Spring-Assisted Closure for Portable Pet Food Container
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing pet food containers are inconvenient for outdoor use due to their bulkiness, lack of water-tightness, and difficulty in converting between carrying and feeding modes, requiring separate containers for solids and liquids.
Innovation Solution
A portable pet food container with a spring-assisted closure that securely seals and easily opens for transportation and feeding, featuring a wearable mechanism and a design that converts between a pouch and a bowl, allowing for hands-free use and easy access for both food and water.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Weight of moving object
If a portable pet food container is made lightweight and compact for carrying, then portability is improved, but the container cannot securely seal to maintain food freshness and cannot function as a feeding bowl
Solution Approach 1:
The container employs a dynamic spring-assisted closure mechanism that automatically transitions between open and closed states. The spring-loaded door with latch mechanism provides secure sealing when closed to maintain food freshness, while easily opening for feeding. This dynamic system resolves the contradiction by making the sealing reliability active rather than passive, ensuring food protection during transport without adding significant weight.
2Reliability
If a separate container is used for water to ensure water-tightness, then liquid containment is improved, but the user must carry multiple containers increasing bulk and weight
Solution Approach 1:
The container is designed as a multi-functional unit that can securely hold both solid food and liquid water. The spring-assisted closure with waterproof sealing mechanism provides reliable containment for liquids while maintaining the same compact form factor. This universal design eliminates the need for separate water and food containers, reducing total volume and weight while maintaining liquid containment reliability.
3Volume of moving object
If the container top is made small to maintain compactness, then portability is improved, but the opening is too small for the animal to access food and for the user to reach in
Solution Approach 1:
The container features a dynamic opening mechanism where the spring-assisted door can be fully opened to create a large access opening. During transport, the door remains closed maintaining compactness. During feeding, the door opens wide to allow animal access and user reach, resolving the contradiction between compact size and operational accessibility through temporal separation of states.
4Ease of operation
If an open-top design is used to allow easy access during feeding, then ease of operation is improved, but the food and water are not secured during transport
Solution Approach 1:
The spring-assisted closure mechanism dynamically transitions between secured closed state during transport and open state during feeding. The automatic latch provides reliable content security when closed, while the easy-open mechanism allows quick access when needed. This dynamic system resolves the contradiction by making security contextual rather than constant.
5Stability of the object's composition
If a rigid structure is used to maintain container shape for stacking and storage, then structural stability is improved, but the container becomes bulkier and harder to wear
Solution Approach 1:
The container employs a flexible yet structurally sound design that maintains its shape when needed but can be compressed or conform to the body when worn. The flexible material provides sufficient structural stability to maintain form factor and stackability while reducing overall bulk and improving wearability, resolving the contradiction between shape stability and compactness.
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 container effectively maintains food freshness, provides convenient hands-free transport, and facilitates easy feeding and drinking for pets during outdoor activities, addressing the limitations of existing solutions by offering a single, versatile, and user-friendly solution for both solids and liquids.
Implementation Method 1
A portable pet food container is provided herein to solve the above-mentioned problems, for example, by enabling a user to store and carry pet food (solid or liquid) in the container and convert the same container to a bowl for feeding the food to an animal. In particular, a top of the portable pet food container includes a spring-assisted closure that enables the container to be securely closed to maintain the freshness of the food
Data Source
AI summary
Embodiments include a portable pet food container comprising a main body having a flexible top end, a flat bottom end, and an internal compartment extending between the top end and the bottom end for storing pet food. The top end comprises a spring-assisted fastener configured to snap open when moved to a first position and snap closed when moved to a second position. The spring-assisted fastener may include a pair of flexible bands and a pair of flex springs, each band having a first end coupled to a first one of the springs and a second end coupled to a second one of the springs, the fastener moving to the first position by pulling the two bands away from each other and moving to the second position by pressing the two bands towards each other. The container may be attached to a wearable device to facilitate portability.