it.
As schematically illustrated in figures 2 and 3, the accessory 1 is used as a containment and confinement element of the panels 13 of a raised floor at the sides of the latter in which there is no resting wall or it is not in any case possible to directly rest against the wall that is possibly present, like, for example, in the case of a ventilated wall V, in which the slab floor 12 ends at a certain distance from the wall itself, thus making it impossible to install supporting columns near it.
In such a case, the accessory 1 is applied to the free end of the end cross-members 15' intended to connect the perimeter columns 11' to the rest of the load-bearing structure 10. In particular, the tubular element 4 is inserted inside the free end of the end cross-member 15' and is fixed to it for example through screws 5. The cross-members 15' equipped with the accessory 1 are then arranged in a manner such as that their opposite ends are respectively received in the seat 16 and in the channel 17 of the gaskets 14 and 14' of the adjacent columns 11 and 11', this latter channel 17 being crossed by the free end of the end cross-member 15' which extends beyond it. In such a way, the end cross-members 15' project beyond the perimeter columns 11' and, therefore, beyond the slab floor 12, thus allowing further panels 13 to be rested.
On the load-bearing structure 10 thus defined and made up of the columns 11, 11', corresponding head gaskets 14, 14' and connection cross-members 15, 15', panels 13 are rested.
Near to the sides of the raised floor that are not delimited or counteracted by a corresponding wall, there are the accessories 1, each associated to a respective end cross-member 15' and, as can easily be understood by a man skilled in the art, acting as a confinement and containment edge of the panels 13, without any further intervention being necessary.
In the light of the above description and of the attached figures, it is clear that the finishing accessory according to the present invention has the utility of facilitating the installation of raised floor offering the necessary confinement and containment of the panels of the flooring itself at its sides that are not delimited by a wall or delimited by a wall that cannot be used to rest against and counteract.
It should finally be clear that the invention thus conceived can undergo numerous modifications and variants, all covered by the scope of invention; moreover, all details can be replaced by technically equivalent elements. In practice the materials used, can be any according to the technical requirements.

Claims

Accessory for finishing raised floors, characterised in that it comprises a plate-like body for laterally containing panels of a raised floor intended, in conditions of use, to make contact with the side of two adjacent panels, or their portions, at their joint and provided with means for coupling with the load-bearing structure of a raised floor.
Accessory according to claim 1, characterised in that said coupling means comprise a tubular element that projects from one of the two opposing faces of said plate-like body and that, in conditions of use, can be coupled in a telescopic manner with a cross-member of said load-bearing structure.
Accessory according to claim 2, characterised in that said tubular element has a quadrangular cross-section.
Accessory according to claim 2 or 3, characterised in that it comprises means for fixing said tubular element to said cross-member, of the type with threaded members.
Accessory according to one or more of the previous claims, characterised in that said plate-like body has a maximum useful height of 50 mm and a thickness ranging from 2 mm to 5 mm.
A load-bearing structure for raised floors, comprising a plurality of supporting columns, a corresponding plurality of head gaskets that can be associated with the upper end of said columns and provided with seats for housing the end of the cross-members and cross-members for connecting said columns two by two, in which the head gaskets that can be associated to the perimeter columns have a cross channel that is passed through by the corresponding end cross-member, characterised in that it comprises a plurality of accessories according to one or more of the previous claims that can be associated to the free end of said end cross-members.