Door draught and weather excluder

• US 5,475,946 A
• Filed: 06/06/1994
• Issued: 12/19/1995
• Est. Priority Date: 01/23/1992
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Ian Howe
• Original Assignee: Ian Howe
• Inventors: Howe, Ian
• Primary Examiner(s): KANNAN, PHILIP
• Application Number:
  US08/244,649
• Time in Patent Office: 561 Days
• Field of Search: 49/470, 49/496.1, 49/475.1
• US Class Current: 49/470
• CPC Class Codes: E06B 7/2316 used as a seal between the floor and the wing
• CPC Class Codes: E06B 7/232 Resilient strips of hard material, e.g. metal

Abstract

A draught and weather excluder comprising a gap sealing section which enables simple, fast and effective closure of gaps below hinged and sliding doors is disclosed. The sealing section may be simply fitted to the underside of a door edge using strips of bonding tape so that the device may be fitted without removing or modifying the door in anyway. The sealing section comprises two main webs, a mounting web and a sealing web, which are connected together along the length of the section by a hinged or weakened section. The mounting web consisting of a generally thin flat flexible web for flush mounting the sealing section directly to the underside of a door edge. The sealing web consists of a generally curved or non-linear cross section for making contact with and freely sliding over floor surfaces including floor coverings and for actively mounting obstacles on the floor. The sealing web may contain a nose portion extending from the free extremity of the sealing web so as to allow the sealing web to glide freely and smoothly over a floor surface without fouling as the door is rotated in either direction. The nose portion may contain a biasing web extending from its free extremity and extending upwardly and inwardly towards the hinge. The biasing web being able to make contact with the mounting web during upward rotation of the sealing web. The sealing section has a generally constant cross section and may be produced in long lengths of resilient flexible type materials such as plastic.

Claims

1. In combination,

a floor surface;

a door mounted for movement in a direction parallel to the floor surface, the door having an underside adjacent to the floor surface; and

a gap sealing section for sealing gaps between said underside of the door and the floor surface, the sealing section being secured to the underside of the door, the sealing section having a mounting web on one side directly flush mounted to the underside of the door and a sealing web at the opposite side making contact with and freely and smoothly sliding over said floor surface, the two webs being flexibly connected at one extremity along a line through their length so as to be movable by relative rotation about this line of their connection, the sealing web bearing against the top of the floor surface along a line which is generally below the area defined by the surface of the underside of the door edge.

2. The combination as claimed in claim 1, wherein the sealing section in use does not protrude past either face of the door.

3. The combination as claimed in claim 1, wherein the line of contact between the sealing web and the floor surface moves horizontally towards the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs, this action occurring when in use the sealing web is caused to rotate upward toward the underside of the door edge.

4. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the mounting and sealing webs are connected by a weakened section along their line of connection so as to allow the webs to come together and separate by their rotation about the weakened section so that rotational forces applied to either web results in relative rotation of the webs only about the weakened section so that no significant rotation occurs within the mounting or sealing web.

5. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the sealing web is of generally curved, or non-linear type cross sectional shape so that the sealing web will not foul with the floor surface and will glide freely and smoothly over said floor surface along a line where the floor surface makes contact at a tangent to the sealing web, when the door is being moved.

6. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the sealing web contains a nose portion along its edge opposite to the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs so as to prevent fouling of the sealing web with the floor and to ensure that the sealing web is able to glide smoothly and freely over a floor surface and to allow a generally flat sealing section to also glide freely and smoothly over a floor surface when the door is rotated particularly in a direction away from the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs.

7. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the mounting web contains an upstand in a direction toward the underside of the door edge surface so that no gaps may occur between the top of the mounting section and the underside of the door edge.

8. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs contains a residual resilience such that the sealing and mounting webs are biased apart when the sealing section has been inserted into a gap which is less in overall vertical depth than the overall vertical depth of the sealing section prior to insertion into the gap, the mounting web being actively pushed up toward the underside of the door edge so that the fixing materials between the underside of the door edge and the top of the mounting section are placed in compression so that the fixing materials are not subject to forces tending to downwardly separate the mounting section from the surface of the underside of the door edge.

9. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs is sufficiently weak in resisting rotation so that rotation of the sealing web in use does not transmit a significant moment couple to the mounting web via its connection thereto, the mounting web so attached to the sealing web, not transmitting any significant rotational forces to the fixing material, the fixing materials in use not experiencing any significant rotational forces, the fixing materials in use experiencing significant compression and shear forces only, the mounting web being simply attachable to the underside of a door edge using fixing materials such as bonding tapes so that stronger fixing materials or rigidly fixed mating parts or modifications to the underside of the door edge are not required.

10. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the sealing web cross section is constructed in a generally curved or non-linear shape so that the underside of the sealing web in contact with the floor surface provides a tangential line of contact to the floor surface, so that where the floor surface contains significant obstacles the sealing web may actively mount such obstacles encountered at the floor surface during rotation of the door in either direction, the sealing web thus formed being able to actively mount such obstacles on the floor surface during rotation of the door by virtue of the cross sectional shape of the sealing web and the ability of the sealing web to rotate upward about the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs and towards the mounting web.

11. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the sealing web extends downwardly and generally directly below the mounting web and away from the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs, rotation of the door away from the line of web connection causing the sealing web to actively clamp down onto the floor surface due to the moment caused by the small friction force between the floor surface and the sealing web about the line of web connection, the sealing web actively releasing the clamp action when the door is rotated towards the line of web connection.

12. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the sealing web is of resilient material so that in situations where the door to floor gap is different along the length of the sealing section, the sealing web is able to extend and retract vertically along its length so that an uneven gap may be effectively sealed.

13. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the sealing section is of a sufficiently curved or non-linear cross section so that the floor makes contact with the sealing web at a tangent to the sealing web, the line of contact so formed between the surface of the floor and the sealing web, being always located at a horizontal distance away from the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs so that in use the sealing web is able to glide freely and smoothly over the floor covering surface so that the sealing web glides freely and smoothly over the floor surface with door rotation as the door is rotated in either direction, and particularly when the door is rotated in a direction away from the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs.

14. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the sealing section in use does not protrude past either face of the door.

15. The combination as claimed in claim 1 wherein the line of contact between the sealing web and the floor surface moves horizontally towards the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs, this action occurring when in use the sealing web is caused to rotate upward toward the underside of the door edge.

16. A gap sealing section for sealing gaps between the underside of a door edge and the top of a floor surface, the sealing section being securable to the underside of a door edge, the sealing section having a mounting web on one side to allow direct flush mounting to the underside of a door edge and a sealing web at the opposite side for making contact with and freely and smoothly sliding over floor surfaces including floor coverings, the two web being flexibly connected at one extremity along a line through their length so as to be movable by relative rotation about this line of their connection, the sealing web bearing against the top of a floor surface along a line which is generally below the area defined by the surface of the underside of the door edge, wherein the sealing web contains a nose portion extending from the free extremity of the sealing web opposite the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs and extending through the length of the sealing web, the nose portion being a general extension of the sealing web so as to assist the sealing web in its intended action of gliding freely and smoothly over a floor surface so that the sealing web does not foul with the floor surface, the nose portion being of suitable shape such as generally curved or non-linear shape so as to provide an effective nose to the sealing web so as to assist the sealing web in its intended action of freely and smoothly gliding over a floor surface particularly when the cross sectional curvature of the sealing web may be less acute than the cross sectional curvature of the nose portion or where the sealing web has been significantly rotated downwardly and away from the underside of the door edge so as to expose the free extremity of the sealing web to the line of contact between the sealing web and the floor surface.

17. A gap sealing section for sealing gaps between the underside of a door edge and the top of a floor surface, the sealing section being securable to the underside of a door edge, the sealing section having a mounting web on one side to allow direct flush mounting to the underside of a door edge and a sealing web at the opposite side for making contact with and freely and smoothly sliding over floor surfaces including floor coverings, the two webs being flexibly connected at one extremity along a line through their length so as to be movable by relative rotation about this line of their connection, the sealing web bearing against the top of a floor surface along a line which is generally below the area defined by the surface of the underside of the door edge, wherein a biasing web is included, the biasing web extending from the extremity of the sealing web furthest from the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs and extending upwardly toward the door edge and inwardly toward the line of connection of the sealing and mounting webs.

18. A sealing section as claimed in claim 17 wherein the sealing web is of a generally curved or non-linear cross section and is sufficiently flexible and resilient so that when the free extremity of the biasing web in use is caused to rotate sufficiently upward so as to contact the underside of the mounting web, further free upward rotation of the sealing web being restricted by the action of the free extremity of the biasing web in contact with the underside of the mounting web so that further free upward rotation of the sealing weld is resiliently opposed by the resisting resilience of the material of the sealing web.