Modular Fire Pit Assembly With Nesting Storage and Airflow Openings
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional fire pits are bulky, difficult to assemble and disassemble, and occupy significant storage space, while they lack efficient airflow for combustion and a method to arrange logs in an orderly manner.
Innovation Solution
A novel fire pit design featuring a circular bottom plate with a log-supporting plate, leg members, arcuate grates, and a cylindrical shroud that allows for easy assembly and disassembly, enhances airflow, and positions logs in a pyramidal shape to improve combustion efficiency, with handles for transportation and a flange to contain ashes.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional fire pits are constructed to provide stable log support and ash containment, then combustion stability is improved, but the device becomes bulky and occupies significant storage space
Solution Approach 1:
The fire pit is divided into separate modular components: a bottom plate with ash containment flange, a log-supporting plate with pyramid-forming openings, leg members, and grates. These segments can be stored separately in a compact configuration, reducing storage volume while maintaining combustion stability when assembled.
Solution Approach 2:
The design allows components to nest within each other during storage. The log-supporting plate with its pyramid structure can contain smaller components, and the overall structure collapses into a compact form factor when disassembled, enabling space-efficient storage while preserving full functionality when assembled.
2Productivity
If conventional fire pits are designed with fixed structures for log arrangement, then combustion efficiency is improved, but the device becomes difficult to assemble and disassemble
Solution Approach 1:
The fire pit transitions from a static fixed structure to a dynamic reconfigurable structure. The leg members can be attached and detached, the log-supporting plate can be positioned at different heights, and the grates are removable. This dynamic design allows easy assembly and disassembly while maintaining efficient log arrangement through the pyramid-forming openings during combustion.
3Ease of operation
If conventional fire pits use simple circular openings for log placement, then ease of use is improved, but airflow optimization and log arrangement capability are reduced
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of uniform circular openings, the log-supporting plate features strategically positioned arcuate openings arranged to form a pyramid structure. This local variation in opening geometry and arrangement optimizes airflow patterns to feed combustion efficiently while guiding logs into an orderly pyramidal configuration, enhancing both combustion efficiency and ease of log placement.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The design enables efficient combustion by improving airflow and log arrangement, is easy to assemble and disassemble, and occupies minimal storage space, resulting in improved combustion efficiency and convenience.
Implementation Method 1
Each of the arcuate openings is provided to enhance airflow into the combustion area
Implementation Method 2
The pyramidal shape enhances oxygen flow into the areas where combustion occurs
Implementation Method 3
A fire pit provides a safe way to burn logs or other combustible materials
Data Source
AI summary
A fire pit includes a circular bottom plate and a circular, centrally-apertured log-supporting plate. A plurality of legs secured about the periphery of the log-supporting plate maintain the bottom and log-supporting plates in vertically spaced, parallel relation to one another. Each leg has a hollow uppermost end. A plurality of arcuate grates is mounted about the periphery of the log-supporting plate and a vertically-oriented post is secured to each of the grates, mid-length thereof. Each of the posts has a lowermost end slideably received within the hollow uppermost end of its associated leg to releasably connect each grate to the log-supporting plate. Arcuate openings positioned radially outwardly of the central opening enhance the flow of oxygen into the areas where combustion occurs. The log-supporting plate is inverted and the grates are stacked atop it when the fire pit is in its storage configuration.