Abstract:
An extrusion head where continuous formation of crushed ice is formed by radially extending cutters which notch the ice rods as the rods move from the channels formed by externally protruding bosses. The extrusion head breaks ice into uniformly shaped pieces. The extrusion head has no moving parts and is easily retrofitted onto existing screw-type continuous crushed ice making machines.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     1. Field of the Invention 
     The present invention relates to a modified extrusion head for use in a crushed ice machine. It includes a plurality of radially outward protruding wide and narrow bosses that extend longitudinally along the exterior of the extrusion head forming channels. The wide bosses extend axially from the top of the extrusion head to a distance just below the bottom of the head. The narrow bosses also extend axially along the exterior of the extrusion head from the top of the head but to a distance just above the bottom of the head. A plurality of cutters extend radially outward from the top of the extrusion head and are aligned near the center of the channels formed by the bosses. The cutters form a wedge which notch the rods of ice allowing them to break horizontally into smaller pieces of clean crushed ice cubes. 
     2. Prior Art 
     Crushed ice is a highly desired commodity especially in the restaurant and convenient store businesses. Large volumes of ice are used daily by both of these industries as well as others. As a result, many different designs have been developed for crushed ice making machines capable of forming crushed ice rapidly and continuously. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 4,429,551, issued on Feb. 7, 1984 to Hizume discloses an extrusion head for an auger type icemaker whose bosses extend downward over the topmost portion of the auger. The design is intended to prevent choking of crushed ice that is pushed up over the top of the extrusion head. It contemplates the use of standard methods for breaking the ice down into smaller pieces. It does not contemplate using outwardly protruding cutters to notch to ice rods allowing them to break horizontally into clean crushed ice cubes. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 4,467,622, issued on Aug. 28, 1984 to Takahashi et al. discloses an extrusion head specifically designed to form shaved ice. The channels of the extrusion head formed by its bosses each contain a small slit or channel that allows air to escape from the ice. This prevents excessive cooling of the ice and forms harder shaved ice particles. This patent also contemplates the use of a standard method of breaking the ice bars into shaved ice chips. It does not suggest that radially extending cutters protruding near the top of the extrusion head to aid the breaking of the ice bars into crushed ice. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 4,741,173, issued on May 3, 1988 to Neumann discloses an extrusion head having modified fins or bosses designed to prevent the ice column from rotating within the extrusion apparatus. As with the above two patents, it contemplates the use of an angled surface to impinge upon emerging ice bars to break up the ice. While the angled surface shown in this patent is intended to rotate, the mechanism operates in the same manner. It does not suggest the modifications made in the present invention. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 5,109,679 issued on May 5, 1992 to Hida discloses an auger type ice making machine having multiple blades above the extrusion head for breaking the ice rods into shaved ice pieces. The blades are adjustable so that the size of the shaved ice pieces may be readily adjusted. As with other ice breaking devices, the blades rotate at the same speed as the auger and the size of the ice pieces is adjusted by adjusting the distance between the blades. It does not suggest that modifying the extrusion head with protruding cutting wedges to notch the ice rods as an alternative method of breaking the ice rods. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 5,197,300 issued on Mar. 30, 1993 to Sakamoto et al. discloses an auger type ice making machine. The device disclosed in this patent has an extrusion head that bobs, or oscillates, in an up and down motion. It is intended to convey some of the load applied to the extrusion head by the auger to a cam device located above the extrusion head. As with much of the prior art, it contemplates only the use of an annular flange to break the ice rods into smaller pieces of ice. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 5,460,014 issued on Oct. 24, 1995 to Wang discloses an auger type ice making machine that has a unique auger-within-an-auger design. As with the other above referenced patents, this patent only contemplates the use of an annular flange to break apart the ice rods. The novelty of this patent lies in increasing the efficiency of heat transfer from the water to the FREON coolant. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 5,911,749 issued on Jun. 15, 1999 to Sugie discloses an auger-type ice maker. The patent discloses a specially designed boss for the formation of ice forming channels about the extrusion head. The lower end of the boss is curved in such a way as to prevent over compression of the ice. This reduces the back load on the auger, thereby increasing efficiency of the machine. It does not disclose any novel methods of breaking the ice rods or ice bars into smaller pieces of ice. 
     U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/743,659 filed on Dec. 22, 2003 by Brooks discloses a modified extrusion head for use in a crushed ice machine, which includes modified bosses that break rods of ice into smaller pieces of a pre-determined size. Large and small bosses are shaped differently so as to break ice rods up into chunks. The larger bosses flange outward at the top of the extrusion head while the smaller bosses do not extend to the top of the head. This application does not disclose the presence of protruding cutters located at the top of the extrusion head and aligned in the center of the channels formed by the bosses which notch the ice rods. 
     The extrusion head shown in the above patents all divide a tubular sheet of ice into a series of ice rods that are then broken up into smaller pieces of ice by various devices above the extrusion head. Some of these devices are complicated and require multiple moving parts. Other devices are stationary but do not break the ice rods into uniform pieces of crushed ice. Relatively long pieces of the ice rods may remain in tact. This results in an inferior crushed ice product. 
     It is therefore desirable to provide means of continuously producing crushed ice having a minimum number of moving parts. 
     It is also desirable to provide a method of continuously producing crushed ice in which the crushed ice pieces are uniform in size. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention provides a modified crushed ice extrusion head for a screw-type crushed ice machine. Existing ice machines may be easily retrofitted with the improved extrusion head. The extrusion head is cylindrical and has a series of externally protruding longitudinal bosses. The bosses alternate between wide bosses and narrow bosses. The wide bosses extend axially from the top of the extrusion head to a distance just below the bottom of the head. The narrower bosses do not extend the entire length of the extrusion head cylinder. A plurality of radially extending cutters in the shape of a wedge are located above the channels of the extrusion head. The cutters are aligned in the center of the channels formed by the bosses. The cutters notch the rods of ice as they pass through the channels allowing the rods to break horizontally into pieces of a uniform size. 
     It is also possible for the bosses to all be of equal size so long as the cutters have the proper configuration. The channels through which the ice rods are pushed have a bottom created by a cylindrical body of the extrusion head. Two walls are created by the bosses on either side of the channels. Located on the top of the extrusion head and being an equidistant between the walls forming the channels are outwardly protruding cutters or wedges. These cutters create a notch in the ice rods as the rods are pushed out of the channels of the extrusion head. After the ice is notched, it breaks horizontally to create clean crushed ice cubes. The resulting ice pieces have a width equivalent to approximately one-half the channel and a depth equivalent to the depth of the channel which is equivalent to the distance the bosses protrude from the cylindrical body of the extrusion head. The length of the ice pieces is dependent upon the width of the top of the cutter. 
     It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a crushed ice extrusion head that does not have any moving parts and separates ice rods into uniformly shaped pieces of crushed ice. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         FIG. 1  shows a perspective view of the preferred embodiment of the present invention. 
         FIG. 2  shows a side view of the preferred embodiment of the present invention. 
         FIG. 3  shows a top plan view of the embodiment of  FIG. 1 . 
         FIG. 4  shows a bottom plan view of the embodiment of  FIG. 1 . 
         FIG. 5  shows an environmental view of the embodiment of  FIG. 1 . 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS 
     The embodiments discussed herein are merely illustrative of specific manners in which to make and use the invention and are not to be interpreted as limiting the scope of the instant invention. 
     While the invention has been described with a certain degree of particularity, it is to be noted that many modifications may be made in the details of the invention&#39;s construction and the arrangement of its components without departing from the spirit and scope of this disclosure. It is understood that the invention is not limited to the embodiments set forth herein for purposes of exemplification. 
     The extrusion head of the present invention is very similar to those of the prior art. Some of the significant differences lie in the combination of the bosses, cutters and channels through which ice is forced by the auger below the extrusion head. The cutters of the present invention notch the ice rods a they are push from the channels causing them to automatically break up. While the prior art produces crushed or flake ice of various sizes, the present invention efficiently breaks the ice rods into uniformly shaped pieces that are the same size. No moving parts are required to accomplish this. In addition, the preferred embodiment creates only a minimal and insubstantial amount of back pressure. 
     In one embodiment alternating wide and narrow bosses protrude from the cylindrical body of the extrusion head. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that this is a common design among crushed and flaked ice extrusion heads. The larger bosses extend the entire length of the cylinder while the smaller bosses extend up to the top of the cylinder but begin with a pointed edge slightly above the bottom of the cylinder. The walls of the bosses form channels through which the ice rods are formed. After the ice rods pass through the extrusion head channels, they are notched by a cutter in the form of a wedge located atop the extruder head. After the ice is forced through the channels and then notched, it automatically breaks along the notched groove forming ice pieces of a predetermined size. 
       FIG. 1  shows a preferred embodiment of the present invention. Extrusion head  10  is comprised of a cylinder  14  that has a bottom  15  and a top  17 . Running longitudinally along the cylinder are wide bosses  12  and narrow bosses  16 . These form channels  18  and  19  through which rods of ice pass. Channels  18  and  19  are mirror images of one another. The ends  24  of narrow bosses  16  do not extend to the bottom of the cylinder  17 . Positioned above the center of channels  18  and  19 , cutters  13  protrude radially outward. In this embodiment, cutters  13  are in the form of wedges. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that cutters  13  can be a variety of shapes and forms. Wide bosses  12  also have attachment hole  20  into which a bolt is inserted to hold the extrusion head in place in the crushed ice making machine. Cutters  13  groove the rods of ice after the rods are passed through channels  18  and  19  allowing it to break horizontally at its natural breaking point. In this embodiment, a single rod of ice will be split in half to form two small cubes of ice. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the length of the resulting cubes of ice can be altered by changing the width of the top of the cutters  13 . The embodiment of the present invention prevents any significant back pressure on ice rods as they move through channels  18  and  19 . Those skilled in the art will also appreciate that it makes no difference whether it is wide or narrow bosses that make up the various sides of the channels. For example, it is equally effective to have the wide bosses shortened so that they do not extend to the top end of the cylindrical body of the extrusion head while the narrow bosses extend all the way to the top of the extrusion head. 
       FIG. 2  shows a side view of extrusion head  10 . Cutters  13  are located atop channels  18  and  19  and are positioned between wide bosses  12  and narrow bosses  16 . Ends  24  of narrow bosses  16  can also be seen to not extend to the bottom  15  of cylinder  14 . The distance  25  between cutters  13  and the walls of channels  18  and  19  determines the width of the crushed or flaked ice pieces. 
       FIGS. 3 and 4  show a top down and bottom up view of the extrusion head respectively. In this particular embodiment, there are four wide bosses  12  and four narrow bosses  16  that alternate around the exterior cylinder  14 . This results in eight channels  18  and  19 . Cutters  13  are positioned near the center of channels  18  and  19  and are located at the top of the extrusion head. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that more or less channels may be formed by changing the number of bosses. With the design of this embodiment, any number of channels may be formed so long as narrow bosses  16  and wide bosses  12  alternate. Those skilled in the art will also appreciate that cutters  13  may be located in a variety of the positions over the channels, depending upon the desired size of the crushed or flaked ice pieces. 
       FIG. 5  shows the extrusion head of the present invention in use in a crushed or flaked ice making machine. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that this is a typical screw or auger-type ice making machine. Extrusion head  10  rests above and on top of auger  32 . Sleeve  28  fits snugly around extrusion head  10  and auger  32 . Water is fed into ice making chamber  33 . Sleeve  28  is surrounded by a cooling device (not shown). Auger  32  turns, and as ice is formed within chamber  33 , thread  34  pushes it upward into the channels of the extrusion head. The ice forms ice rods  36 . As the top of ice rods  40  pass through channels  18  and  19 , they come into contact with the cutters  13  located atop of the extruder head causing ice rods  40  to be notched or grooved allowing them break up into crushed or flaked ice pieces  38 . Ice pieces  38  are approximately half as wide as the channels  18  and  19 . No substantial back pressure is created by this design. Furthermore, extended rods of ice do not escape from the extrusion head, and in the present embodiment, the ice rods are all divided up into crushed ice of a uniform size. The size of the crushed or flaked ice pieces can be altered by changing the distance between cutters  13  and the walls of wide bosses  12  and narrow bosses  16  of the extrusion head  17  or by changing the width of the top of the cutters  13 . As will be understood by those skilled in the art, the extrusion head of the present invention may readily be inserted into existing crushed ice machines. Such retrofitted machines will have fewer parts that must be maintained, cleaned and replaced. 
     Whereas, the present invention has been described in relation to the drawings attached hereto, it should be understood that other and further modifications, apart from those shown or suggested herein, may be made within the spirit and scope of this invention.