GB2196233A - Bin - Google Patents

Abstract

A bin comprises a support comprising a body portion 10, a base 11 and a door 13, together with a lid 12 which is hingedly connected to the support. Within the body portion there is provided elongate guide means comprising a pair of spaced parallel guide rods 19 and 20 which support a plurality of bags each formed with apertures adjacent their upper corners, said guide rods 19 and 20 extending through the apertures. In use the foremost bag is opened by pulling the outer sides of such bag outwardly towards the front of the body and in this position rubbish can be deposited within the open bag. Conveniently each of said guide rods 19 and 20 is formed at each of its ends with a kink or like formation which serves as a stop or abutment to locate the bags in either the closed or open positions. In an alternative arrangement the support comprises a wall engaging plate to which a U-shaped frame and a lid are hingedly connected. In either of the aforementioned constructions the assembly is collapsible in order that it can be disposed in a flat pack. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Bin This invention relates to a bin which is primarily (but not exclusively) intended for use in temporarily storing all kinds of refuse (as for example in a house or garden) before it is collected and eventually disposed of.

Bins of this kind are commonly of generally cylindrical form and of rigid construction and consequently take up a great deal of space in stores or other places where they may be sold. Their bulkiness and rigidity may also create difficulties for people who buy them and then wish to transport them to their own houses.

Furthermore it is becoming quite common for local municipal authorities to require a householder to place his or her refuse in plastic bags and to carry these bags to a convenient place for collection which may for example be in or just outside the front garden of the house in question where they may the more readily be picked up by the refuse collectors. Such a plastic bag may be placed in a conventional cylindrical bin until such time as a refuse collection is expected when the householder has to lift the bag (which may be quite heavy) upwardly out of the top of the bin after the bin lid has been removed. Such an operation may not be easy to accomplish especially when the plastic bag is full of relatively heavy rubbish.

The object of the present invention is to provide an improved bin which seeks to avoid the above-mentioned disadvantages.

In its broadest aspect, the invention consists of a bin which comprises an assembly including a support portion, a lid and elongate guide means which are connected to the support portion so as to be adapted to support a piurality of flexible bags which in use will hang in a vertical orientation, said assembly being capable of being collapsed or folded or dismounted whereby it may be arranged for storage or transport purposes, or when not in use, in a substantially flat package or condition.

The aforesaid guide means may comprise a pair of spaced parallel guide rods which are adapted to support said flexible bags within the container for which purpose each of said bags may be formed adjacent to each of its upper corners with an aperture, each guide rod extending in use through a set of aligned apertures formed in the bags. Said guide rods may be hingedly connected to the support.

In one convenient form, said support comprises a body portion, a base and, preferably, a door which, like the lid, may be hingedly connected to the body portion (when the latter is in its operative condition) to form a container which may be of generally square or rectangular (or any other polygonal shape) in horizontal cross-section.

With such an arrangement, the bin can be, in use, free-standing, with its base resting on the floor but in an alternative construction said support comprises a wall-engaging plate to which said lid is hingedly connected. There may also be provided a frame which is also hingedly connected to said plate and which is adapted in use to form a rigid top to the assembly from which an opened bag will in use depend, the frame lying beneath the lid when the latter is in its closed position. In this case, said guide rods may be foldable on to the wall-engaging plate in a generally horizontal plane, the arrangement being such that when the guide rods are in their extended positions then they will support and lie beneath the frame when the latter is also in its folded down position in which it also lies in a generally horizontal plane.

The invention will now be more particularly described with reference to the accompanying drawings wherein Figure 1 is a perspective view of one example of a bin (in the assemblies or in use condition) in accordance with the invention, Figure 2 is a perspective view of an alternative form of bin in accordance with the invention, and Figure 3 is a perspective view showing the bin seen in Fig. 2 when in a folded or flat condition.

Referring now to Fig. 1 there is shown therein a bin assembly which includes a support in the form of a body portion 10 a base 11 and a door 13 (the latter having a handle 14), together with a lid 12. All of these parts may be formed in metal (such as sheet steel) or in any suitable synthetic resin material and as shown the door 13 is hinged to the front of the body portion 10 so that when in a closed position it will close an aperture which is formed at the front of said body portion.

As shown the latter is of generally channelshaped configuration (which may for example be formed by bending sheet metal or by a moulding operation) and the free edges of said channel-shaped portion are formed with outturned lips or flanges 15 and 16, the flange 16 being hingedly connected to said door 13 whereas the flange 15 is provided with an aperture 1 7 which can be engaged by a coacting projection 18 provided on the door when it is required to close the latter. Conveniently said body portion 10 is however formed so that it can be collapsed or folded or otherwise dismantled (the door 13 and lid 12 also being detachable if desired) so that the whole bin can be arranged in a generally flat package, for which purpose the aforesaid base 11 is also detachably connected to the body portion 10.Thus in one example the body portion 10 can be formed of two side panels which are each either hingedly or detachably connected to the rear portion the lid portion 12 is, as shown in the drawing, preferably hingediy connected to the upper part of the back of the body portion.

There is also provided within the bin guide means in the form of a pair of guide rods 19 and 20 which extend from back to front of the body portion in a spaced parallel relationshiip, each of said rods being connected at its rearmost end to the rear of the body portion 10 in a cantilevered fashion. Furthermore as will be seen from the drawing each guide rod is formed adjacent to its rear and its front end with a downwardly extending V-shaped kink as indicated by reference numeral 21.

Mounted within the body portion 10 of the bin is a stack of vertically extending flexible bags generally indicated by reference numeral 22, each of said bags hanging in a vertical orientation and being arranged when they are empty in a compressed condition in which they are held towards the rear of the body portion by means of the rearmost kinks 21 of the guide rods 19 and 20, each of said bags being formed adjacent to each of its upper corners with a hole through which the guide rods 19 and 20 respectively extend. The guide rods thus serve to support the stack of bags 22 in position.

When it is desired to use the bin the foremost bag, indicated by reference numeral 23, is opened so that its front side is extended to rest in the forward kinks 21 of the guide rods 19 and 20 and such bag is then maintained in an open position. Rubbish can thus be inserted into the bin by iifting the lid 12 and dropping the rubbish into the open suspended bag 23. When such bag becomes full the door 13 is opened from the front and the bag can then be pulled forwardly through the open front of the bin, its neck then being tied and the bag being removed for disposal. The next bag in the stack of bags 22 can then be opened so that its front is pulled forward to rest in the forward kinks 21 of the guide rods 19 and 20.

As shown the body portion 10 of the bin is generally of square or rectangular configuration in horizontal cross-section and if desired a line of such bins can be mounted in a side-by-side relation with any suitable interconnecting means such as suitable clips being used if desired to maintain the bins in a tidy row. The bins themselves can be finished in any suitable weatherproof finnish which may be of any desired colour.

Reference is now made to the alternative embodiment shown particularly in Figs. 2 and 3. This embodiment includes a support in the form of a wall-engaging plate 24 which can be secured to a wall or other vertical surface by means of screws 25. A lid 26 is hingedly connected to said support 24 so as to be pivotable in use about a generally horizontally extending axis, said lid having a pair of parallel flanges 27 and 28 extending along its opposite side edges.

There is also provided a frame 29 which is of channel-shaped configuration in cross-section and which is overall of generally U-shaped configuration, the free ends of the sides of such frame being themselves hingedly conncted to said support 24, the arrangement being such that said frame 29 is arranged so that its two sides will lie between the flanges 27 and 28 of the lid 26 when the frame and the lid are brought together either in a generally vertical or generally horizontal configuration.

A pair of guide rods 30 and 31 for a pack of flexible bags 32 are provided as before but in this case said guide rods 30 and 31 are hingedly connected to said support 24 so that they can each pivot about a generally vertical axis relative to the support 24 whereby they may either be disposed in an extended position in which they project outwardly in a spaced parallel relationship as seen in Fig. 2 or alternatively in a folded position in which they are each folded inwardly along the lines indicated by arrows 33 and 34 when they will lie closely adjacent to each other when it is desired to fold the assembly into a flat out of use condition as seen in Fig. 3.

When it is desired to use the assembly shown in Figs. 2 and 3 the aforesaid guide rods 30 and 31 are set in their extended position as shown in Fig. 2 where upon the first of the flexible bags 32 can be pulled out to an open position along the guide rods. The frame 29 can then be lowered so that the guide rods 30 and 31 will engage within the channels formed by the sides of said frame 29 and in this position the frame will be supported in its folded down condition by said guide rods. The lid 26 can then also be folded down to a closed position in which it lies on top of the frame to close off the mouth of the open flexible bag but obviously when it is required to insert refuse or rubbish into the bag then the lid 26 will be temporarily lifted.

When the-bag is full however it can be withdrawn forwardly from the front of the assembly so that it becomes detached from the guide rods 30 and 31 and another flexible bag drawn forward ready for use. If however the assembly is to be folded into a flat condition for storage or transport purposes then the rods 30 and 31 will be folded inwardly to enable the frame 29 and the lid 26 to be folded down into the position which is seen in Fig. 3 in which said frame is contained within the lid 26, both such parts then lying over the upper end of the stack of flexible bags 32.

It will be appreciated that with either of the bin assemblies described above the assembly can firstly be arranged in a substantially flat package so that it can easily be stored or arranged in an out-of-use condition without using an excessive amount of space and can also be readily transported to its intended po sition of use. When the bin is erected however the pack of flexible bags contained within the body position can be successively used and when each bag has been filled it can readily be removed from the bin from the front thereof, thereby avoiding the necessity of having to lift the filled bags upwardly through the top of the assembly.

Claims (1)

1. A bin comprising an assembly including a support, a lid and elongate guide means which are connected to the support portion so as to be adapted to support a plurality of flexible bags which in use will hang in a vertical orientation, said assembly being capable of being collapsed or folded or dismounted whereby it may be arranged for storage or transport purposes, or when not in use, in a substantially flat package or condition.

2. A bin as claimed in Claim 1 wherein said guide means comprise a pair of spaced parallel guide rods which are adapted to support said flexible bags within the container.

3. A bin as claimed in Claim 1 or Claim 2 wherein said support comprises a body portion and a door which, like the lid, is hingedly connected to the body portion to form a container which is of generally square rectangular or other polygonal shape in horizontal crosssection.

4. A bin as claimed in Claim 3 which is of free-standing construction.

5. A bin as claimed in Claim 1 or Claim 2 wherein said support comprises a wall-engaging plate to which said lid is hingedly connected.

6. A bin as claimed in Claim 5 wherein there is provided a frame which is also hingedly connected to said plate and which is adapted in use to form a rigid top to the assembly from which an opened bag will in use depend, said frame lying beneath the lid when the latter is in its closed position.

7. A bin as claimed in Claim 5 or Claim 6 where dependant upon Claim 2 wherein said guide rods are foldable on to the wall-engaging plate in a generally horizontal plane, the arrangement being such that when the guide rods are in their extended positions then they will support and lie beneath the frame when the latter is also in its folded down position in which it also lies in a generally horizontal plane.

7. A bin as claimed in Claim 2 and any claim dependent upon Claim 2 wherein each of said guide rods is formed at or adjacent to each of its ends with a kink or other formation adapted to form a stop or abutment for an apertured bag which is to be supported by the bin, the guide rods being arranged in use to extend through the bag apertures.

9. A bin assembly substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to and as shown in Fig. 1 or Figs. 2 and 3 of the accompanying drawings.