Single-lever sanitary water valve
AssigneeAmerican Standard Inc.
InventorKonrad Bergmann
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A single-lever sanitary water valve is provided with a fixed cylinder which has at least one water inlet aperture and serves to receive a rotatable and/or slidable piston, by means of which the inlet aperture can be wholly or partly closed and can be linked to the outlet aperture, the slidable and/or rotatable piston being controlled by means of a lever assembly. The lever assembly includes a rotatable cap mounted on the valve body to which is coupled the piston and the adjusting lever via at least two linkage members so that first, second and third pivot bearings are formed at their respective points of connections whereby lateral forces acting on the piston are substantially eliminated when the adjusting lever is shifted between its raised and lowered positions.
Claims9
A sanitary water valve comprising:
- a valve body including a cylinder mounted therein;
- said cylinder having at least one inlet aperture and an outlet aperture;
- a piston having a piston axis existing in said cylinder and longitudinally shiftable along said piston axis and rotatable about said axis with respect to said cylinder;
- a lever assembly coupled to said piston;
- said lever assembly including an adjusting lever pivotally and rotatably mounted on said valve body and being shiftable about a first pivot bearing on a lever axis between open and closed positions to control the flow of water through said valve;
- a linkage member pivotally coupled at one end to said piston so as to be rotatable about a second pivot bearing on the piston axis and pivotally coupled to the lever assembly so as to be rotatable about a third pivot bearing on a linkage axis;
- and
- the lever assembly, linkage member and piston being arranged so that, as the lever assembly is shifted between the open and closed positions, the third pivot bearing and the linkage axis will shift between opposing lateral sides of the second pivot bearing and the piston axis to thereby assist in balancing and minimizing lateral forces being applied to the piston.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.