EP0587713B1 - Sweeping unit - Google Patents

Abstract

PCT No. PCT/EP92/01294 Sec. 371 Date Dec. 7, 1993 Sec. 102(e) Date Dec. 7, 1993 PCT Filed Jun. 9, 1992 PCT Pub. No. WO92/01275 PCT Pub. Date Dec. 10, 1992.A sweeping unit for a sweeping machine to clean a floor area, has a driven pair of closed loop sweeping belts for engaging the floor, the driven sweeping belts including a first portion fixed in position relative to a mounting platform and a second movable portion. First rollers constrain the first portions of the driven sweeping belts relative to the mounting platform, and second guide rollers, which are movable relative to the mounting platform, constrain the second portions of the belts, respectively. The width of the floor area that is swept when the sweeping machine moves in a working direction, is variable as the second guide rollers are moved manually or automatically. The sweeping unit may be combined with a scrubber device having similar width adjustment features.

Description

The present invention relates to a sweeping unit, in particular as an additional device for a scrubber drier, with at least one driven sweeping device arranged on a guide, the guide consisting of several elements, one part of which is fixed, another part for changing the sweeping width of the sweeping unit is.

Such a sweeping unit is known from FR-2 652 100 A1. It has two sweeping devices, each of which comprises a band covered with bristles, which rotates around two rollers forming the respective guide with a vertical axis of rotation. One of the rollers is fixed, the other is pivotable. To reduce the working width, the two positionally variable rollers of the sweeping devices are aligned in the known sweeping unit with the working direction, i. H. swung forward, inward.

Another sweeping unit known from DD 269 549 has a transverse brush belt which is guided around rollers with a horizontal axis each side of a centrally positioned suction mouth. The two brush belts can be swiveled in a horizontal plane into a V position that is open to the front so that the sweeping unit can pass through narrow passages. The guide elements of the two brush belts, each related to a belt guide, are not changeable with respect to one another.

In both known sweeping units, automatic avoidance when approaching an obstacle is not possible. Rather, the V-position of the two brush belts must be adjusted accordingly before driving over an obstacle in order to avoid the outer ends of the brush belts abutting the boundaries forming the obstacle.

The known sweeping units are not provided as an additional device for a scrubber drier.

In contrast, the present invention has for its object to provide a sweeping unit, which allows mechanical sweeping with variable working width in the interior and exterior, so that its contour can be adjusted automatically.

The sweeping unit should expediently be able to be used in connection with any scrubber-drier. A particular object of the present invention is to use the sweeping unit in connection with a scrubber drier with a variable working width, which is the subject of the German patent P 41 03 087. Just like the working width of the scrubber drier, the working width of the sweeping unit should also be variable.

In this way, the cleaning of heavily contaminated and / or floors whose cleanliness is subject to increased demands should also be able to be carried out more economically. At present, such floors are cleaned in such a way that dirt lying loosely on the floor is first swept away, usually by hand, after which the floor is cleaned of stuck dirt by means of a scrubber drier. In numerous areas of application, such as cleaning floors in supermarkets and department stores, the sweeping that precedes scouring is indispensable. Otherwise, hard dirt, such as broken glass, would be picked up by the rotating scrubbing brushes and could damage the floors, or else they could cause damage to the scraper unit's scraper blades made of soft rubber; furthermore, in particular paper, for example discarded receipts, would stick to the floor moistened during the scrubbing process. The two steps (sweeping and scrubbing) that are often required when cleaning floors, which have to be carried out in succession, cause correspondingly high costs.

According to the present invention, the stated object is achieved in a generic sweeping unit in that the position-changing guide elements can be pivoted or displaced inward in relation to the fixedly arranged guide elements associated with the sweeping device in question, with the sweeping width being reduced in the direction opposite to the working direction. In the present application, “guidance” of the sweeping device is understood to mean the sum of the individual elements that serve to guide and adjust the width of the sweeping device; deflection, pressure, guide rollers, sliding surfaces, guide rails and the like are particularly suitable as guide elements. The sweeper can be hand-held or powered by various brooms the field of cleaning machines of known designs include, for example, disc brooms rotating about vertical axes or roller brooms rotating about horizontal axes or endless brush strips covered with bristles.

If endless sweeping belts are used, it is expedient that at least two endless sweeping belts (1) are provided which are arranged in an upright arrangement on the elements of the guide.

The position of the guide can be changed within the sweeping unit in a variety of ways; for example, the position-changing elements of the guide can be pivoted so that they enclose a variable angle with the working direction; furthermore, in the event that several guides provided with sweeping belts are provided, these can be moved sideways on the sweeping unit be stored; Finally, the position of the guide can be changed by the fact that it is deformable in itself, ie the position of the individual elements of the guide can be changed with respect to one another, so that the path of the revolving sweeping belt has a different shape (straight, inward / outward or forward) / curved backwards). For this purpose, the components connecting the elements of the guide can consist, for example, of a flexible material or can be made up of articulated members. The formation of the broom as a revolving sweeping belt is particularly advantageous if a guide which is deformable in itself is provided; because in this way, the position of the guide and the broom can be adapted to the desired working width in a particularly simple manner. Furthermore, the design of the broom as a sweeping belt has the particular advantage that the detected dirt - more directly than with a roller broom (sweeping roller) and plate broom - is conveyed to a narrowly limited area, namely the deflection point of the sweeping belt; the suction can thus be limited to this narrowly limited area, ie the suction mouth can be dimensioned accordingly small, which leads to a low suction air throughput and thus in turn leads to a low power requirement of the suction unit. This is particularly important in the context that the sweeping unit according to the invention is also to be operated in combination with a mains-independent scrubber drier with a correspondingly limited battery capacity.

The sweeping unit according to the invention preferably has at least two endless sweeping belts rotating in an upright arrangement on the elements of the guide, with associated guides. In this case, at least one pair of sweeping belts is preferably provided, in which the sweeping belts are rotated in opposite directions with respect to one another and convey the dirt to a suction mouth arranged between the two sweeping belts of a pair of suction devices receiving the sweepings. Accordingly, a deflection point of the two sweeping belts of the pair are adjacent to each other and arranged near the common suction mouth. It is conceivable that the pair of sweeping belts in particular are followed by two further sweeping belts in a staggered arrangement, the two front sweeping belts being fixed and the downstream sweeping belts being laterally displaceable and / or pivotable are suspended from the sweeping unit; this makes it possible to form each individual guide rigidly, that is to say in particular to build up all the elements of a guide on a common rigid support which is suspended either fixedly or in a positionally variable manner within the sweeping unit. Conversely, the guides as such can also be deformable, ie the individual elements of the guides can change their position with respect to one another. Thus, in this case, the contour of the sweeping belt rotating around the guide elements changes. In this case, the carrier connecting the guide elements to one another expediently consists of a plurality of sections which are connected to one another in an articulated manner.

In the event that several guides are provided with revolving sweeping belts, their position can preferably be changed independently of one another. This allows the working width to be changed on one side, for example when hitting a one-sided obstacle. The flexibility in choosing the optimal working width is higher than if the corresponding sweeping belt guides could only be symmetrically changed in pairs.

In a preferred embodiment of the sweeping unit, it is provided that a suction mouth is provided at each deflection point of the sweeping belts. Because not only the front section of the sweeping belt in the working direction picks up dirt, but also the rear section to a certain extent conveys dirt to the corresponding deflection point, after a 100% sweeping performance is technically not feasible through the front sweeping belt section. A scraper hook against which the bristles of the sweeping belts run is expediently provided in the area of each suction mouth. They have the effect that the dirt loosens better from the bristles and can be absorbed by the suction mouths of the suction device. The sweeping performance can be further increased in that the bristles of the sweeping belts are inclined against their direction of rotation, i.e. that the bristles point obliquely forward in the direction of rotation of the sweeping belts.

To collect coarse dirt, it can be advantageous in particular when using sweeping belts if a scraper is provided in the area of the suction mouths and / or directly along the rear of the sweeping belt. This is conveniently a usual over Bottom surface sliding band-shaped elastic bar, which is changeable in position together with the sweeping belt

A deflector bar is expediently arranged in the working direction in front of the sweeping belts, which, when encountering an obstacle, changes the position of the carrier in the sense of reducing the sweeping width. Various technical implementations are conceivable for this. For example, the deflector bar can be designed as a button which, when hitting an obstacle, actuates a switch which in turn controls an electrical, pneumatic, hydraulic or similar adjusting device for pivoting or shifting the corresponding, assigned reversing belt guide. On the other hand, the deflector bracket, particularly in the case of smaller sweeping units, can be designed so that it immediately shifts or swivels the associated sweeping belt guide if it encounters an obstacle, i.e. the corresponding guide is moved or moved as far as possible by the obstacle hitting the deflector bracket . pivoted until the obstacle can be passed through the sweeping unit.

In order to keep the swirling of dust as low as possible, the sweeping unit can have an additional fog system. The liquid to be atomized is drawn off from a storage container by means of a pump and sprayed via pressure lines which are laid along the sweeping belts and have a plurality of atomizing nozzles.

The sweeping unit according to the invention can be built on a chassis and thus forms an independent sweeper. On the other hand, there is the particularly advantageous possibility of building a scrubber-drier unit with a variable working width in accordance with German patent P 41 03 087 and a sweeper unit according to the invention on a common chassis, so that a combined sweeper and scrubber-drier machine is created. The working width of the sweeping unit and the scrubbing suction unit are coordinated with one another, ie the parts of both units that are variable in position are coupled to one another. It is also particularly expedient to design the sweeping unit according to the invention in such a way that it has fastening means for quick assembly on a scrubber drier according to German patent P 41 03 087. The fasteners to be used for the quick attachment of the sweeping unit to the scrubber drier are known as such in the prior art.

Fig. 1

eine Draufsicht auf ein erfindungsgemäßes Kehraggregat in seinem an eine Scheuersaugmaschine angebauten Zustand;

Fig. 2

einen Schnitt durch die kombinierte Kehr- und Scheuersaugmaschine gemäß Fig. 1 entlang der Linie II-II;

Fig. 3

einen Schnitt durch die kombinierte Kehr- und Scheuersaugmaschine gemäß Fig. 1 entlang der Linie III-III und

Fig. 4

in schematischer Draufsicht eine Variante der Kehrmaschine.

In the following the invention with a sweeping device in the form of a continuous endless sweeping belt is explained in more detail with reference to the drawing. It shows

Fig. 1

a plan view of a sweeping unit according to the invention in its state attached to a scrubber drier;

Fig. 2

a section through the combined sweeper and scrubber drier according to Figure 1 along the line II-II.

Fig. 3

a section through the combined sweeper and scrubber drier according to FIG. 1 along the line III-III and

Fig. 4

a schematic plan view of a variant of the sweeper.

The scrubber drier, after not being the subject of the present application, is shown with thin lines, while the sweeping unit according to the invention is shown with bold lines. The sweeping unit shown in the drawing has two endless sweeping belts 1, which have bristles 2 at their lower edges are equipped. The sweeping belts consist of a flexible, stretch-resistant band material or of articulated, chain-like elements. Each of the two sweeping belts runs between a drive roller 3 and a deflection roller 4, which define the two deflection points. For each of the two sweeping belts, a drive motor 5 is provided in a lying arrangement, which is connected to the respective drive roller 3 via an angular gear 6. Two guide rollers 7 and guide surfaces 8 are additionally provided for guiding the sweeping belt.

The suction unit comprises the suction tank 9 on which the suction motor 10 driving a suction fan (not shown) is constructed. A filter is installed on the suction tank as a separating device 11, which separates the dirt absorbed by the suction air from it and retains it in the suction tank. Three suction hoses 12, which are connected to a front, central suction mouth 13 and in each case an outer, rear suction mouth 14, open into the suction vessel 9 (in order not to hide the parts underneath, the suction hoses 12 in FIG. 1 are only by dash-dotted lines indicated). The front, central suction mouth 13 is between the two front ends of the sweeping belts, where they rotate around the drive rollers 3, arranged. The rear suction mouths 14 are arranged immediately behind the deflection points of the sweeping belts, which are defined by the deflection rollers 4. The naturally aspirated motor is powered by a power source (not shown).

1-3 is attached to a scrubber drier known from German patent P 41 03 087, the contours of which are reproduced with thin line widths and the details of which can be found in the abovementioned application. It is essential that in addition to the main brush 15, which is driven by the drive motor 16, there are additional brushes 17 which are variable in their position and which can be pivoted sideways on a respective link 18. 1, the additional brush on the left in the working direction is shown in its retracted position, the right additional brush in its extended position. For the interaction of the sweeping unit and scrubber drier in such a way that the working widths of the two units are coupled to one another, tensioning levers 19 are articulated on the links 18 of the scrubber drier, each carrying a deflection roller 4. Here are the tension levers 19 pivotable with respect to the handlebars 18 about a vertical axis. A spring 20 arranged between each link 18 and the associated tensioning lever 19 pretensions the tensioning lever to such an extent that the sweeping belt 1 has its optimal tension. A strut 21 is provided on each tensioning lever 19 and serves to hold the respective outer, rear suction mouth 14.

The drive motors 5, guide rollers 7 and guide surfaces 8 of each sweeping belt 1, as well as the suction tank 9 and the front suction mouth 13 are constructed on a common mounting plate 22 which is fastened on the cover 23 of the main brush 15 of the scrubber-suction unit. In order to illustrate the parts of the guide arranged below the mounting plate, the mounting plate in FIG. 1 is drawn broken on the right side of the sweeping unit.

The sweeping device of the sweeping unit can be driven by motor or by hand. In the case of the manual drive, a gear can be provided for this purpose, which is coupled in the usual way to the wheels of the pushed sweeping unit. In addition, a battery for the electric motor drive of the suction fan for the suction unit be provided. Instead of a suction unit, another pick-up device for the sweepings can be considered, such as a bristle-covered pick-up roller, which conveys the swept goods backwards, preferably via a ramp that ends near the floor or grazes on the floor surface, into a sweeping-goods bin connected to it. Such a variant is shown in FIG. 4.

Fig. 4 shows a top view of the front half of a sweeper whose sweeping unit does not require a suction unit. Instead, it has a sweeping roller 25 which rotates about a horizontal axis 26 which runs transversely to the longitudinal axis 27 of the sweeper. The sweeping roller 25 conveys the sweepings detected between the front ends of the two sweeping belts 1 from bottom to top via a scraper strip 29 which ends at the bottom with its end edge 28 and rises from there into a sweeping hopper 30 connected to it. Of the two sweeping belts 1, this is in the The upper drawing level is shown in the extended position, the lower one is shown in the pivoted position. While the three front guide rollers 31 with respect to the direction of travel F are fixed to the machine, the rear one is Deflection roller 32 can be pivoted in accordance with double arrow P, as a result of which the variable sweeping width of the sweeper is realized. Using the example of the sweeping belt drawn above, a scraper 33 is also drawn in with a dashed line, which moves with the pivotable rear section of the sweeping belt.

Claims (20)

1. Sweeping unit for a sweeping machine, in particular as an additional device for a scrubbing vacuum cleaner, with at least one driven sweeping device (1, 2) located on a guide (3, 4, 7), the guide consisting of several members, whereof one part is stationary, another part is arranged to have a variable position for varying the sweeping width of the sweeping unit, characterised in that with respect to the guide members (7) arranged in a stationary manner and associated with the respective sweeping device, when reducing the sweeping width, the guide members (3, 4) having a variable position can be swung or slid inwards in the direction opposing the working direction.
2. Sweeping unit according to Claim 1, characterised in that the at least one sweeping device comprises plate-shaped brooms, roller brooms and/or sweeping belts provided with bristles.
3. Sweeping unit according to Claim 2, characterised in that at least two endless sweeping belts (1) are provided travelling on edge on the components of the guides.
4. Sweeping unit according to Claim 3, characterised in that the sweeping belts (1) and the associated guides are arranged in pairs and symmetrically with respect to each other as regards the working direction.
5. Sweeping unit according to Claim 4, characterised in that the position of the guides may be varied independently of each other.
6. Sweeping unit according to Claim 4, characterised in that each guide comprises a rigid region located at the front in the working direction and a region able to tilt sideways arranged therebehind in the working direction.
7. Sweeping unit according to Claim 3, at least one suction orifice of a suction device receiving the material swept up being associated with the sweeping device, characterised in that two sweeping belts (1) are arranged symmetrically with respect to each other at the front in the working direction and are driven to rotate in opposite directions and that located between the associated front, adjacent guide points of the two sweeping belts is a common, central suction orifice (13).
8. Sweeping unit according to Claim 3, characterised in that a suction orifice (13, 14) is provided at each guide point of the sweeping belts (1).
9. Sweeping unit according to Claim 3, characterised in that provided in the region of the suction orifices (13, 14) are stripping hooks, against which the bristles (2) of the sweeping belts (1) travel.
10. Sweeping unit according to Claim 3, characterised in that the bristles of the sweeping belts are inclined obliquely forwards in opposition to their direction of rotation (A).
11. Sweeping unit according to Claim 10, characterised in that located in the working direction in front of each sweeping device is a deflector bar, which on encountering an obstacle brings about a variation of position of the guide in order to reduce the sweeping width of the sweeping unit.
12. Sweeping unit according to Claim 1, characterised in that an atomizer system with atomizer nozzles arranged in the region of the sweeping device is provided.
13. Sweeping unit according to Claim 1, characterised in that it is installed on a chassis.
14. Sweeping unit according to Claim 1, characterised in that it comprises fastening means for rapid mounting on a scrubbing vacuum cleaner.
15. Sweeping unit according to Claim 1, characterised in that it is installed on a chassis, which simultaneously supports a scrubbing vacuum unit with a variable working width, the working widths of the sweeping unit and of the scrubbing vacuum unit being connected to each other.
16. Sweeping unit according to Claim 15, characterised in that two sweeping belts (1) are provided, whereof the rear guide points are mechanically connected to respectively one scrubbing brush of variable position of the scrubbing vacuum unit.
17. Sweeping unit according to Claim 16, characterised in that the guide rollers (4) are located on bolt levers (19), which are pivoted on guide rods, which support the two scrubbing brushes of variable position of the scrubbing vacuum unit.
18. Sweeping unit according to Claim 6, characterised in that the parts of the guide arranged so that their position cannot be varied, as well as the components of the suction unit, whereof the position cannot be varied, are arranged on a common mounting plate.
19. Sweeping unit according to Claim 3, characterised in that the parts of the guide are formed respectively by guide rollers (3, 4, 7) able to rotate about vertical axes or guide surfaces (8).
20. Sweeping unit according to Claim 3, characterised in that a doctor blade (33) is provided in the region of the suction orifices (13, 14) and/or directly along the rear side of the sweeping belt (1).

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