Child Resistant Container Inverting Cap Bottom Lift Mechanism
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing child-resistant container technologies do not effectively prevent children from accessing potentially harmful spray products with top-positioned spray actuators, as they can still activate the sprayer by inverting or manipulating the container.
Innovation Solution
A child-resistant container design featuring a container main body with a top-positioned actuator flange and a cap with downwardly projecting lift rods that can be inverted and aligned with lift rod slots on the container bottom, allowing the cap to push up the spray actuator for activation, ensuring the spray actuator is inaccessible to children until the cap is properly aligned and activated by an adult.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a conventional container with top-positioned spray actuator is used, then the spray product is easily accessible and can be activated by children, but the container lacks child-resistant protection
Solution Approach 1:
The spray container is nested within an outer container body that has a restricted opening. The outer container acts as a protective shell, allowing the inner spray container to be stored safely while preventing children from accessing the spray actuator. The lift rod mechanism is nested within the cap structure, enabling automatic activation when the cap is removed.
Solution Approach 2:
The lift rod serves as an intermediary mechanism between the cap and the spray actuator. When the cap is removed, the lift rod automatically pushes the spray actuator upward through the restricted opening, allowing adult activation without direct manual manipulation of the actuator by children. This intermediary mechanism decouples the cap removal action from direct actuator control.
2Reliability
If the spray actuator is made inaccessible to prevent child activation, then child safety is improved, but adult activation becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The cap is designed with integrated lift rods that automatically perform the actuator activation action when the cap is removed. The preliminary positioning of the lift rods within the cap structure ensures that upon cap removal, the actuator is automatically pushed upward without requiring additional manual manipulation, thereby maintaining ease of operation for adults.
Solution Approach 2:
The system uses the cap removal action itself to trigger the spray actuator activation. The lift rods are positioned such that the natural motion of removing the cap automatically pushes the actuator upward, making the activation process self-service and eliminating the need for separate manual actuation steps by adults.
3Reliability
If the container opening is made small to prevent child access, then child-resistant protection is improved, but the spray actuator cannot be activated
Solution Approach 1:
The solution moves the activation mechanism from a horizontal access dimension to a vertical dimension. The restricted opening prevents horizontal insertion of fingers to manually press the actuator, but the lift rods extend vertically through the opening to push the actuator upward from below, enabling activation through a different dimensional approach that is inaccessible to children.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of pushing the actuator down from the top (conventional approach), the lift rods push the actuator up from below through the restricted opening. This inverted activation mechanism allows the spray to be dispensed through a small opening that would otherwise prevent manual actuation, maintaining child-resistant protection while enabling adult activation.
Data Source
AI summary
A child resistant container with inverting cap bottom lift features has a container main body adapted to receive a sprayer container with a vertical spray nozzle top-positioned spray actuator, and has at least one lift rod slot on its bottom; an inner cap for permanent connection to the open top of the container after a spray container is placed therein; and an outer cap with at least one downwardly projecting lift rod. The inner cap has a spray actuator orifice large enough to permit a vertical nozzle of a spray container to pass therethrough and small enough to prevent a spray container spray actuator from passing therethrough. A user removes the outer cap, inverts it and pushes up through the bottom to raise up the spray container nozzle and to push on the spray actuator to dispense.