Refrigeration – Display type – With air controlling or directing means
Patent
1994-10-11
1996-04-02
Tapolcai, William E.
Refrigeration
Display type
With air controlling or directing means
62298, 312116, A47F 304
Patent
active
055029795
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The present invention relates to a cabinet for displaying food products or the like in a shop.
Numerous products need to be placed (in sales outlets) in cabinets or displays that are refrigerated (or cooled) by a flow of cold air in order to keep said products under acceptable conservation conditions.
Three main problems need to be solved for this type of cabinet: such cabinets must enable the product on sale to be displayed in a manner that provides maximum visibility for the consumer visiting the shop and coming close to the cabinet, thereby enabling the product to be shown off at its best, in particular by good lighting; in addition, such a cabinet must enable products to be conserved, and this is generally achieved by circulating cold air (inside the cabinet), generally in dynamic manner, i.e. driven by at least one cold air fan; numerous cabinets of this type have a plurality of superposed shelves and include in their front facade a zone giving substantially frontal access to the products on display via an opening of large dimensions provided in the front facade of said cabinet; said air circulation includes a curtain of air for preventing or limiting penetration of warm air into said cabinet via said zone that gives frontal access to the products on display.
Another general problem to be solved for this type of apparatus is to enable products to be loaded into the cabinet and unloaded therefrom quickly and easily.
A cabinet that substantially satisfies these functions is described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 3,719,408 (Fullington), which cabinet has a product display zone including a zone with frontal access, the cabinet including a cold air circulation circuit having a curtain of cold air that protects said front access opening, and a system for cooling the circulating air; said cabinet is designed to receive mobile carts that include a plurality of superposed shelves for receiving and displaying the products on sale.
Nevertheless, known cabinets as described in particular in that document suffer from numerous drawbacks.
That type of cabinet is very expensive and very difficult or impossible to take apart and reuse when altering the layout or the fittings of a shop, where such alterations in shops are becoming more and more frequent in order to attract customers.
Patent application EP 296 343 (Gervais Danone) describes a container for displaying products that are kept at low temperature on sales premises; that document describes a generally rectangular container or box which is open via its top face and has side walls that may be made of cardboard, in particular; the container may be disposed on a pallet; the container may receive a cooling device, either in a cavity or cutout in one of the side walls of the box, or else placed on the top portion of the box, which cooling device may be a cold accumulator pack or an apparatus including a cooling circuit that is provided with an evaporator suitable for cooling the air in a top zone of the box and containing the products on display.
Although the appliance described in that document facilitates loading and unloading products since they can be delivered in said box, that appliance does not provide for cold air to circulate in the container containing the products, so its use is limited to certain types of products for which the relatively small amount of cooling provided by the cooling module described in that document suffices; in addition, that appliance suffers from a major drawback in that it is completely ill-adapted to promoting the products put on sale, which products are piled up inside the box, which box does not provide good visibility of the products or easy consumer access thereto.
The problem posed therefore consists in providing a refrigerated cabinet or display which is very easily taken apart, while still satisfying the general problems raised by that type of appliance, namely: ensuring very good conservation of products by proper circulation of cold air, be it static or driven by cold air circulation fans, providing the consumer with
REFERENCES:
patent: 2915884 (1959-12-01), Haushalter et al.
patent: 3719408 (1973-03-01), Fullington et al.
patent: 4457140 (1984-07-01), Rastelli
patent: 4845957 (1989-07-01), Richardson
patent: 4898004 (1990-02-01), Richardson
patent: 5086627 (1992-02-01), Borgen
patent: 5140830 (1992-08-01), Sawyer
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