Sliding Gate Sealing with Automatic Drop Seal Activation
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Solution Overview
Problem
There is a lack of effective sealing solutions for sliding doors with integrated pivoting wing doors, particularly for fire protection or smoke protection doors with escape doors, where existing solutions do not provide comprehensive sealing across the entire width of the sliding gate.
Innovation Solution
A sliding gate system with multiple pivoting wing doors, each equipped with an automatically mechanically activated lowering seal that activates subsequent seals, ensuring seamless activation and comprehensive sealing without additional bridging means, using spring-loaded actuating rods for efficient operation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If multiple pivoting wing doors are integrated in a sliding gate, then the gate can provide comprehensive sealing across its entire width, but the complexity of the sealing system increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The sealing system is divided into multiple independent lowering seals, each responsible for sealing a specific wing door. Each lowering seal operates autonomously with its own actuating rod and sealing element, allowing individual activation and control. This segmentation enables comprehensive sealing across the entire sliding gate width while maintaining manageable complexity through modular design.
2Reliability
If each wing door has its own automatically activated lowering seal, then comprehensive sealing is achieved, but the number of moving parts and potential failure points increases
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple lowering seals are merged into a single integrated system where the seals are arranged adjacent to one another along the sliding gate. The seals share common structural elements and can be actuated in sequence through the pivoting motion of wing doors. This merging reduces overall system complexity while maintaining comprehensive sealing coverage across all wing doors.
3Ease of operation
If the lowering seal is automatically activated by the door closure, then operational reliability is improved, but the mechanism requires additional triggering components
Solution Approach 1:
The lowering seal system is designed to activate automatically through the self-service mechanism of wing door closure. When a pivoting wing door is closed, its motion directly triggers the corresponding lowering seal to activate without requiring external control systems or additional triggering components. The door's own closing action serves as the activation mechanism, simplifying the overall system while ensuring reliable automatic operation.
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 system provides comprehensive sealing across the entire sliding gate, ensuring effective fire and smoke protection by automatically raising and lowering seals as the doors open and close, maintaining a threshold-free design and enhancing operational reliability.
Implementation Method 1
Proven lowering mechanisms that are triggered on one side are described, for example, in EP 0 509 961 and CH 688 741. These lowering mechanisms use one or more leaf springs arranged one behind the other.
Data Source
AI summary
A sliding gate has a sliding base leaf (10) and at least one pivoting hinged door (13, 14) arranged in the base leaf (10). The hinged door (13, 14) has an automatically mechanically activated drop seal (30, 31, 33) for sealing the hinged door (13, 14) against a floor or ceiling. The drop seal (31, 33) is automatically raised when the hinged door (13, 14) is opened and automatically lowered when the hinged door (13, 14) is closed. In the sliding gate, but outside the hinged door (13, 14), there is another automatically mechanically activated drop seal (30, 31, 32, 33, 34), wherein a second of these two drop seals (31, 32, 33, 34) can be activated by a first of these two drop seals (30, 31, 32, 33). This allows for flexible design of sliding gates, especially with multiple hinged doors.