Rolled Product Bushing Geometry for Dispenser Compatibility Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing rolled product dispensers face issues with damage and maintenance costs due to the installation of incompatible rolls, highlighting a need for improved captivity systems that ensure compatibility between rolled products and dispensers.
Innovation Solution
A bushing with a cylindrical body and end wall, featuring a central pin-receiving hole and a curved rib, is press-fitted into the rolled product's core, and a support member with a pin and platform design that allows the bushing to rotate, ensuring compatibility and preventing the use of incompatible products.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If a simple bushing design is used, then manufacturing cost is reduced, but compatibility control and damage prevention are insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The bushing incorporates an asymmetric curved rib that projects from the end wall and encircles the pin-receiving hole. This asymmetric feature creates a geometric key that must match a corresponding asymmetric recess in the dispenser support member, ensuring compatibility control while maintaining a relatively simple manufacturing process for the overall bushing structure.
Solution Approach 2:
The bushing design adds a localized curved rib feature to an otherwise simple cylindrical structure. This local modification provides the necessary compatibility control through the curved rib's specific geometry, while the majority of the bushing remains a simple press-fit component, balancing manufacturing simplicity with functional requirements.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If a captivity system with curved rib is implemented, then dispenser damage is reduced, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The curved rib creates an asymmetric engagement geometry that prevents incompatible rolls from being installed. The rib's curvature and positioning ensure that only rolls with matching asymmetric features can be properly installed, thereby preventing dispenser damage while adding minimal structural complexity to the bushing.
Solution Approach 2:
The curved rib modifies the geometric parameters of the bushing's end wall, creating a specific engagement profile that must match the dispenser's recess. This parameter change provides effective captivity and damage prevention while maintaining a relatively simple overall bushing design with only one additional geometric feature.
3Productivity
If press-fit installation is used, then assembly speed is improved, but manufacturing precision requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The bushing is designed with a press-fit configuration that allows for preliminary positioning and alignment before final installation. The curved rib and pin-receiving hole geometry provide guiding features that facilitate proper alignment during assembly, reducing the precision requirements for the press-fit operation itself while maintaining assembly speed.
Data Source
AI summary
A bushing for a rolled product having roll of web material defining a hollow center portion. The bushing includes a cylindrical body sized to be press-fitted into an extremity of the hollow center portion of the roll of web material; and an end wall fixed to the cylindrical body for closing at least partially its extremity and having a central pin-receiving hole extending therethrough and a curved rib projecting outwardly and encircling partially the pin-receiving hole. It also concerns a rolled product dispenser, including: a pair of support members for supporting a rolled product inbetween. At least one of the support members includes a rolled product connector comprising a base wall, an outer wall structure and a platform, each one protruding from the base wall and being spaced-apart from one another to define a recess inbetween, and a pin protruding from the platform. The pin is engageable in a pin-receiving hole of a bushing of the rolled product and to allow the rolled product to rotate once the bushing is engaged with the pin.