GB2048088A

GB2048088A - Pipe Construction Set

Info

Publication number: GB2048088A
Application number: GB8014047A
Authority: GB
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 1979-04-30
Filing date: 1980-04-29
Publication date: 1980-12-10
Also published as: AT386132B; ATA229080A; FR2455469A3; ES250329U; FR2455469B3; JPS55158799U; ES250329Y; IT8021664V0

Abstract

Plastics pipes (1), elbows (21), T- pieces (25), shut-off valves (16, 16a-d) vessels (28, 30) and hand pumps (33, 34) form a construction set for assembling fluid-conducting systems. The pipes (1) are supported on holders (32) and carry in grooves at their ends O-rings (2, figure 1, not shown) whereby they are retained and sealed in members to which they are coupled. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Construction Set for Play and Educational Purposes In developing toys, too little notice is generally taken of the fact that every healthy child has a natural urge for movement and activity. A toy should firstly give the child the possibility of living out this urge, and to work through and practice his fantasy in association with the outside world.

From this point of view, a toy is of greater value the more it requires the active cooperation of the child. The opposite to this would be the perfect automatically operating toy which one can only look at, and at best can only dismantle into its individual parts.

The object of the present invention is to provide a construction set in the form of a toy, which satisfies the activity requirement of the child and thus overcomes a clear deficiency in the present toy market. This construction set is characterised according to the invention by the combination of characteristics defined in patent claim 1, and its special embodiments are described in the subsidiary claims.

One embodiment of the invention together with some constructional modifications are described hereinafter.

Figures 1 to 8 are diagrammatic sections through individual elements of the construction set, and Figure 9 is a simplified perspective view of one application.

Figure 1 shows a plastics pipe 1 of wall thickness d. At each of its two end positions, this plastics pipe comprises an O-ring 2, which serves for fixing an adjoining coupling member into the bore. As shown in Figure 2, one of the end portions of the plastics pipe 1 projects into the bore of a coupling sleeve 3. For reasons of length adaptation to other parts of the construction set, the pipe 1 should only project into the coupling sleeve 3 by a certain length. For this reason, a stop bar 4 is disposed on the inner wall of the coupling sleeve, against which the front edge of the plastics pipe 1 rests. The O-ring 2 thus serves on the one hand for retention purposes, and on the other hand for sealing the plastics pipe 1 into the bore of the coupling sleeve 3.Instead of the stop bar 4, other stop members could obviously be fitted by the expert The element shown in Figure 3 by the reference numeral 5, which likewise carries an 0ring 2 on its end portion, serves as a stopper. This stopper 5 can for example be inserted into the free end of the coupling sleeve 3, and thus close this in a fluid-tight manner.

Figure 4 shows a further possibility of cooperation between plastics pipes and coupling members. In this case, the plastics pipe indicated by the reference numeral 6 carries no O-ring, but instead an O-ring 7 is disposed inside the coupling member, which in this case is an elbow 8. This elbow 8 is provided in each of its two arms with a bore 9, the diameter of which corresponds to the outer diameter of the plastics pipe 6. The two bores 9 are connected together by an angular duct 10, of which the cross-sectional passage area is equal to that of the pipe 6. The pipe 6 can thus be inserted into any of the bores 9, and is retained in this position by the O-ring 7, which again performs both a retention function and a seal function.

Figure 5 shows various elements of the construction set connected together An elbow 11 is coupled to a T-piece 12 by way of a pipe portion 13. The pipe portion 13 carries an O-ring 2 on each of its two end portions, and its end edge rests against a stop bar 14 disposed inside the bend 11. In one of its arms, the T-piece 12 likewise carries a pipe portion 15, which is provided with two O-rings 2.

Adjoining the other arm of the T-peice 12, there is a shut-off valve 1 6, which is shown in Figure 6 in a sectional view rotated through 900.

The shut-off valve 1 6 comprises a shut-off member 17, which can be rotated from the outside by means of a hand grip 18. The through bore 1 9 in the shut-off member 1 7 can be positioned therewith either coaxially to the adjoining pipe or transversely thereto, so that the flow can be either free or shut off as required.

The element of the building set indicated in Figure 7 by the reference numeral 20 serves either as a shut-off or tap member for an elbow 21. A tap 23 provided with a hand grip 22 projects into the elbow 21 from one side, and is retained therein by means of an O-ring 2. A through bore 24 is provided L-shaped in the tap 23, and allows free outward flow when in the tap position indicated by full lines. When the tap is rotated through 1800 by means of the grip 22, its mouth then lies against the inner wall of the elbow, so that the liquid cannot flow out.

The tap 23 can also be provided with an O-ring 2 on that end external to the elbow, and can then be connected to further plastics pipes.

Figure 8 shows a further embodiment of a coupling member. A shut-off member 26 projects from one side into a T-piece indicated overall by the reference numeral 25, and is positioned inside the T-piece rotatable but fluid-tight by means of an O-ring 2. The practically cylindrical plug 27 of the shut-off member is inclined at that end portion which lies inside the T-piece, so that when in the position indicated by full lines it allows free flow, whereas when in the 1800-rotated position indicated by broken lines, it shuts off the flow.

The individual elements of the construction set are preferably so matched in terms of their dimensions that they can be built up without difficulty into the most varied types of systems. In Figures 1, 2 and 5 of the drawing, this is attained by using the dimension x or a multiple of this dimension.

Using the illustrated and described individual parts, the expert of the art is able to construct the most varied installations and systems for play and education purposes. One example is illustrated diagrammatically in Figure 9.

A plastics pipe 1 with a shut-off valve 1 6 is fixed to a water vessel 28, which for example can be a normal plastics bucket. The water which flows out of the bucket flows through pipes 1 and corresponding elbows 21 and T-pieces 25 through a further shut-off valve 1 6a to a vessel 29, and through a third shut-off valve 1 6b to a vessel 30. As the vessel 28 is located on a table T and the vessel 30 on the floor, the water flows by itself into the two vessels 29 and 30 by virtue of gravity and the static pressure of the water in the vessel 28.

It can also be seen how a fourth vessel 31 can be fed with water by way of further shut-off members 1 6c and 16d.

The plastics pipes 1 are preferably supported on holders 32 which comprise a flat base surface 32a for supporting on the table T, and a recess 3ob which matches the contour of the plastics pipes 1.

The water can be pumped back to the vessel 28 through the pipes 1 by means of a pump 33 disposed inside the lower vessel 30. A further pump 34 can for example be disposed in the return pipe.

Numerous modifications are possible with the described construction set, and can be devised in diverse ways by the expert of the art.

Claims

1. A construction set for play and educational purposes, characterised by a number of plastics pipes which can be connected together by coupling members into a fluid system, wherein the end portions of adjoining plastics pipes and coupling members can be fitted into one another, and an O-ring disposed in an annular groove therebetween acts as a retention and seal member,

2. A construction set as claimed in claim 1, characterised in that each plastics pipe comprises an annular groove with an O-ring at each of its end portions, and the outer diameter of the plastics pipes corresponds to the bore diameter of the coupling members.

3. A construction set as claimed in one of claims 1 and 2, characterised in that the plastics pipes connected to each other are disposed between a lower and an upper vessel, and a pump is disposed at the plastics pipe which projects into the lower vessel.

4. A construction set as claimed in claim 1, characterised in that the coupling members comprise a right angled pipe piece, into which a rotatable tap member provided with a L-shaped through bore projects from one side, wherein the mouth of the through bore which lies inside the pipe piece is fully exposed in one position of the tap member, while in a position rotated through 1800 therefrom, it faces the wall of the pipe piece and is closed thereby.

5. A construction set as claimed in claim 1, characterised in that the coupling members comprise a T-shaped pipe piece, into one arm of which a rotatable shut-off member projects, the cylindrical shank of which is inclined in the central region of the pipe piece, such that the shut-off member allows free flow in one position, while in a position rotated through 1 800 therefrom shuts off the flow, and in the intermediate positions correspondingly reduces the flow.

6. A construction set as claimed in one of claims 1 to 5, characterised by a support element comprising a flat base surface and, in its upper position, a recess which matches the contour of the plastics pipes.

7. A kit toy which comprises a plurality of conduits which can be connected together to form a system for transporting a liquid.

8. A kit toy according to claim 7, substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawings.