Electricity: conductors and insulators – With fluids or vacuum – Boxes and housings
Reexamination Certificate
2002-04-09
2004-04-06
Reichard, Dean A. (Department: 2831)
Electricity: conductors and insulators
With fluids or vacuum
Boxes and housings
C174S015100, C174S016200, C174S093000, C174S038000, C174S100000, C174S068300, C174S07700S, C174S037000, C361S716000, C361S704000, C361S721000, C361S720000, C361S699000, C361S688000, C361S689000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06717046
ABSTRACT:
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electric device such as a personal computer (PC), for which liquid penetration into its inside is not desired, and particularly relates to a technique for preventing or reducing liquid penetration into the electric device.
2. Background Art
An electric device such as PC has as its components, electric/electronic parts responsible for functions of the electric device, and a housing (or cover) for accommodating the electric/electronic parts. As well known, water should be avoided for the electric/electronic parts. Therefore, it is desired that the inside of the housing for accommodating the electric/electronic parts is completely sealed from the outside. However, for some electric devices, the inside of the housing cannot be sealed completely in terms of function, and holes through which the inside of the housing communicates with the outside may be formed. In the case where a fan is provided inside the housing, for example, a through-hole referred to as ventilation hole or exhaust hole (referred to as ventilation hole hereafter) is formed into the housing. It is obvious that the ventilation hole cannot be sealed. Accordingly, it is assumed that liquid may penetrate inside through the ventilation hole.
PROBLEMS TO BE SOLVED BY THE INVENTION
For example, Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 8-203365 specification discloses a communication device that is subject to dampproofing treatment. The communication device has an arrangement wherein a water absorbing sheet is attached onto a back inner surface of the device body with ventilation holes formed therein and a waterproof sheet preventing water penetration but allowing air ventilation through the ventilation holes. As the communication device disclosed in the Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 8-203365 specification, an arrangement in which a waterproof sheet preventing water penetration but allowing air ventilation through a ventilation hole is attached may be employed, if the arrangement is for a level where a ventilation hole only needs to allow air ventilation. However, such a waterproof sheet does not have adequate ventilation capability required for the case where a fan is operated, because of its high density. In other words, there is a case where it is difficult to employ the waterproof sheet preventing water penetration but allowing air ventilation for the ventilation hole for the fan.
For example, there is a case where a user using a notebook PC carelessly spills coffee he/she drinks over the PC. The coffee spilled onto the periphery of a ventilation hole may penetrate through the ventilation hole. It is expected to prevent such liquid penetration such as coffee by forming a three-dimension barrier around the ventilation hole. However, since in order to prevent liquid penetration through the ventilation hole the required height of the three-dimension barrier is several millimeters, the design of the notebook PC is sacrificed. There are some cases where provision of such three-dimension barrier should be avoided in the light of the size or operation of the notebook PC.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a computer device and electric device wherein liquid penetration through a ventilation hole from its periphery is prevented or reduced without sacrificing the design and limiting the size and operation. It is also an object of the present invention to provide a housing or cover suitable for such an electric device.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
There is large attention to material with water-repellency or hydrophilicity these days. For example, it is known to apply water repellent finish to a cloth to provide the cloth with waterproofness. It is also known, as disclosed in Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 2000-309068 specification, to attach hydropholic film onto a predetermined portion to provide super-hydrophilicity, antifogging characteristic, and antifouling characteristic.
Those skilled in the art may attempt to apply water-repelling material onto periphery of a ventilation hole formed into a notebook PC so that water of coffee or the like, when it spills on the periphery of the ventilation hole, is prevented from penetrating through the ventilation hole. They may do it because of an advantage that water-repelling material can be formed much thinner than the three-dimension barrier described above. However, water on the water-repelling material gets out from the area on the water-repelling material while the possibility of the water movement toward the ventilation hole cannot be eliminated. Thus, it is difficult to solve the problem of the present invention only by applying wet-repelling material onto the periphery of the ventilation hole. This is similar for the case where hydrophilic material is applied onto the periphery of the ventilation hole.
The inventors investigated control of flow of water to prevent or reduce its penetration through a ventilation hole typically in the case where the water is present in a part where water penetration should be avoided, typically around the ventilation hole. Liquid flow on solid's surface is largely influenced by wet-characteristic of the solid's surface. Particularly, if there are boundaries where wet-characteristic for liquid varies steeply, surface tension of liquid on the boundaries is different from the one on the other portions. Use of this property allows controlling of liquid movement. More specifically, boundaries with different wet-characteristic are formed so that the boundaries reduce liquid fluidity in a direction along which liquid penetration should be prevented. In order to form the boundaries with different wet-characteristic, materials with different wet-characteristic may be alternately arranged. This arrangement allows change in the physical dimension to be reduced extremely smaller than the case where three-dimension barrier is provided.
The present invention is a computer device based on the things described above, comprising a device body with a keyboard disposed as input means; and an display part for displaying an image corresponding to an operation for said device body, wherein a ventilation hole through which an inside of said device body communicates with an outside of said device body are formed in said device body, and wherein a liquid flow control arrangement in which a first region with a first wet-characteristic and a second region with a second wet-characteristic different from the wet-characteristic of said first region are alternately arranged is provided in said device body such that the arrangement surrounds a periphery of said ventilation hole.
Objects to which the present inventions are applied are not limited to computer devices but can be applied to a variety of electric devices. Specifically, an electric device of the present invention comprises: a housing having an exposed surface portion outside and predetermined accommodation room inside; and electric and/or electronic parts accommodated in the accommodation room in said housing, wherein said housing comprises: a ventilation hole through which said accommodation room communicates with outside of the housing; and a liquid flow control arrangement formed on a periphery of said ventilation hole of said surface portion, in which arrangement a first region with a first wet-characteristic and a second region with a second wet-characteristic different from the wet-characteristic of said first region are alternately arranged.
A computer device and an electric device of the present invention have a ventilation hole in their housings. The ventilation hole is not limited to the one required for the function of the electric device but includes the ones formed because of a design requirement. Since the ventilation hole allows communication between the accommodation room for accommodating the electric/electronic parts and the outside, there is possibility that water of coffee or the like that user spilled onto the outside penetrates th
Harris Anton
International Business Machines - Corporation
Munoz-Bustamante Carlos
Reichard Dean A.
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