Onion Skin Cutting and Lifting Tool to Prevent Peeling Jams
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing onion peeling devices often jam with slit skins, making it difficult to complete the peeling process and clean the device, and their complex structures complicate the removal of onion skin.
Innovation Solution
A kitchen tool with a skin contacting side and a cutting and spreading element, along with a lifting member, that cuts and lifts the onion skin in a way that allows for easy removal of the outermost layer and hard skin in one motion, preventing jamming and simplifying cleanup.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If conventional onion peeling devices with multiple arms and knives are used, then the peeling function is achieved, but the device structure becomes complex and the slit skins jam at the bottom making cleanup difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The device is segmented into distinct functional zones: a cutting zone with a single knife at the top, and a peeling zone with a stripper at the bottom. This segmentation allows each component to perform its specific function efficiently, with the stripper positioned to catch and remove skins immediately after cutting, preventing jamming in a single collection area.
Solution Approach 2:
The stripper is positioned at the bottom of the rest, extending downward, while the knife is at the top. This vertical dimensionality arrangement allows the skin removal action to occur at a different spatial location than the cutting action, enabling skins to be caught and removed in a separate zone, thus preventing accumulation and jamming at the bottom.
2Productivity
If conventional onion peeling devices are used, then the peeling process can be initiated, but slit skins jam during the peeling process making it difficult to complete
Solution Approach 1:
The stripper is pre-positioned at the bottom of the rest before the peeling process begins. This preliminary positioning ensures that as soon as the knife slits the skin and the onion is depressed, the pre-placed stripper is already in position to catch and remove the skin, preventing it from falling and jamming during the process.
Solution Approach 2:
The stripper acts as an intermediary element between the cutting action and the skin removal. It mediates the process by catching the slit skins and lifting them away from the onion, preventing direct contact between the skins and the rest surface that would cause jamming, thus ensuring continuous operation.
3Ease of operation
If multiple arms with cutting and peeling means are used, then comprehensive peeling is achieved, but the device becomes complex and difficult to clean
Solution Approach 1:
The complex multi-arm structure is extracted and replaced with a simplified design featuring only two essential components: a single knife at the top for cutting and a single stripper at the bottom for peeling. This extraction of unnecessary components reduces the device to its core functional elements, making it much easier to clean and maintain while still achieving effective onion peeling.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of having multiple arms radiating outward from a central point (conventional design), the invention inverts the structure by having a single vertical rest with components positioned at opposite ends - the knife at the top and the stripper at the bottom. This inverted arrangement simplifies the structure to a single linear element that is trivial to remove and clean.
Data Source
AI summary
Provided is an apparatus which simplifies the removal of an onion skin comprising a skin contacting side (1), a cutting and spreading element (2), and a lifting member (31, 32). After the cutting tip (22) of the cutting and spreading element (2) cuts into the outermost onion layer(s) at a top end of the onion and slides downwards along an outer contour of the onion towards a bottom end of the onion to create a cut along the contour of the onion, the lower lifting edge (312, 322) of the lifting member (31, 32) slots behind an inner edge of the cut outermost onion layer(s) and the lifting member (31, 32) lifts up portions of the onion layer(s) in contact therewith as it slides downwards until it passes through the bottom end of the onion, thereby allowing a user to split apart the lifted portions along the cut to remove the outermost onion layer(s) together with outer hard skin of the entire onion in one go.