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US 7,610,634 B2Granted
Bathtub device
AssigneeSony Corporation
InventorTetsujiro Kondo
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A bathtub device includes a bathtub internal wall made of a flexible material, a pressure unit for changing a shape of a tub, which is a concavity surrounded with the internal wall, by applying a pressure on the internal wall, a setting unit for setting a movement range that is a changeable range of the shape of the tub, and a pressure control unit for controlling the pressure unit based on an operation entry by a user and the movement range.
Claims15
A bathtub device comprising:
- an internal wall made of a flexible material, the internal wall is shaped as a concave tub and is configured to hold water and a user submersed in the water, the internal wall including a front surface, a rear surface, a right surface, a left surface, and a bottom surface;
- a pressure unit configured to change a shape of the internal wall by applying a pressure on the internal wall;
- a setting unit configured to set a movement range for the shape of the internal wall;
- and
- a pressure control unit configured to control the pressure unit based on an operation entry by a user and the movement range,
- wherein the pressure control unit is configured to change the shape of the internal wall in length, width or depth directions within the movement range for the shape of the internal wall by controlling the pressure unit to apply a pressure independently to each of the front, rear, right, left, or bottom surface of the internal wall.
3 more elements
A bathtub device comprising:
- an internal wall shaped as a concave tub and made of a flexible material, the internal wall having a horizontal surface and a plurality of side surfaces;
- a pressurizing means for changing a shape of the internal wall by applying a pressure on a surface of the internal wall;
- a setting means for setting a movement range that is a changeable range of the shape of the internal wall;
- and
- a pressure controlling means for controlling the pressurizing means based on an operation entry by a user and the movement range, enabling each surface of the internal wall to be moved independently.
2 more elements
An adjustable bathtub device, comprising:
- a tub wall made of a flexible material, the tub wall having a shape of a concave receptacle, the tub wall having a concavity side and on the opposite side of the tub wall a non-concavity side, the tub wall having a plurality of support surfaces configured to hold water and to hold a user at least partially submerged in the water, the non-concavity side is not configured to contact the water, the plurality of support surfaces includes a plurality of substantially vertical surfaces and a bottom surface, the concave receptacle having a plurality of dimensions, including a bottom surface length, a bottom surface width, and a height of the vertical surfaces;
- an actuator system configured to independently move each of the plurality of support surfaces and thereby change at least one of the plurality of dimensions;
- and
- a control system having a processor configured to instruct the actuator system to independently move each of the plurality of support surfaces, the control system configured to accept instructions from the user to change at least one of the plurality of dimensions, the control system configured to keep the plurality of dimensions within an acceptable set of values.
1 more element
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.