Compact Control Station Layout With Side Emergency Stop
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing control stations for electrical systems, such as elevators and hoists, have significant thickness issues that limit their installation in confined spaces and lack configurability, with mushroom emergency buttons contributing to increased dimensions and requiring additional space protection against accidental activation.
Innovation Solution
A control station with a protection box featuring a side-mounted mushroom emergency button and removable contact units, allowing for reduced transverse dimensions and enhanced configurability, where the mushroom button is housed on a side face and operated along a longitudinal direction, and contact units are movable to adapt to various circuits.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If the mushroom emergency button is arranged on the front face with other controls, then all controls are accessible from one side, but the transverse dimensions of the control station increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent relocates the mushroom emergency button from the front face to a lateral face of the control station, utilizing a different spatial dimension. This allows the button to be accessible from the side while keeping the front face compact, effectively resolving the contradiction between accessibility and transverse dimensions by distributing controls across multiple faces of the box.
2Reliability
If the control station is designed with adequate protection against accidental activation, then safety is improved, but the device complexity increases due to protective covers
Solution Approach 1:
The protective cover is designed as a separate, removable component that can be detached to access the controls. This segmentation allows the cover to provide protection when closed while being easy to remove when needed, reducing the overall complexity compared to integrated locking mechanisms or complex protective structures.
3Ease of manufacture
If the contact units are fixed in position, then the manufacturing process is simplified, but the adaptability to different circuit configurations is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The contact units are designed to be movable and repositionable within the control station rather than fixed in predetermined locations. This dynamic arrangement allows installers to configure the contact units according to different circuit requirements while maintaining a standardized base structure, balancing manufacturing simplicity with operational versatility.
Data Source
AI summary
A control station for electrical installation comprises a protection box (2) having a side wall (3) with a front face (4) defining a development plane (π), a plurality of controls (5, 9, 20) anchored to the protection box (2), at least one of the controls being a mushroom emergency push button (9), movable electrical contacts associated with respective controls (5, 9, 20) to be connected to one or more circuits of the electrical installation for the opening/closing thereof. Each control (5, 9, 20) is associated with one or more contact units (22) having movable electrical contacts arranged in the protection box (2). The emergency push button (9) is housed in a seat (8) formed on a side face (7) of the side wall (3) perpendicular to the development plane (π) and is anchored to one or more contact units (22) removably housed in the protection box (2).