US-12623896-B2 - Electric jar opener

US12623896B2US 12623896 B2US12623896 B2US 12623896B2US-12623896-B2

Abstract

The present invention discloses an electric jar opener comprising a housing; a first clamping jaw group; a second clamping jaw group; a movement mechanism. The first clamping jaw group comprises two oppositely-disposed mutually facing first clamping jaws for clamping a can body, the second clamping jaw group comprises two oppositely-disposed mutually facing second clamping jaws for clamping and screwing a lid; the movement mechanism comprises a motor and a differential with two outputs; a first output of the differential is in transmission connection to the first clamping jaws and a second output thereof is in transmission connection to the second clamping jaws. By use of the differential, the first output of the differential is in transmission connection to the first clamping jaws and the second output thereof is in transmission connection to the second clamping jaws, so that the whole machine operates in a balanced and stable manner.

Inventors

Renjian Wei
Lihua ZHOU

Assignees

Ningbo Lobone Household Items Co., Ltd.

Dates

Publication Date: 20260512
Application Date: 20240311
Priority Date: 20240109

Claims (10)

1 . An electric jar opener, comprising: a housing; a first clamping jaw group extending from the housing; a second clamping jaw group extending from the housing; a movement mechanism disposed inside the housing; wherein, the first clamping jaw group comprises two oppositely-disposed mutually facing first clamping jaws for clamping a jar body, and the second clamping jaw group comprises two oppositely-disposed mutually facing second clamping jaws for clamping and screwing a lid; the movement mechanism comprises a motor and a differential with two outputs driven by the motor, the movement mechanism is capable of driving the first clamping jaws and the second clamping jaws to move; a first output of the differential is in transmission connection to the first clamping jaws and a second output thereof is in transmission connection to the second clamping jaws; the differential comprises one or more planetary gears, a transmission shaft, a rotatable shell, an intermediate gear, a first driven gear and a second driven gear; an annular gear is connected to the rotatable shell, and a driving gear attached to the motor is connected to the annular gear; wherein the rotatable shell is driven by the motor to rotate about an axis of the transmission shaft; each planetary gear is disposed inside the shell, when the shell is driven by the motor each planetary gear is capable of rotating about the axis of the transmission shaft and is also capable of rotating relative to the shell, the transmission shaft rotates together with the shell; each planetary gear engages with the intermediate gear, the first driven gear rotates together with the intermediate gear, the second driven gear rotates together with the transmission shaft; the first driven gear defined as the first output end of the differential is in transmission connection to the first clamping jaws, and the second driven gear defined as the second output of the differential is in transmission connection to the second clamping jaws.
2 . The electric jar opener of claim 1 , wherein the differential further comprises a support frame disposed inside the shell, the support frame comprises a main rod and one or more branch rods connecting to the main rod; the transmission shaft passes through the main rod and rotates together with the main rod, each branch rod extends and inclines upward from a periphery of the main rod away from the main rod, each planetary gear is rotatably arranged on one branch rod; a first transmission gear formed at an inner surface of the shell engages with the planetary gear; the differential further comprises a second transmission gear defined as the intermediate gear and is integrally connected to the first driven gear.
3 . The electric jar opener of claim 1 , wherein the differential further comprises two side gears which are arranged around the axis of the transmission shaft, the planetary gear is rotatably supported inside the shell, and the planetary gear engages with the two side gears; one of the two side gears rotates together with the transmission shaft, while the other of the two side gears is defined as the intermediate gear.
4 . The electric jar opener of claim 1 , wherein each first clamping jaw comprises a first rack portion engaging with the first driven gear, each second clamping jaw comprises a second rack portion engaging with the second driven gear.
5 . The electric jar opener of claim 4 , wherein each first clamping jaw further comprises bent portions arranged at ends of the first rack portions away from the first driven gear and first clamping portions arranged at ends of the corresponding bent portion away from the corresponding first rack portion; each second clamping jaw is arranged below each first rack portion and located between the bent portions, each second clamping jaw further comprises a second clamping portion arranged at an end of the corresponding second rack portion, and each first clamping portion is located below each second clamping portion.
6 . The electric jar opener of claim 1 , wherein the housing comprises an upper housing, a lower housing and a rotating housing arranged below the lower housing and used for clamping the lid, the second clamping jaws protrude from a bottom of the rotating housing, and the movement mechanism jar drive the rotating housing to rotate relative to the lower housing.
7 . The electric jar opener of claim 6 , wherein the rotating housing comprises a bottom plate and a rotating device arranged on an upper surface of the bottom plate, the second clamping jaws protrude from a bottom of the bottom plate, and the bottom plate has a partial bottom surface protruded upward for receiving the second driven gear.
8 . The electric jar opener of claim 7 , wherein the rotating device comprises a first circular ring, the first circular ring comprises a first semicircle and a second semicircle which are combined to form the whole first circular ring, and a diameter of the first semicircle is smaller than that of the second semicircle; the housing further comprises a base arranged between the lower housing and the rotating housing, and the base is firmly connected to the lower housing and rotatably connected to the rotating housing; a driven cam resisted against a circumferential wall of the first circular ring and a steering switch for controlling the forward or backward rotation of the motor are also arranged on the base, the driven cam is disengaged from the steering switch when the driven cam engages with the first semicircle, and the driven cam resists against the steering switch when the driven cam engages with the second semicircle.
9 . The electric jar opener of claim 7 , wherein the rotating device further comprises a second circular ring, two cam grooves recessed radially inward on a circumferential wall of the second circular ring, and the two cam grooves are circumferentially symmetrical; the housing further comprises a base arranged between the lower housing and the rotating housing, and the base is firmly connected to the lower housing and rotatably connected to the rotating housing; a cam extension portion is also arranged on the base, and the cam extension portion is urged into one of the cam grooves by a corresponding elastic element.
10 . The electric jar opener of claim 1 , wherein the annular gear has a key portion, the rotatable shell has a groove portion, and the key portion of the annular gear slots into the groove portion of the rotatable shell to affix the annular gear to the rotatable shell.

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a field of small household tools, and in particular to an electric jar opener. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION In recent years, for the convenience of life, some cooked products are packaged in jar bodies after processing in many countries and areas, and lids are then screwed on the jar bodies through threads. Such canned products are convenient to carry and quick to eat on a trip. However, for food packaging, the food in the jar body is usually sealed by vacuum. When it is necessary to open the jar body, in order to overcome a friction and vacuum pressure between the lid and the jar body, it is often impossible to directly unscrew the lid by a hand, and additional tools are needed to destroy the vacuum inside the jar body before opening, so that it is difficult to open the jar body. For this purpose, jar openers, as a kind of household tools for opening jars, have been invented. Jar openers are generally classified into hand-operated jar openers and electric jar openers, wherein the electric jar openers are easy to operate and can automatically open jars by pressing the START button manually. The existing electric jar opener, as disclosed in a Chinese Patent CN201343432Y (patent No.: 200820003894.X), comprises: a housing; two oppositely-disposed mutually facing jar engaging and clamping elements extending downward from the housing; two oppositely-disposed mutually facing lid engaging and clamping elements extending downward from the housing to be adjacent to the jar engaging and clamping elements; and, a motor which is arranged in the housing and connected to the jar engaging and clamping elements and the lid engaging and clamping elements in a gear transmission manner so that the lid engaging and clamping elements move relative to the jar engaging and clamping elements. While in the above structure, the transmission among the motor, the main clamping jaw and the lid clamping jaw is realized by a series of gears. When a resistance of the main clamping jaw and the resistance of the lid clamping jaw are different, the driving forces of the respective driving gears are correlated. Thus, interference and slippage may occur between the gears, thereby easily damaging the gears and affecting the normal operation. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide an electric jar opener which can operate in a balanced and stable manner. For achieving the above object, the electric jar opener comprises a housing; a first clamping jaw group extending from the housing; a second clamping jaw group extending from the housing; a movement mechanism disposed inside the housing; wherein, the first clamping jaw group comprises two oppositely-disposed mutually facing first clamping jaws for clamping a jar body, and the second clamping jaw group comprises two oppositely-disposed mutually facing second clamping jaws for clamping and screwing a lid; the movement mechanism comprises a motor and a differential with two outputs driven by the motor, the movement mechanism is capable of driving the first clamping jaws and the second clamping jaws to move; a first output of the differential is in transmission connection to the first clamping jaws and a second output thereof is in transmission connection to the second clamping jaws. Specifically, the differential has the following structure: the differential comprises one or more planetary gears, a transmission shaft, a rotatable shell which is driven by the motor to rotate about an axis of the transmission shaft, an intermediate gear, a first driven gear and a second driven gear; each planetary gear is disposed inside the shell, when driven by the shell each planetary gear is capable of rotating about the axis of the transmission shaft and is also capable of rotating relative to the shell, the transmission shaft rotates together with the shell; each planetary gear engages with the intermediate gear, the first driven gear rotates together with the intermediate gear, the second driven gear rotates together with the transmission shaft; the first driven gear defined as the first output end of the differential is in transmission connection to the first clamping jaws, and the second driven gear defined as the second output of the differential is in transmission connection to the second clamping jaws. The first output of the differential is in transmission connection to the first clamping jaws and the second output thereof is in transmission connection to the second clamping jaws by use of the differential. Even if the resistance suffered by the first clamping jaws and the resistance suffered by the second clamping jaws are different, different output rotation speeds can be adjusted by the differential, so that the whole machine operates in a balanced and stable manner. To realize the movement of the planetary gears, according to one aspect of the present invention, the differential further comprises a s