JP2002120630A - Cup holder - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a cup holder usable safely even in the night time and serving as both cold insulation and hot insulation, by using an optically transparent material member and by forming its shape into a hollow shape by blow molding. SOLUTION: A parison using an optically transparent material as a material is blow-molded to partition an insulated space 16 in a holder body 11, and a light source 24 is provided in a proper position of the holder body 11.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a cup holder used as a vehicle interior material.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Vehicle interior materials such as air conditioners and colored glass have been used as equipment for enhancing comfort during driving. As one of such comfortable equipment, there is a cup holder for receiving a beverage or the like when riding.

[0003] The cup holder is installed near each occupant such as a center console and around a steering wheel.
It has a shape such that a beverage can such as juice or a paper cup can be set up and held, and is manufactured by injection molding using a resin such as PP or ABS which is easy to be injection molded.

[0004]

However, when the cup holder is used at night, the use of the cup holder under dim lighting with only the interior light is required, especially when the passenger is a child. When returning a beverage can or the like into the cup holder, the contents of the beverage may be spilled due to an incorrect return position. If contents such as juice are spilled into the vehicle, interior materials such as seats may be stained, and in some cases, various electrical components may be short-circuited.

Further, the cup holder itself does not have a temperature holding function such as a refrigerator or a hot storage which can be installed in a car, so that a cold beverage is warm and a hot beverage is cooled. Did not drink until delicious. Some retrofit cup holders have a structure that can be attached to the outlet of an air conditioner to keep the temperature of the beverage constant.
In this case, the air outlet that sends air at a predetermined temperature to the occupant is blocked, so that not only is it difficult to maintain the temperature inside the vehicle,
There is also a drawback that the sensation on the occupant is increased by affecting the sensible temperature.

[0006]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been proposed in view of the problems inherent in conventional cup holders, and has been proposed in order to solve the problem in a favorable manner. An object of the present invention is to provide a cup holder which can be safely used even at night and can be kept cool and warm by being hollowed by blow molding.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In order to overcome the above-mentioned problems and achieve the intended object, a cup holder according to the present invention is a cup for a vehicle which holds a cup for accommodating various contents such as beverages. A holder, wherein a parison made of a light-transmitting material is blow-molded to define a hollow heat-insulating space in the holder body, so that the temperature change of the contents in the cup held by the cup holder is moderated. And by providing a light source at an appropriate position on the holder main body, the visibility of the arrangement position of the cup holder made of a light transmissive material is improved.

[0008]

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a cup holder according to the present invention. In view of the above-mentioned drawbacks of the prior art, the inventor has adopted a light transmitting material as a material of the cup holder, so that the cup holder itself can emit light, and the structure of the cup holder is hollow by blow molding. By doing so, the inventors have come to recall that a heat insulating layer made of air or the like is formed in the inside to improve the cool keeping property and the heat keeping property, and the temperature change can be kept slowly.

FIG. 1 is a sectional view showing a structure for attaching a cup holder to a center console according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention. The illustrated example of the cup holder 10 is fitted to the base material 32 and forms a part of the center console 30 as a vehicle interior material. The cup holder 10 is easily reachable from an occupant and is disposed in a place where it does not hinder driving operation and the like. Have been. The base material 32 is a so-called structural material that expresses the rigidity of the interior material for a vehicle, and has various surface materials 34 on its surface as required.
Are arranged in a two-layer structure. In the vicinity of the mounting position of the cup holder 10, an air-conditioning duct 38 through which temperature-controlled air from an air conditioner unit is guided is provided, so that the temperature-controlled air can be supplied to the cup holder 10. .

FIG. 2 is a perspective view showing a cup holder according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention. This cup holder 10
A cylindrical holder body 11 having a closed bottom, and a flange-shaped exposed portion 1 which protrudes by a predetermined distance in the outer peripheral direction of an upper portion of the holder body 11 and engages with a mounting hole 36 described later.
2 basically. Inside the holder main body 11, a cup accommodating portion 13 for accommodating a cup 70 accommodating contents such as a beverage is defined. A fitting portion 14 is provided below the exposed portion 12 by a predetermined distance in the outer circumferential direction at a predetermined interval around the entire outer circumferential portion of the holder main body 11 so as to be separated by a thickness of a concave portion 36a described later. I have. In this embodiment, such a mounting structure is used, but any shape and structure may be used as long as it can be mounted at a predetermined position and can hold the cup 70 upright.

The cup holder 10 has a hollow structure, in which a heat insulating space 16 is defined. Air whose temperature has been adjusted to a predetermined temperature from an air conditioning duct 38 flows into the heat insulating space 16 through a ventilation hole 20 described later.
The contents such as beverages held in 0 can be kept cold and warm. The temperature-controlled air that has flowed in is discharged from a discharge hole 22 located on the opposite side of the vent hole 20. At this time, the air circulates in the heat insulating space 16.
After the circulation, the discharge hole 22 comes out,
The temperature of the cup 70 placed on the cup holder 10 can be adjusted efficiently. In addition, by sealing the heat insulating space 16 and blocking it from the outside, it is possible to develop heat insulating properties between the inside and the outside of the cup holder 10. In this case, the heat insulating space 16 usually contains only air or the like, but a gas having a large heat insulating effect, a liquid such as diethylene glycol, or other heat insulating materials may be filled to perform efficient heat insulating. Good.

Further, the cup holder 10 is made of a light transmitting material such as an acrylic resin. A hole 18 is provided in the bottom of the cup holder 10 as a mounting portion for installing a light source for supplying light to the cup holder 10 body, which is a light-transmitting material, and the hole 18 serves as a light source. The lamp 24 is detachably mounted. Since the light from the lamp 24 causes the cup holder 10 itself to emit light, its position and shape can be easily confirmed by the occupant even at night. The light source may be an LED or the like having a required light amount in addition to the lamp. The position of the hole 18, that is, the mounting position of the lamp 24, is such that when the cup holder 10 is used as an interior material for a vehicle, the appearance thereof is slightly impaired and the driving operation is not hindered. , Any position can be adopted.

When the heat insulating space 16 is in a closed state and is filled with a liquid or a solid such as a filler, the structure as shown in FIG. Alternatively, the lamp 24 may be mounted by using a mounting member 40 that allows the lamp 24 to be mounted close to the light transmitting material. With such a configuration, light from the lamp 24 can be efficiently transmitted to the entire cup holder 10 while the heat insulating space 16 is maintained in a closed state.

Further, in the present embodiment, the cup holder 10
A light masking paint is applied to a required position such as an inner surface of the light emitting device to form a paint layer 17, and the exposed portion 12 which is mounted on the center console 30 and exposed at an upper portion thereof is formed.
Only the light of the lamp 24 is transmitted to improve the clarity, so that both the appearance at normal times and the visibility at night are compatible. It is more preferable that a light-collecting agent is added to the light-transmitting material because the light-collecting function can be enhanced.

At a required position of the base material 32, there is provided a mounting hole 36 into which the cup holder 10 is fitted in a fitting manner. The cup holder 10 is attached to the mounting hole 36 by mounting the exposed portion 12 having a flange shape from above to the concave portion 36a protruded by a predetermined distance.
Fixed to This fixation is set to such an extent that the cup holder 10 once attached is not easily dislodged. In the present embodiment, the fixation is performed by the fitting portion 14.

[0016]

[Manufacturing method] The cup holder 10 according to the present invention is manufactured to be hollow so as to have a heat insulating space therein, and thus is suitably manufactured by hollow molding, that is, blow molding. In this manufacturing method, as shown in FIG. 4, a tube-shaped parison 50, which is a raw material softened by heating, is suspended by an extruder P via a first mold 52 (FIG. 4).
(See (a)). Then, a required amount of high-pressure air is supplied to the parison 5
It is blown and expanded into 0 (see FIG. 4 (b)). Then, the parison 50 should have the cup holder 10 to be obtained therein.
Mold 52 defining a cavity 56 having a contour of
Then, the cup holder 10 is obtained by squeezing between the mold and the second mold 54 and forcibly blowing high-pressure air into the parison 50 to expand the parison 50 (see FIG. 4C). Finally, the extruder P is detached, the cup holder 10 is removed from the first mold 52 and the second mold 54, and finishing such as polishing may be performed.

The cup holder 10 finally obtained has a withdrawal mark, which is a mark for removing the extruder P. The withdrawal mark is used as a hole 18 for mounting the lamp 24. It may be. In this case, there is no need to perform post-processing of the removal trace and to perform a drilling operation for providing the hole portion 18, and the process can be shortened.

As another manufacturing method, as shown in FIG. 5, a tube-shaped parison 50 which is a material softened by heating is formed into a first mold 62 and a second mold 62 which define a cavity 66 having a shape to be formed. It is hung by the extruder P between the molds 64 (see FIG. 5A). Next, while the required amount of high-pressure air is blown into the parison 50 and inflated, the pressure is narrowed by the first mold 62 and the second mold 64 (FIG. 5).
(b)). When the cup holder 10 is formed, the parison 50 is inserted through a piercing hole 62a provided in a portion corresponding to the hole 18 where the light 24 as a light source is attached.
Then, a blow pin 68 is pierced, and a required amount of high-pressure air is blown into the parison 50 from the probe pin 68 to obtain the cup holder 10 having a contour along the outer edge shape of the cavity 66 (FIG. 5). (See (c)). Finally, the blow pin 6 is removed from the cup holder 10.
8 is removed, the cup holder 10 is removed, and finishing such as polishing is performed, thereby completing the manufacturing. On this occasion,
Since the trace of removal of the blow pin 68 from the cup holder 10 is used as the hole 18 for attaching the light 24, which is a light source, it is not necessary to perform a drilling operation for providing the hole 18 as in the above-described manufacturing method. Becomes

In the above-described embodiment, the cup holder according to the present invention is disposed on the center console. However, the present invention is not particularly limited to this. If so, for example, it may be attached to an arbitrary position on the instrument panel.

[0020]

As described above, according to the cup holder according to the present invention, since the cup holder is formed into a hollow shape by blow molding and employs a light-transmitting material, it has a heat insulating function such as cooling and heat retaining. At the same time, by simply arranging a small light source at an arbitrary position, the position can be easily confirmed even at night.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a sectional view showing a state in which a cup holder according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention is attached to a center console.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view showing the structure of the cup holder shown in FIG.

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view showing a state where a lamp as a light source is attached to a hole using an attachment member.

FIG. 4 is a process chart showing an example of a method of manufacturing a cup holder according to the embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a process chart showing another method of manufacturing the cup holder according to the embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 Cup holder 11 Holder main body 12 Exposed part 13 Cup accommodating part 16 Insulated space 17 Paint layer 24 Light source (lamp) 50 Parison 68 Blow pin 70 Cup P Extruder

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[Procedure amendment]

[Submission date] October 18, 2000 (2000.10.
18)

[Procedure amendment 1]

[Document name to be amended] Drawing

[Correction target item name] Fig. 4

[Correction method] Change

[Correction contents]

FIG. 4

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A cup in which various contents such as beverages are stored.
A cup holder (10) for a vehicle holding the (70), wherein a parison (50) made of a light transmissive material is blow molded to form a hollow heat insulating space (16) in the holder body (11). By doing so, the temperature change of the contents in the cup (70) held by the cup holder (10) is slowly maintained, and a light source (24) is provided at an appropriate position on the holder body (11). A cup holder for a vehicle, wherein the visibility of the arrangement position of the cup holder (10) made of a light transmissive material is improved. 2. The cup holder for a vehicle according to claim 1, wherein temperature-controlled air from a vehicle air conditioner unit is circulated and supplied to the hollow heat insulating space. 3. The cup holder for a vehicle according to claim 1, wherein said hollow heat insulating space is filled with an object having excellent heat insulating properties such as ethylene glycol. 4. A place where the light source (24) is provided in the holder main body (11), wherein the parison (50) is formed at the time of the blow molding.
Extruder (P) or blow pin to be pierced (58)
The cup holder for a vehicle according to claim 1, wherein a removal trace is used. 5. A parison made of the light transmissive material.
The cup holder for a vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the light collector is added to the (50). 6. A coating layer (17) made of an optical masking coating is formed mainly on a required surface of a cup accommodating portion (13) of the cup holder (10) so that the cup holder (10) is exposed in a vehicle interior. The cup holder for a vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the light from the light source (24) is concentrated on the portion (12) to be exposed, thereby improving the clarity of the light at the exposed portion (12).