Electric toothbrush

• US 9,642,684 B2
• Filed: 03/07/2014
• Issued: 05/09/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 03/11/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sunstar Incorporated (Hosei Gijuku Luxembourg SA)
• Original Assignee: Sunstar Incorporated (Hosei Gijuku Luxembourg SA)
• Inventors: Yoshida, Kazuaki, Nishiura, Masahiro
• Primary Examiner(s): CHIN, RANDALL E
• Application Number:
  US14/774,441
• Publication Number:
  US 20160022393A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,159 Days
• CPC Class Codes: A46B 15/0006 with a controlling brush technique device, e.g. stroke movement measuring device
• CPC Class Codes: A46B 2200/1066 Toothbrush for cleaning the teeth or dentures A61C17/16 takes precedence; bristles arrangements for toothbrushes A46B9/04
• CPC Class Codes: A61C 17/221 Control arrangements therefor
• CPC Class Codes: A61C 17/225 Handles or details thereof
• CPC Class Codes: A61C 17/3481 Vibrating brush body, e.g. by using eccentric weights

Abstract

An electric toothbrush with a thinner handle part to ensure the ease of manual tooth-brushing while improving the ease of a switch operation between the operating state and the stopped state, the electric toothbrush being configured to realize an effective oral cleaning by automatically giving a necessary mechanical assistance to a brush part according to the brushing state constantly varying during tooth-brushing depending on the cleaned part and the ways of holding and moving the toothbrush.

Claims

1. An electric toothbrush comprising:

a toothbrush main body having a brush part and a handle part for manually operating the brush part;

a vibration generation means that vibrates the brush part;

an acceleration sensor that detects a manual brushing action; and

a control means that controls the vibration generation means to switch between an operating state and a stopped state, according to output from the acceleration sensor, so that the vibration generation means is switched from the stopped state to the operating state at least when the toothbrush main body is moved in a manner of the manual brushing action, and the vibration generation means is switched from the operating state to the stopped state when the manual brushing action is stopped.

2. The electric toothbrush according to claim 1, wherein the vibration generation means includes a motor and a weight eccentrically rotated by the motor.

3. The electric toothbrush according to claim 1, wherein the acceleration sensor detects the motion of the toothbrush main body in an X-axis direction along the length of the toothbrush main body.

4. The electric toothbrush according to claim 1, wherein

a threshold storage means is provided to store in advance a threshold larger than the upper limit for the output from the acceleration sensor during a manual brushing action, and

when the output from the acceleration sensor is equal to or larger than the threshold stored in the threshold storage means, the control means switches the vibration generation means to the stopped state.

5. The electric toothbrush according to claim 1, wherein the control means controls the number of vibrations from the vibration generation means according to the output from the acceleration sensor.

6. The electric toothbrush according to claim 1, wherein

an output means is provided to output information to the user, and

the control means determines whether the user is performing a proper brushing action according to the output from the acceleration sensor, and provides the user with instructive information through the output means so that the user performs a proper brushing action.

7. The electric toothbrush according to claim 1, wherein

an output means is provided to output information to the user, and

the control means determines whether the vibration generation means normally operates according to the output from the acceleration sensor, and when determining the operation of the vibration generation means as abnormal, provides the user with the information on current operation through the output means.

8. The electric toothbrush according to claim 1, wherein

one or more selected from a temperature sensor that detects whether the user holds the handle part by hand, an optical sensor that detects a replacement brush is attached to or detached from the toothbrush main body, and a pressure sensor that detects pressure acting on the brush part, are provided, and

the control means controls the vibration generation means according to the outputs from these sensors and the output from the acceleration sensor.