Flexible formed sheets for treating surfaces
AssigneeBall Burnishing Machine Tools Ltd.
InventorGeoffrey R. Linzell
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A surface treatment tool formed from a thin sheet of flexible material, typically a polymer, shaped to store and dispense fluid, scrub, abrade, scrape off and retain debris, including particulates from treated surfaces, and including an array of closely spaced hollow mushroom-shaped protrusions that store (after a bottom sheet which is not shown is added), and then release fluids during rubbing via perforated faces, and upstanding mushroom shapes carrying soft rubbing faces which have harder scraper edges constituting operable faces with gaps between faces leading into a sunken labyrinth into which loosened debris is scraped up and retained.
Claims22
A surface-treatment tool comprising a flexibly-deformable sheet of non-absorbent material embossed with protrusions, each protrusion with an obverse side that constitutes a raised rubbing element on the face of the tool, and a reverse side bounding a cavity, the sheet being formed to have the shape of a closely-spaced array of similarly oriented hollow protrusions upstanding from either side of the sheet, the protrusions having mushroom-shaped cross-sections, each having a head that forms an apex of the cross-section and a stem that is narrower than the head, the protrusion forming cavities opening onto the reverse side and being fillable with a fluid, a solid, or a semi-solid, and such that the heads of the mushrooms comprise the operable face of the tool, while the interlinking space between the mushroom stems forms a sunken labyrinth running throughout the sheet accessible from the operable face and fillable with dirt.
A surface-treatment tool comprising:
- a flexibly-deformable sheet having a closely-spaced array of a plurality of similarly oriented protrusions upstanding from either side of the sheet;
- each of the protrusions having:
- (A) an obverse side which constitutes a raised rubbing element on the face of the tool;
- and (B) a reverse side that constitutes a cavity which is hollow and which opens onto said reverse side and is capable of being filled with stuff;
- each of the protrusions also having a mushroom-like cross-section with head larger than stem thereof, wherein the surface of the head of the mushroom comprises said rubbing element and the operable face of the tool;
- and
- an interlinking space:
- (a) which is positioned between the mushroom stems;
- (b) which comprises a sunken labyrinth running throughout the sheet;
- and (c) which is accessible from the operable face of the tool and is capable of being filled with other stuff.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.