US3713561A

US3713561A - Cabinet for selectively dispensing different types of paper towels

Info

Publication number: US3713561A
Application number: US00093621A
Authority: US
Inventors: G Wyant
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Wyant and Co Ltd
Priority date: 1970-11-30
Filing date: 1970-11-30
Publication date: 1973-01-30
Anticipated expiration: 1990-01-30

Abstract

A paper towel dispensing cabinet of improved design is described for holding and dispensing rolled paper towels and single-fold, multi-fold and C-fold towels. The novel cabinet comprises a casing having a rear wall, a pair of side walls, a bottom member and a front wall, said bottom member including a substantially horizontal portion merging into an upwardly inclined portion towards the front of the casing, said inclined portion terminating in a substantially vertical rolled paper guide spaced rearwardly from the front wall, a folded towel dispensing slot in the inclined portion of the bottom, said slot being narrow adjacent the ends thereof and being enlarged rearwardly in the central region thereof to form a space for grasping C-fold towels and an adaptor plate hingedly mounted on the rear wall arranged to assume a first position flat against the rear wall to accommodate a towel roll or a wide width single-fold towel pack and a second position in which the plate is inclined downwardly with the lower edge thereof resting on the bottom adjacent the rearward edge of the dispensing slot to guide narrow width multifold and C-fold towel packs into engagement with the dispensing slot.

Description

ite States Patent 1 Wyant 1 Jan. 30, 1973 i541 CABINET FOR SELECTIVELY DISPENSING DIFFERENT TYPES OF PAPER TOWELS Gerald Willis Wyant, 4343 Mayfair Avenue, Montreal, Quebec, Canada [22] Filed: Nov. 30, 1970 [211 App]. No.: 93,621

[76] Inventor:

[52] US. Cl ..221/44 [51] Int. Cl. ..A47k 10/34 [58] Field of Search ..22l/48,62,52,53,6l,55,

Primary Examiner-Stanley l-I. Tollberg Attorney-Fetherstonhaugh & Co.

[57] ABSTRACT A paper towel dispensing cabinet of improved design is described for holding and dispensing rolled paper towels and single-fold, multi-fold and C-fold towels. The novel cabinet comprises a casing having a rear wall, a pair of side walls, a bottom member and a front wall, said bottom member including a substantially horizontal portion merging into an upwardly inclined portion towards the front of the casing, said inclined portion terminating in a substantially vertical rolled paper guide spaced rearwardly from the front wall, a folded towel dispensing slot in the inclined portion of the bottom, said slot being narrow adjacent the ends thereof and being enlarged rearwardly in the central region thereof to form a space for grasping C-fold towels and an adaptor plate hingedly mounted on the rear wall arranged to assume a first position flat against the rear wall to accommodate a towel roll or a wide width single-fold towel pack and a second position in which the plate is inclined downwardly with the lower edge thereof resting on the bottom adjacent the rearward edge of the dispensing slot to guide narrow width multi-fold and C-fold towel packs into engagement with the dispensing slot.

1 Claim, 5 Drawing Figures PATENTEDJAHBO I975 3.713.561

SHEET 1 [IF 3 INVENTOR Gerald Willis WYANT PA TENT AGENTS PATENTEDJAI 30 I973 SHEET 2 BF 3 INVENTOR Gerald Willis WYANT PATENT AGENTS PATENTEDJAIIBO ms 3,713,561

'snmsnfs INVENTOR Gerald Willis WYANT CABINET FOR SELECTIVELY DISPENSING DIFFERENT TYPES OF PAPER TOWELS This invention relates to an improved paper towel dispensing cabinet for holding and dispensing rolled paper towels and single, multi-fold and C-fold towels.

Cabinets for dispensing paper towels have long been known and are widely used. Many of these cabinets are designed to dispense only a single type of towel so that certain cabinets will dispense only rolled paper towels while others will dispense only wide width single fold packs, still others will handle only the narrow multifold packs and still others will handle only the narrow C- fold packs. With these single purpose cabinets it will be evident that one must always have the proper type of towel for each type of cabinet and the result is that if that particular type of towel pack is out of stock, the cabinet becomes useless even though other types of towel packs may readily be available. Attempts have been made to overcome this difficulty by designing a multi-purpose cabinet which is adaptable to handling all of the usual different types of towel packs on the market. One such attempt is described in our US. Pat. No. 3,115,998 issued Dec. 31, 1963. While this cabinet solved the problems of being able to use different towel packs, the cabinet design was rather complicated which greatly increased production costs. The result was that this cabinet was not competitive in cost with the usual simple cabinets for handling a single type of towel pack.

It is therefore, the object of the present invention to provide a simplified cabinet design which will embody the versatility of the cabinet described in the above patent and the simplicity and low production costs of the usual single purpose cabinets.

The paper towel dispensing cabinet of this invention comprises a simple cabinet having a rear wall, a pair of side walls, a bottom member and a front wall. The bottom member includes a substantially horizontal portion merging into an upwardly inclined portion towards the front of the casing. This inclined portion terminates in a substantially vertical rolled paper guide which is spaced rearwardly a small distance from the front wall. A folded towel dispensing slot is provided in the inclined portion of the bottom and this slot is narrow adjacent the ends thereof while being enlarged rearwardly in the central region to form a space for grasping C-fold towels. t

An adaptor plate is hingedly mounted on the rear wall and is arranged to assume either an up position flat against the rear wall to accommodate a towel roll or a wide width single-fold towel pack or a down position in which the plate is inclined downwardly with the lower edge thereof resting on the bottom adjacent the rearward edge of dispensing slot to guide narrow width multi-fold and C-fold towel packs into engagement with the dispensing slot.

According to a preferred feature of the invention, the bottom member includes a depression with converging side walls extending transversely between the side walls of the cabinet. The converging side wall of the depression towards the front of the cabinet is the main inclined portion of the bottom containing the dispensing slot. This depression serves as a nesting position for the rolled towels and the rearmost converging wall serves as an abutment for the adaptor plate when in its down position.

The dispensing slot is conveniently formed by constructing the bottom in two parts with the slot representing a gap between the two parts. The enlargement of the slot is in the form of a curved stepwise cutout which extends into the horizontal portion of the above mentioned depression. Thus, when the adaptor plate is in its down position, its lower edge is adjacent the rearmost extent of the slot enlargement.

The front walls of the cabinet can be conveniently in the form of a door and this is preferably hingedly mounted at its lower corners. The door can conveniently be shaped to form both a front and a top for the cabinet and the bottom edge of the door provides a tear edge for the rolled towels.

From the above description it will be seen that the cabinet of this invention is very simple in design and inexpensive to construct and yet embodies all of the features of the more complicated cabinet described in the prior patent. Moreover, it is more easily converted for use with the different types of towels since the conversion is simply a matter of swinging the hingedly mounted adaptor plate into an up or down position.

Certain preferred embodiments of the invention will now be illustrated with reference to the attached drawings wherein: 9

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a complete cabinet;

FIG. 2 is a sectional view showing the adaptor plate in the up position with the cabinet dispensing a towel roll;

FIG. 3 is a sectional view similar to FIG. 2 but showing the adaptor plate in its down position for accommodating a narrow width towel pack;

FIG. 4 is a bottom view of the cabinet; and

FIG. 5 is a perspective view of the cabinet with the door removed.

Referring to the drawings, the paper towel dispensing cabinet can as shown have a pair of side walls 11, a rear wall 12, a bottom member 13 and a door member 14. Each side wall has an upwardly inclined bottom edge 15, a vertical front edge portion 16, an inclined front edge portion 17 and a horizontal upper edge 18. A narrow bent flange 19 extends inwardly along the edges 18 of side walls 11 and along the top edge of rear wall 12. A slot 20 can also be provided in the side walls 11 for determining the amount of towelling still in the cabinet. The door 14 also has bent side flanges 21 and is hingedly mounted to side walls 11 by pins 22. The door member has a vertical panel 23 which merges into an inclined panel 24 which in turn merges into a top horizontal panel 25. A locking mechanism 26 is provided in top panel 25 and this engages a projection 27 which extends downwardly from flange 19. A cutout 28 is provided in vertical door panel 23 to assist in grasping rolled towelling. The lower edge 29 of panel 23 serves as a tearing edge for rolled paper towelling.

Towards the front of the cabinet is positioned a guide member 30 for rolled paper towels. This guide member is made of sheet material which is folded over on itself so as to form an outer panel 31 and an inner panel 32 joined by an upwardly facing bend edge 40. The inner panel 32 merges into an inclined bottom panel 33 which terminates in a beaded edge 34. This beaded edge 34 forms one edge of the towel dispensing slot 35.

Commencing at the rear wall 12 of the cabinet the bottom 13 includes a horizontal panel 36 which merges into a downwardly inclined panel 37 which in turn merges into a horizontal panel 38 and this in turn merges into an outwardly and upwardly inclined panel 39. The outer edge of panel 30 forms the second edge of towel dispensing slot 35.

The slot 35 includes stepwise cutout portions 35a and 3512. Thus, a relatively long cutout portion extends into inclined panel 39 and a second cutout portion 35d extends into horizontal panel 38. These cutout portions 35a and 35b facilitate grasping the folded towels and in particular make it possible to grasp the C-fold towels.

The adaptor plate is a simple sheet metal plate 41 which is mounted to rear wall 12 by a pair of hinge connections 42. The plate 41 is shown in solid lines in FIG. in its up position and is held in that position by means of clasp 43. When this clasp 43 is released the plate 41 swings down into the position shown in broken lines and comes to rest on the inclined panel 37 with the edge of the plate adjacent the slot cutout portion 35b.

As will be seen from FIG. 3, with the adaptor plate in the down position, the narrow width folded towel pack is directed forwardly in the cabinet so that the towels are in proper alignment with the slot 35.

When the adaptor plate is in the up position as shown in FIG. 2, the paper towel roll rests in the bottom depression as shown and when a wide width folded towel pack is used, this will rest directly on bottom panel 36 and extend out to slot 35 with the outer edge of the pack resting on the panel 39.

Thus, it will be seen from the above detailed description that this very simple cabinet is extremely easily adapted to all of the usual types of paper towels including both rolls and folded towels.

What I claim is:

1. In a cabinet for selectively dispensing different types of paper towels such as rolled towels, single, multi-fold and C-fold towels, the combination of a casing including a rear wall, a pair of side walls, a bottom member, and a hinged door which constitutes the front and top of the casing when closed, said bottom member extending generally forwardly and upwardly from said rear wall and terminating at the front thereof in a downturned edge spaced rearwardly from said door so that rolled towels placed on the bottom member may be drawn downwardly over said downturned edge, the intermediate portion of said bottom member being provided with a transversely extending dispensing slot for single and folded towels, the rear portion of the bottom member being provided with a rearwardly inclined step spaced forwardly from said rear wall, an adaptor plate hingedly mounted on said rear wall in a plane spaced above said bottom member, said adaptor plate being swingable from a lower downwardly and forwardly slanting position in which its lower edge abuts said step of the bottom member to a raised position wherein it extends upwardly from its hinged mounting and lies flat against said rear wall, and latch means on the rear wall for releasably relating the adaptor plate in its raised position.