Abstract:
A Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer, disposable or reusable, consisting in a drinking straw to sip beverages with its intake end provided with conveniently shaped radial vanes each provided with a hole at alternate positions which, when immersed into a beverage in any suitable container, impart a whirling effect to said beverage when the user conveniently twirls the drinking straw with his/her hands or fingers, thereby mixing or improving the homogenization and blend of the beverage, being this feature particularly useful with beverages made with ice cream and milk or soda, or flavored powder with milk or other liquids, or even cocktails with ice, and, in addition, it may be provided with appealing advertising attachments and this utensil may be offered to consumers as option to mix beverages by themselves, saving time and energy, particularly in Fast Food Services.

Description:
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
       [0001]    (Not Applicable) 
       STATEMENT REGARDING FED. SPONSORED R &amp; D 
       [0002]    (Not Applicable) 
       REFERENCE TO SEQUENCE LISTING 
       [0003]    (Not Applicable) 
       BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0004]    This invention relates to drinking straws and particularly to variations of drinking straws with modifications or attachments intended for combined functions additional to their main purpose of sipping beverages which, in this case, consists in that the drinking straw is modified to perform also as a mixer, driven by the user&#39;s hands or fingers, to improve the quality and flavor of beverage mixtures, such as cocktails and/or milk or water with flavored granules and/or dense syrups and/or ice cream, and/or to accelerate the cooling of beverages with ice, very easily, by means of the same device used to sip the beverage from the container. 
         [0005]    The author had the opportunity to sip a dense ice cream shake using a reusable glass drinking straw with a spoon-like end and found the combination very practical and useful thereof, based on that experience, conceived the idea to provide an end of drinking straws with attached or integrated elements to perform as mixers, so that the user, twirling manually in a proper way the drinking straw so modified, is able to mix or improve the mixing of beverages composed by two or more substances, as well as accelerate the cooling of a beverage mixed with ice very easily and with little effort, thereafter using it like any common drinking straw to sip the beverage, instead of using complex and more expensive electro-mechanical appliances, 
         [0006]    After a thorough search, the author found that since long time ago, many patents have been issued to variations and improvements to drinking straws, mainly related to modifications to use drinking straws as spoons, stirrers and mixers, showing, teaching and claiming very similar shapes, uses and performance, with little differences among them. 
         [0007]    Those patents that the author considers relevant are listed in the References Cited above and are briefly discussed below, but no prior art drinking straw patent found has the same features of the object of this invention. 
         [0008]    The nearest prior art to the object of the present invention, is the Swirling and Mixing Sipping Straw, U.S. Pat. No. 2,613,107 filed by P. L. Hartnett on Sep. 14, 1950, which teaches a sipping straw with an end modified provided with radially extended flat stirring blades to cause the mixing of beverages driven by the user&#39;s hands or fingers. 
         [0009]    But in Hartnett&#39;s invention, on one hand, the blades are solid, so they are not provided with openings as the object of the present invention, being said openings an important feature to improve the mixing effect, and on the other hand, the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer teaches further improvements, not taught by Hartnett&#39;s invention, such as an offset crank-like modification of a portion of the drinking straw or a knob-like attachment conveniently configured to provide a better leverage for the user to twirl the device mixing beverages relatively dense such as ice cream with milk shakes. 
         [0010]    U.S. Pat. No. 2,979,267, Drinking Tube, filed on Jun. 18, 1958 by Frederik W. Miller, teaches a drinking straw provided with fin-shaped elements evenly spaced to be used as stirrer driven by the user&#39;s hands or fingers. Those elements have the form of spoon shells and are provided with grooves, but not with openings as is the case in the object of the present invention. 
         [0011]    U.S. Pat. No. 3,315,405, Drinking Straw Attachment, filed on Sep. 23, 1964 by A. L. Hoffer is another prior art patent closely related to the same field, consisting in an attachment provided with radial blades to use a sipping straw as mixer. 
         [0012]    Although Hoffer&#39;s invention is likely to provide an effective mixing effect, the attachment comprises helical blades distributed in two concentric sets, being the inner set of helical blades allocated inside the lower widened section of the attachment therefore interfering with the flow of the beverage being sipped, and, in addition, its configuration is rather complex and the helical blades are not quite effective when manually driven, particularly with dense beverage mixtures. 
         [0013]    U.S. Pat. No. 6,056,206, Combination Straw, Stirrer and Citrus Fruit Squeezer, filed on Dec. 7, 1998 by Whiton, is particularly intended to squeeze citrus fruits and mix the extracted juice manually moving the modified drinking straw, combining axial and tilting relatively vigorous movements, being the shapes and uses taught in said invention patent very different to the object of the present modified drinking straw, which is not intended to squeeze fruits and wherein the manual motion imparted is mostly rotational and relatively gentle. 
         [0014]    Prior art U.S. Pat. No. 6,561,434 B2, Straw for Sipping Liquid, issued on May 12 th , 2003 to Barry Kaplan, refers to a drinking straw with its immersed end modified to cause a whirling effect in the liquid being sipped by means of the fluid flow through ramified ducts or by means of a thin plate normal to the axis of the straw provided with openings and/or protuberances, so that it rather works with axial movements and does not cause a mechanical rotating mixing effect in the beverage, as does the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer object of the present invention, which is conveniently driven by the user&#39;s hand or fingers, particularly advantageous when the beverages to mix and sip are dense, in a way resembling the effective mixing provided by electro-mechanical mixers. 
         [0015]    Furthermore, neither the above mentioned inventions, nor any other prior art found in this field, provide convenient modifications or attachments to the drinking straw to increase the mixing driving action of the user&#39;s hands or fingers as does the Combined Drinking Straw with mixer object of the present invention, which has been successfully tested by the author. 
         [0016]    Although this Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer can be in all or in part reusable, it comprises very low cost components that can be produced by means of well known large scale manufacturing processes using available low cost materials, to supply it as a new attractive disposable utensil within the fast food services and particularly useful where dense ice cream milk shakes are served. 
       BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
       [0017]    It is the purpose of the present invention, to provide drinking straws users with an additional useful feature, consisting in the modification of an end of a drinking straw in such a way that when it is immersed into a beverage comprising two or more different substances, the user can twirl it manually with very little effort in a convenient way, to mix or improve the mixing or blend of the beverage with no need of electrical or complex devices and thereafter use it as a common drinking straw to sip the beverage. 
         [0018]    The modified end of the drinking straw can be an attachment securely fixed, or an integral part of the straw, conveniently shaped to form mixing blades. 
         [0019]    This Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer, can be disposable or made of suitable materials to make it washable/reusable. 
         [0020]    Furthermore, this Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer can be used in conjunction with a common or a special lid, disposable or reusable, to fit on top of disposable or reusable glasses, inserting the straw through a center hole in the lid, in order to prevent any mixture spillage during the mixing operation. 
         [0021]    This Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer can be manufactured with any suitable material or combinations of materials, in a great variety of shapes and colors, thus providing the device with attractive appearance and making it appropriate for diverse kind of beverage mixtures. 
         [0022]    In addition, this Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer, can be provided with an integrated or with a separate element to increase the driving torque applied by the user&#39;s hands or fingers, and at the same time, said element may be used to exhibit commercial logos or decorative figures. 
         [0023]    The extensive use of this Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer, as an additional important advantage, will provide the Fast Food Services Business with the possibility to offer the consumers the option to mix manually by themselves, in a very efficient way, beverages such as those comprising ice cream and milk or soda, adding fun to the consumption of said beverages, with significant labor time and energy costs savings. 
         [0024]    These features and advantages, and some others, will become evident to those skilled in the art through the drawings and their descriptions illustrating the present invention. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0025]      FIG. 1  shows a simple embodiment of the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer object of the present invention with a modified and provided with two opposite blades. 
           [0026]      FIG. 2  shows a section elevation view of a glass with a lid through which is inserted a Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer like that previously shown in  FIG. 1 , while it is being rotated by the user&#39;s hand. 
           [0027]      FIG. 3  shows an alternate embodiment of the invention in which a portion of the combined drinking straw is offset to form a sort of little crank, while the modified mixer end is provided with four radial blades. 
           [0028]      FIG. 4  shows a section view of a glass with a lid and an alternate embodiment of the invention with a two radial blades mixer attachment at its intake end and a second special attachment properly shaped fixed to the upper portion of the drinking straw to facilitate the action of rotating or twirling the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer by the user&#39;s hands or fingers. 
           [0029]      FIG. 5  is an exploded view that shows the embodiment of the invention previously shown in  FIG. 4  with all its components apart. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
       [0030]    The Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer object of the present invention comprises two basic elements but can be provided with diverse supplementary components. 
         [0031]    The two basic elements are: a drinking straw and a set of attached or integrated mixing elements at the intake end of the drinking straw that is immersed into the beverage to mix and sip. 
         [0032]    One supplementary component can be a commercially available or a specially configured lid with an orifice to insert through the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer, in order to prevent spillage of the beverage from the container, usually a commercially available disposable glass, during the mixing performance. 
         [0033]    Another supplementary component can be a specially shaped attachment fixed to the upper portion of the drinking straw, to facilitate the action of the user&#39;s fingers to the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer when it is used to mix the beverage. 
         [0034]    This Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer can be in all or in part, disposable like most common drinking straws commercially available, or made of any suitable washable and reusable material. 
         [0035]    This Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer is used like any drinking straw to sip a beverage from a container, but in addition, can be twirled by the user&#39;s hands or fingers, with very little effort and with no need of electrical or complex devices, to mix beverages composed of two or more different substances or to accelerate the cooling of a beverage with ice. 
         [0036]    All components of the present invention, in all their possible variations, can be produced using ordinary manufacturing processes that allow high rates of production, are highly efficient and reliable, and are well known in the field of supplies for the fast food services in general and beverage consumption in particular. 
         [0037]    In the consecutive drawings, the same or equivalent components or parts of components are designated with the same reference character of three digits, wherein from left to right the third digit identifies the function of the part and the first indicates the figure where it was first shown with the same configuration, since there are many different possible shapes for a same component or part of component. 
         [0038]    Most main features of the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer are explained below in the detailed description of the illustrative drawings, however, the embodiments of the components of the present invention may be much more diversified than those shown in the following figures. 
         [0039]      FIG. 1  shows an elevation view slightly tilted of a simple embodiment of the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer object of the present invention which comprises an upper part  101  consisting like common drinking straw, in an elongated cylindrical tube, and its lower or intake end to be immersed into the beverage to sip has two opposite radial flat blades or vanes  102 , with rectangular shape, each provided with a hole  103  located at different alternate positions. 
         [0040]    The vanes  102  are conveniently shaped and dimensioned to freely enter and rotate inside common beverages containers such as disposable glasses. 
         [0041]      FIG. 2  shows an axial section view of the same embodiment of the Combined Drinking Straw with mixer previously shown in  FIG. 1 , introduced inside a glass  204 , through the central hole of a lid  205  fitted on top of the glass  204 , while the user&#39;s hand  200  holds the upper portion  101  of the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer to twirl it clock and counterclockwise as indicated by the double arrow head dashed line M 1 , so that the vanes  102  with the holes  103  immersed in the beverage contained in the glass and comprising two or more substances, impart a whirling motion to the beverage, providing a very effective mixing of the beverage, particularly because the holes  103  located at different positions on the blades  102 , force the fluid to abrupt changes in the direction of the flow. 
         [0042]      FIG. 3  shows an elevation view of the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer, whose upper portion, near its top end  301  is bent in an offset crank-like shape  301   a , to make easier to the user the mixing action in dense beverages, such as, but not limited to, ice cream with milk or soda, increasing the torque applied with little effort by the user&#39;s fingers to mix the beverage, by means of the lower or intake end immersed in the beverage and provided in this case with four radial flat vanes  102  protruding outwardly around it, in radial planes evenly spaced at angles of 90 degrees, aligned with the geometrical axis of the drinking straw, and each vane, in turn, is provided with holes  103  located at alternate positions. 
         [0043]      FIG. 4  shows an axial section elevation view of an alternate embodiment of the present invention, inserted into a glass  204 , through the central hole of a special lid  405  properly fitted to the upper rim of the glass. 
         [0044]    This alternate embodiment comprises a common drinking straw  101 , to whose lower or intake end is properly fitted a mixer attachment  402 , with several radial vanes  102 , although only two opposite radial blades are shown in this figure, each provided with the holes  103  at alternate positions. 
         [0045]    In this figure, is shown a knob-like attachment  406 , which is affixed to the upper and sipping end of the straw  401  above the lid  405 , being said knob-like attachment  406  shaped like a disc concave downward to reduce undesirable spillage of the beverage during the mixing action and with its top provided with tiny levers to increase the little effort applied by the user&#39;s fingers to mix dense beverages, such as, but not limited to, ice cream with milk shakes. 
         [0046]    The knob-like attachment  406 , as shown in  FIG. 4 , can be also provided with a prominent surface  407  to exhibit advertisement images. 
         [0047]      FIG. 5  shows an exploded elevation view in axial section of the components of the embodiment of the invention previously shown in  FIG. 4 . 
         [0048]    Below at left on  FIG. 5  is shown a glass  204 , and at right is shown a common drinking straw  401 , to which are to be attached the special components shown further in this same figure. 
         [0049]    Near the upper left corner of this figure is shown the knob-like attachment  406 ; below it is shown the special lid  405 , and at the lower left corner is shown an axial section view of the mixer attachment  402  inside the glass  204 . 
         [0050]    The knob-like attachment  406  consists in a hollow central hub  406   a  with its outer upper cylindrical portion provided with several radial tiny flat blades or levers  406   b , for the user to drive the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer, twirling it rapidly with his/her fingers. 
         [0051]    The lower end of the knob-like attachment  406  is surrounded by a thin disc  406   c  with its lower surface concave, to prevent beverage spillage during the manual mixing performance. 
         [0052]    The hole in the central hollow hub  406   a  of the knob-like attachment, must be properly shaped and dimensioned with an inner diameter substantially equal to the outer diameter of the drinking straws currently used, so that either the user him-herself, or an attendant, may easily slide said knob-like attachment to reach the desired position with appropriate fit onto the drinking straw after having inserted it through the central hole in the lid  405 . 
         [0053]    The special lid  405  must be conveniently shaped and dimensioned to fit properly onto the upper rim of beverage containers, such as reusable glasses or disposable glasses frequently used in fast food services. 
         [0054]    In addition, said special lid  405  has a hollow central hub  405   a , which must have an inner diameter slightly bigger than the outer diameter of the drinking straw to facilitate the insertion of the drinking straw through it, and with the purpose to provide an improved bearing for the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer while it is twirled by the user. 
         [0055]    The mixer attachment  402 , has a central hollow hub  402   a , from which protrude outwardly a plurality of radial vanes  102 , two shown in this case, in radial planes evenly spaced around the central hollow hub  402   a , being said vanes aligned with the central hub geometrical axis and accordingly aligned with the geometrical axis of the drinking straw to whose intake end the mixer is attached. 
         [0056]    Each radial vane  102  is provided with a hole  103 , located at alternate positions in adjacent radial blades. 
         [0057]    The radial vanes  102  must be conveniently shaped and dimensioned to enter and move freely inside the container of the beverage. 
         [0058]    The diameter of the inner hole of the central hollow hub  402   a  must be substantially equal to the outer diameter of the drinking straw, in order to provide an appropriate tight fit onto its lower intake end. 
         [0059]    The components of the Combined Drinking Straw with Mixer can be manufactured using low cost non-toxic materials and well known large scale manufacturing processes, in such a way that some or all of them can be either disposable or reusable. 
         [0060]    The above description with reference to the figures is considered to be illustrative and not restrictive. The true scope and spirit of the invention resides in the appended claims and their legal equivalents, rather than in the given examples. Modifications and variations on the embodiments described, or known to those skilled in the art, may be made within the scope of the invention.