Sheet-Metal Drip Coffee Cone With See-Through Support Ring
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing manual drip coffee cone designs are not compatible with sheet metals like stainless steel, requiring costly molten fabrication and lacking a clear view of the coffee level, which leads to inefficient water usage and potential health concerns associated with plastic materials.
Innovation Solution
A design where the drip ring is integrated with the conical body base, and a ring collar is constructed as a minimal, flat frame with a minimal number of support arms to maximize visibility and reduce material usage, allowing for easy fabrication and use with sheet metals, while eliminating unnecessary features like ribbing and optimizing drip plate height.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If molded designs with multiple protruding elements are used, then fabrication is easy with glass, ceramic, or plastic, but fabrication becomes cost-prohibitive with sheet metals
Solution Approach 1:
The drip ring is merged with the conical body base to form a single integrated component. This eliminates the need for separate fabrication and attachment of the drip ring, reducing manufacturing steps and costs while maintaining functionality. The integrated design allows the base to serve dual purposes: structural support and drip guidance.
Solution Approach 2:
The conical body base is designed to serve multiple functions: it provides structural support for the cone, acts as the drip ring to guide liquid flow, and forms the mounting surface for the ring collar. This multi-functionality reduces the number of separate components needed, simplifying fabrication from sheet materials.
2Ease of operation
If a traditional ring collar with sufficient surface area is used, then structural support is adequate, but view beneath the cone is obstructed
Solution Approach 1:
The ring collar is segmented into a minimal frame structure with discrete support arms rather than a continuous solid ring. This segmentation reduces the surface area that obstructs the view beneath the cone while maintaining structural support through strategically positioned arms. The frame structure allows light to pass through, enabling users to monitor coffee brewing.
Solution Approach 2:
The ring collar employs local quality by concentrating structural support only where needed through minimal support arms, rather than providing uniform support around the entire circumference. This allows maximum transparency in areas where view is needed while maintaining adequate support at critical points.
3Device complexity
If separate drip ring and conical body are used, then functionality is optimized, but fabrication complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The drip ring functionality is merged into the conical body base, creating a single integrated component that performs both structural and drip guidance functions. This reduces the number of parts from two (separate drip ring and conical body) to one, simplifying fabrication from sheet metal while maintaining the necessary functionality through clever design of the integrated base.
4Object-affected harmful factors
If plastic materials are used, then cost is low and fabrication is easy, but health concerns arise from potential toxin leaching
Solution Approach 1:
The material parameter is changed from plastic to metal (such as stainless steel), fundamentally altering the chemical properties to eliminate concerns about toxin leaching into hot beverages. This material substitution maintains safety while the design adaptations (integrated base, minimal ring collar) ensure the metal version remains cost-effective and manufacturable.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for fabricating a manual drip coffee cone from sheet material is comprised of three general steps: In the first step, a conical body 1 is formed from sheet material in the shape of a truncated cone to hold a coffee filter. The base of the conical body 1 forms a drip ring 2, which directs dripping coffee into a receiving vessel and prevents the cone from slipping off the vessel. In the second step, a drip plate 3, having at least one drip hole 4, is fixed to the inside of the conical body 1, near the drip ring 2, to form a drip plate 3 at a short height above the drip ring 2 to provide maximum headspace for effective drip filtration. In the third step, a flat ring collar frame 5 having minimal support components is attached to the outside of the conical body 1 near the same height as the drip plate 3 in order to support the cone to sit on top of a receiving vessel to allow a user to see through to the receiving vessel beneath the cone so that the user can view the rising level of coffee inside the vessel below.