Fishing – trapping – and vermin destroying – Vermin destroying – Fumigators
Reexamination Certificate
2001-10-01
2002-11-26
Price, Thomas (Department: 3643)
Fishing, trapping, and vermin destroying
Vermin destroying
Fumigators
Reexamination Certificate
active
06484438
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a pest control device and a volatile substance holder for use in same. Particularly, the present invention relates to a pest control device of a non-heating type, which volatilizes into the air a pest control component, such as a pesticidal component or a pest repellent component, which are volatile at ordinary temperature, and a volatile substance holder for use in same.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
A pest control device, which has been developed recently to replace a pest control device of a heating type, uses a fan to air a holder, such as paper, in which absorbed is a pest control agent whose active component is a pesticidal component or a pest repellent component that are volatile at ordinary temperature, thereby volatilizing the active component into the air so as to control the pest (Japanese Un-Examined Patent Publication, Tokukaihei, No. 7-236399: published on Sep. 12, 1995).
Moreover, Japanese Un-Examined Patent Publication, Tokukaihei, No. 5-68459 (published on Mar. 23, 1993) discloses a pest control device, which volatilizes an active component into the air by using driving means to rotate a holder itself, which has absorbed a pest control agent.
Those pest control devices need no heating means for volatilizing the pest control agent, unlike the pest control device of the heating type, thereby having low energy consumption. For this reason, a fan of the pest control devices can be driven by using a dry battery and the like, without using a commercial power supply. Therefore, the pest control devices have excellent compatibility, while the pest control devices are excellently safe, because the pest control devices themselves and their surroundings are prevented from being heated, thereby eliminating possibilities of burning and fire.
However, when the pest control agent is absorbed in the holder in this way, a user has no way to check how much an active component of the pest control agent remains, because the active component of the volatile pest control agent, which is volatilized from the holder, is invisible. Therefore, the user cannot determine when the holder runs out of the active component of the pest control agent and has no efficacy anymore (hereinafter, the loss of the efficacy due to the running out of the active component is referred to as an end of the efficacy). Thus, the user should refer to a serviceable time that is roughly estimated. However, depending on how frequently the holder is used, or how the user judges, the user may judge that the holder is finished even the holder can be still used efficaciously, or the user may decide to continue to use the holder even after the end of the efficacy has come.
Therefore, there is a need to develop means that surely determines reduction or an end point (the end of efficacy) of the active component of the pest control agent.
A well-known conventional methods of determination of the end point is, for example, a method in which the amount of the active component of the pest control agent is adjusted in accordance with a service life of a dry battery so that an end of the service life of the dry battery indicates an end of the active component absorbed in paper, thereby informing a user a time to exchange the paper.
However, the method in which the end of the efficacy is indicated by the end of the service life of the dry batter has such problems that the end of the efficacy and the end of the service life of the dry battery often do not synchronize with each other, because the active component of the pest control agent is not reduced always in a synchronizing manner with the usage of the dry battery. Further, the end of the service life of the dry battery also merely indicates in approximation how long the holder can be used, because there is no way to see the reduction of the active component of the pest control agent. Therefore, the user may be informed of the end of the efficacy by the end of the service life of the dry battery long after the active component has run out, and the holder has lost its efficacy.
To overcome the problems, suggested is a method in which the reduction or the end point of the active component of the pest control agent to be volatilized can be checked by looking at how much the active component is left. For example, Japanese Un-Examined Patent Publication, Tokukaihei, No. 8-147 (published on Jan. 9, 1996) discloses a method in which an pest control agent or a holder of it is colored, so that a time to exchange the holder is indicated by disappearance of the color.
However, while the method of in which a pest control agent or a holder of it is colored allows a user to see and judge the color, the color is not color of the active component itself, but the color of a pigment added. The color disappears with a lapse of time, for example, due to a chemical change, and a period of time for the color to disappear is merely adjusted to the period of time for the active component of the pest control agent to vanish. In other words, there is no physical interrelationship between the volatilization of the active component of the pest control agent and the change of the color of the pigment. Because of this, in the above method, it is impossible to have a good synchronization between the running out of the active component (the end of the efficacy) of the pest control agent and the disappearance of the color of the holder, while it is hard to adjust timing of the color disappearance subtly to attain the good synchronization, thus posing a problem that it is hard to control the end point.
Moreover, every user differently judges the end point from the color disappearance, while the color may change with speckles, or may not disappear completely, thereby making it difficult to judge the end point from the color change. For those reason, while some users may judge it is time to exchange the holder, the others may not judge so and continue to use the holder. To conclude, none of the methods can provide the users with means to surely determine the end point.
Conventionally, as a pest control device that can surely check the reduction and the end point (the end of the efficacy) of the active component of the pest control agent, well known is a pest control device that uses a bottle to contain a pest control solution, in which a pest control agent is dissolved in a solvent, so that the pest control solution is sucked up and heated in order to volatilize the solvent together with the active component. An example of such pest control device is a pest control device using a liquid mosquito-repellent. This type of the pest control device allows a user to check by sight how much the pest control solution is left.
However, the method of the above pest control device needs heating of the pest control solution. Thus, when a pest control agent, which is volatile at ordinary temperature, is dissolved in a solvent and contained in a bottle so that the pest control solution is sucked up from the bottle and volatilized by wind, for example, use of a solvent having low boiling point, such as ethanol, is impractical because the pest control solution evaporates to disappearance too fast and has a very short service time. On the contrary, use of a solvent having a high boiling point retards the volatilization of the pest control agent, thereby deteriorating efficiency of the pest control.
Furthermore, when the pest control agent is dissolved in the solvent so as to be contained in a bottle and used in the pest control device of the ordinary-temperature volatilization type, as above, the amount of the pest control agent to be volatilized is decreased as a result of the dissolution of the pest control agent in the solvent, thereby limiting efficacy of the pest control agent.
Therefore, there is no pest control device of the non-heating type which allows a user to easily control the end point and to surely check the reduction or the end point (end of efficacy) of the active component of the pest control agent, while using a pest control agent that can volatilize at
Iwasaki Tomonori
Matsunaga Tadahiro
Nixon & Vanderhye P.C.
Presta Frank P.
Price Thomas
Sumitomo Chemical Company Limited
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