WO2009138811A2

WO2009138811A2 - Inertial dust separator for vacuum cleaners

Info

Publication number: WO2009138811A2
Application number: PCT/IB2008/001961
Authority: WO
Inventors: Kala Sampath Kumar
Original assignee: Kala Sampath Kumar
Priority date: 2008-05-14
Filing date: 2008-05-14
Publication date: 2009-11-19
Also published as: WO2009138811A3

Abstract

An inertial dust separator for a vacuum cleaner, which utilizes the suction energy loosed at the bends in the flow path, for pre filtration, and adds one more stage of filtration to the vacuum cleaners. The apparatus is formed in canister type by making an opening at outer radius wall of the curvature of handle and placing a dust collecting chamber to receive and store the separated dust. The curvature of handle can be altered according to the amount of dust separation requirements. The dust collecting chamber can be of any shape.

Description

INERTIAL DUST SEPARATOR FOR VACUUM CLEANERS

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of invention

The present invention relates to vacuum cleaners, and more particularly to an inertial dust separator, which is formed by the handle of canister vacuum cleaner, by making an opening at outer radius wall of curvature of the handle and placing a dust collecting chamber on the handle, such that the separated dust received into the chamber. The same utilizes the inertial force, for separating dust from the dirt-laden air drawn through the suction port.

2. Description of the Prior Art

Fig.l shows canister vacuum cleaners with filter bag and without bag. As shown in fig. 1, a flexible hose 6 is connected to a vacuum cleaner body 7 having filter bag, other end of the flexible hose is connected to a handgrip 5, hand grip's other end is connected to handle 3, which is connected to telescopic tube 2 and other end of telescopic tube 2 is connected to suction port 1. In filter bag vacuum cleaner body 7, a cover 74 is pivoted to the body, and the cover is connected to flexible hose 6. The body 7 has a dust collecting chamber 72 inside. A filter bag 73 is removably placed inside the chamber 72, to filter the dust from the dirt-laden air, which is sucked through the suction port 1. The handgrip 5 which is placed in between handle 3 and flexible hose 6, provides a location for a user for easy manipulation of the telescopic pipe 2 and there by for easy guiding of suction port 1 during the cleaning operation.In bagless vacuum cleaner, what differs from a vacuum cleaner with bag is, the vacuum cleaner body 8. The flexible hose 6 is connected to an entrance 83, which is connected to cyclone dust separator 82 internally. The parts 1 to 6 are the same for the bagless vacuum cleaner too. That is the reason, why these are explained in same figure. The cyclone dust separator separates dust due to centrifugal force and there is a filter medium inside the cyclone dust separator (not shown) for fine dust filtration. All other parts other than vacuum cleaner body 8 are the same as vacuum cleaner with filter bag as quoted before. Now onwards the bagless vacuum cleaner and filter bag vacuum cleaner together referred as 'both vacuum cleaners'. The both vacuum cleaner bodies include a motor ( not shown) in chambers 71 and 81 , to generate a suction force, to draw in dirt laden air through suction port 1. In filter bag vacuum cleaners, the dirt-laden air is drawn into vacuum cleaner body 7 through suction port 1 , telescopic tube 2, handle 3 and flexible hose 6. Solid contaminants are filtered in the filter bag 73, and disposed in the dust collecting chamber 72 of the cleaner body 7, while the exiting air is discharged outside of the cleaner body 7.

In bagless vacuum cleaners the dirt laden air is drawn into vacuum cleaner body 8, through suction port 1, telescopic tube 2, handle 3 and flexible hose 6, which is connected to entrance 83 of the body 8. Solid contaminants are filtered inside the cyclone body 82 by centrifugal separation and filter medium (not shown), while the exiting air is discharged outside of the cleaner body 8.

In general filter bag vacuum cleaners described above, all dust that is drawn in through suction port 1 , has to be filtered out by a single filter bag 73, disposed in the dust collecting chamber 72 of the body 7. As a result filter bag 73 filled with contaminants quickly and must be replaced often in order to prevent overloading of the motor and loss of suction force . An over heated motor due to overloading, damages electronic circuits in the vacuum cleaner and the motor itself stops functioning. This leads to increased cost of operation of the vacuum cleaner.

In general bagless vacuum cleaners described above, all dust has to be filtered inside the cyclone separator 82 of cyclone body 8. The time allowed for separation is not enough inside this and big sized particles will leave toward filter medium (not shown). This leads to blockage of filters, which in turn over loads the motor and suction force looses. As said above the motor and electronic circuits may get damaged. Replacement of filter medium inside the cyclone body costlier than filter bags of filter bag vacuum cleaner.

In attempt to solve this problem, a vacuum cleaner having inertial dust separator has been suggested. An inertial dust separator serves as a first stage of filtration with out requirement of additional energy and in fact utilizes the wasted energy at the bends in flow path. The collected dust in the same is simply dumped out after cleaning operation is finished. The filter bag inside the vacuum cleaner body 7 and cyclone separator inside body 8 serves as a secondary stage filtration. As shown in figures 1 and 2, the inertial dust collecting apparatus is formed by handle 3 and dust collection chamber 4. The handle has an opening 33 at upper radius wall, through which the dust is thrown out from the dirt laden air, and this dust is received by the dust collecting chamber 4. In construction referring to FIG.3 , the handle 3 is passing through the dust collecting chamber 4. This chamber shown in FIG.3 is of circular shape and extending towards telescopic tube 2.

In operation ( refer FIG.2 section A - A ), the dirt laden air drawn in through the suction port 1, through the telescopic tube 2 it is brought to the entrance 31 of handle 3. In FIG.2, arrows represent air, where as dots represent dust particles. At the change in direction of the dirt-laden air inside the handle, the dust particles try to balance by moving on to opposite direction to the of direction of flow. A body which is in motion under influence of external forces, if takes a right turn the balancing force pulls the body towards left at the curvature and vice versa. This is by virtue of inertia of motion due to change in direction. This is called as law of inertia, which states a body resists change in it's position under the action of influencing forces. In this case there is a direction change towards right, and the balancing force pulls the dust towards left, that is towards upper radius wall of handle. As the change in direction is continuous due to the curvature of the handle 3, the dust experiences more inertial force, and pressed against the upper radius wall. At the opening 33, considerable amount of dust is thrown out of the handle 3 and into the chamber 4. The un separated dust will flow towards vacuum cleaner body for next stage of filtration. In this pre filtration mostly big sized dust is separated. But high dense particles and little fine dust also gets separated.

In this manner, the inertial separator functions as an additional stage of filtration. The pre filtration decreases load on filter media of both vacuum cleaners, which leads to prolonged life period of filter media. Specially in bag less vacuum cleaners, the efficiency of cyclone dust separator increases. In addition to this the over loading of motor and deterioration of suction force is reduced to a maximum extent.

The drawback of the vacuum cleaner with above apparatus is, the handle has to be made bigger than a simple general vacuum cleaners. The user has to empty two dust collector instead of one. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention has been made to overcome the above mentioned problems in prior art. Accordingly it is a novel objective of present invention, to utilize the consumed energy at the bends in flow channel, for pre filtration, thus adding one more stage of filtration to the existing vacuum cleaners.

In the case of canister type vacuum cleaner curvature on the handle is chosen, to form an inertial separator, that utilizes the energy, which is consumed at the handle for change in direction of flow, for pre filtration.

Another object is to provide a dust collecting chamber, which facilitates easy manipulation for a user to carry the same during cleaning operation as well as in dust disposal operation.

The inertial dust separator for using in canister type vacuum cleaners, according to present invention, includes many of the same features of the as the vacuum cleaner described above, a dust collecting chamber is placed on the handle, generally the chamber can be of any shape. This should enable the canister vacuum cleaners, to adapt this inertial separator, with less costs.

The above objects are also accomplished by the vacuum cleaner according to the present invention having above inertial dust separator.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above mentioned objects and features of the present invention will be more apparent by describing the preferred embodiment of the present invention, in detail referring to the appended drawings, in which :

FIG.l is a perspective view of canister type vacuum cleaners with filter bag and with out filter bag. Here except the main bodies the common equipment are shown only once.

FIG.2 an enlarged section view of inertial dust separator of FIG. l and it's functioning FIG.3 an exploded perspective view of inertial dust separator according to present invention

FIG.4 perspective view of inertial separator with rectangular shaped dust collecting chamber.

FIG.5 perspective exploded view of FIG.4

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

In this description and referred figures, fitting and ergonomic elements of inertial separator are not discussed. The preferred embodiments of the invention will be described by referring to accompanying figures. For convenience the embodiments described in flow direction.

Referring to FIG. 1 , handle 3 and dust collecting chamber 4 constitute an inertial separator and handle is passing through the dust collecting chamber. Referring to FIG.3, handle 3 has an entrance 31 , which connects to telescopic tube 2, the handle has a curvature to allow the flow direction change. 32 is a projection on handle, to stop the slipping of the chamber 4 and guide a user for perfect placement of the chamber 4. At the outer radius wall of the handle 3 an opening 33, is provided to separate the dust . 34 is the other end of the handle which is connected to flexible hose 6 through handgrip 5. The chamber 4 further divided into a cap 41 and a dust storing cup 45 to allow disposal of dust by opening the chamber 4. A sealing 42 is placed between cap 41 and handle 3, to avoid leakage of the air. For the same reason sealing 44 is placed between cup 45 and handle 3. When these all are assembled looks like the parts 3 and 4 in FIG. 1.

Referring to FIG.4, the dust collecting chamber 4 can be made into rectangular shape and instead of passing the handle 3 through chamber 4 (refer FIG.3), the rectangular dust collecting chamber 4' is just placed above the handle 3 ( refer exploded view in FIG. 5). FIG.4 shows the perspective view inertial separator with rectangular shaped dust collecting chamber 4'. Referring to FIG.5, the handle is same as before except the projection 32'. This is made a bit bigger, but the function is the same as before. The rectangular chamber 4' has a lid 41' which covers the dust collecting cup 45'. A sealing 42' is placed between the handle 3 and dust collecting cup 45' of chamber 4'. The assembly of FIG.5 looks like in FIG.4.

As described in detail above, the inertial dust separator for vacuum cleaner formed by handle and a chamber according to present invention and the chamber can be easily separated after the cleaning operation with the vacuum cleaners is finished, emptied and reattached to the handle.

Although preferred embodiments of the present invention have been disclosed for illustrative purposes, those skilled in the art will appreciate that various modifications, additions, position changes and substitutions are possible without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention as disclosed in the accompanying claims.

Claims

1. An inertial dust collector for a vacuum cleaner , comprising of either a curved or a bended flow channel, having an opening at outer radius wall and a dust collecting chamber attached to it for the dust collection and storage.

2. In canister type vacuum cleaner , inertial separator said in claim 1, is formed by handle and a detachable dust collecting chamber.

3. In inertial separator said in claim 2, the handle can be passed through the chamber or placed outside of the chamber.

4. A projection on the handle is made to guide the user for the placement of dust collecting chamber on the handle.

5. The sealing is provided to the said chambers to avoid air leakage.