Excavating – Scoop or excavating and transporting container – Scoop or bucket structure – per se
Reexamination Certificate
2000-07-06
2001-11-20
Shackelford, H. (Department: 3671)
Excavating
Scoop or excavating and transporting container
Scoop or bucket structure, per se
C037S200000, C172S701100
Reexamination Certificate
active
06318007
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to buckets for tractors and dozers and more specifically it relates to a heated bucket system for significantly reducing the accumulation of frozen mud and ice within a bucket thereby maintaining the bucket's dirt moving capacity.
Tractor and dozer operators often times must operate their machinery during cold weather conditions. When utilizing their machines, the buckets will accumulate mud and water within them when digging into moist ground. This mud and water then eventually becomes frozen within the interior portion of the bucket. Over a period of time this accumulated frozen material begins to significantly reduce the amount of interior volume within the bucket thereby significantly reducing the earth moving capacity. Even during warm weather conditions the mud will accumulate within the bucket. Hence, there is a need for a system that significantly reduces the amount of accumulated mud and ice within a bucket.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Tractors, dozers other excavating equipment have been in use for years. Typically, a conventional tractor or dozer has a frame, a motor, a pair of arms pivotally attached to the frame, and a bucket attached to the pair of arms. The user operates the bucket through hydraulic levers to dig the earth and move it to a desired location while operating the tractor or dozer forwardly or rearwardly. When the outside temperature drops below freezing, water and mud begin to freeze within the bucket. The only currently utilized method of removing the frozen mud and water is to physically remove the frozen debris with a hard object such as a hammer or elongate shaft.
When the operator of the tractor or dozer has to leave the machine to remove the frozen debris, the tractor or dozer is not in operation making the user and the tractor very unproductive. If the operator allows the debris to significantly accumulate within the bucket, the volume of earth that can be moved is significantly reduced thereby reducing productivity. In addition, often times the debris will accumulate within the bucket without the user being aware of the accumulation.
Examples of attempts to reduce the amount of frozen debris include U.S. Pat. No. 1,376,741 to J. L. Boyle; U.S. Pat. No. 1,127,407 to E. Clayborne; U.S. Pat. No. 5,515,623 to Weeks; U.S. Pat. No. 4,032,015 to Hemphill; U.S. Pat. No. 3,872,986 to Campbell; U.S. Pat. No. 4,324,307 to Schittino et al. which are all illustrative of such prior art.
J. L. Boyle (U.S. Pat. No. 1,376,741) discloses a steam-heated snowplow. Boyle teaches a snowplow for a locomotive with the plow member having two walls connected by stay bolts with the stay bolts perforated to allow steam which enters the cavity to pass upwardly into direct contact with the snow upon the outer surface of the plow for melting the snow.
E. Clayborne (U.S. Pat. No. 1,127,407) discloses a snowplow. Clayborne teaches a plow member attachable to a locomotive wherein the plow member has a radiator that receives steam from the locomotive for melting and removing snow.
While these devices may be suitable for the particular purpose to which they address, they are not as suitable for significantly reducing the accumulation of frozen mud and ice within a bucket thereby maintaining the bucket's dirt moving capacity. There currently is no available system for removing ice and frozen mud from a bucket of a tractor or dozer machine. In addition, conventional methods of removing frozen debris within a bucket are extremely time intensive making the user extremely inefficient.
In these respects, the heated bucket system according to the present invention substantially departs from the conventional concepts and designs of the prior art, and in so doing provides an apparatus primarily developed for the purpose of significantly reducing the accumulation of frozen mud and ice within a bucket thereby maintaining the bucket's dirt moving capacity.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In view of the foregoing disadvantages inherent in the known types of tractor and dozer devices now present in the prior art, the present invention provides a new heated bucket system construction wherein the same can be utilized for significantly reducing the accumulation of frozen mud and ice within a bucket thereby maintaining the bucket's dirt moving capacity. The invention also prevents the accumulation of mud and dirt during warm weather conditions.
The general purpose of the present invention, which will be described subsequently in greater detail, is to provide a new heated bucket system that has many of the advantages of the tractor and dozer devices mentioned heretofore and many novel features that result in a new heated bucket system which is not anticipated, rendered obvious, suggested, or even implied by any of the prior art tractor and dozer devices, either alone or in any combination thereof.
To attain this, the present invention generally comprises a bucket attachable to a pair of arms of the tractor or dozer, a pump attached to the coolant system of the tractor or dozer, an inflow tube fluidly connected to the pump, a heat tube attached to the back member of the bucket preferably in a sinusoidal pattern and fluidly connected to the inflow tube, and an outflow tube fluidly connected to the heat tube opposite of the inflow tube and fluidly connected to the coolant system of the tractor or dozer. In operation, the pump draws the heated coolant within the coolant system and pumps it through the heat tube attached to the bucket. The heat from within the coolant is exchanged with the bucket thereby maintaining the temperature of the bucket above freezing. The coolant is then returned to the coolant system through an outflow tube. The heated bucket prevents the mud and water from freezing within the bucket during operation thereby maintaining the earth moving capacity of the tractor or dozer in cold weather conditions.
There has thus been outlined, rather broadly, the more important features of the invention in order that the detailed description thereof may be better understood, and in order that the present contribution to the art may be better appreciated. There are additional features of the invention that will be described hereinafter and that will form the subject matter of the claims appended hereto.
In this respect, before explaining at least one embodiment of the invention in detail, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited in its application to the details of construction and to the arrangements of the components set forth in the following description or illustrated in the drawings. The invention is capable of other embodiments and of being practiced and carried out in various ways. Also, it is to be understood that the phraseology and terminology employed herein are for the purpose of the description and should not be regarded as limiting.
A primary object of the present invention is to provide a heated bucket system that will overcome the shortcomings of the prior art devices.
Another object is to provide a heated bucket system that efficiently removes accumulated frozen debris within a bucket of a tractor or dozer.
An additional object is to provide a heated bucket system that reduces the amount of time wasted by a tractor or dozer operator cleaning the bucket of a tractor or dozer.
A further object is to provide a heated bucket system that maintains the amount of earth moving capacity for a tractor or dozer.
Another object is to provide a heated bucket system that lowers the cost of production to the user because the bucket has a maximum dirt moving capacity.
A further object is to provide a heated bucket system that prevents mud and water from freezing within the interior of the bucket.
Another object is to provide a heated bucket system that prevents the accumulation of mud and dirt within a bucket even during warm weather conditions.
Other objects and advantages of the present invention will become obvious to the reader and it is intended that these obj
Neustel Michael S.
Shackelford H.
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