| US 7,591,439 B2 | ||
| Electric Condiment Grinder with Epicyclic Geartrain | ||
| Yu Wing Tang, Kowloon (Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, The) | ||
| Assigned to Samson Bright Industrial Company Limited, Kowloon (Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, The) | ||
| Filed on Sep. 04, 2007, as Appl. No. 11/849,562. | ||
| Prior Publication US 2009/0057452 A1, Mar. 05, 2009 | ||
| Int. Cl. A47J 42/06 (2006.01) | ||
| U.S. Cl. 241—169.1 | 2 Claims |

| 1. A condiment grinder comprising:
a motor having a motor shaft that rotates about a central axis;
a grinding rotor mounted to rotate about the central axis relative to a grinding stator, the rotor and stator cooperating
for grinding the condiment therebetween;
a plurality of sour gear epicyclic gearsets connected for transmitting torque from the motor shaft to the grinding rotor,
each gearset comprising planet gears meshed with a sun gear, the planet gears of each gearset support upon a planet carrier,
the gearsets stacked within a common ring gear with the sun gears coaxial, adjacent sun gears and planet carriers of adjacent
gearsets being rotationally fast for transmitting torque between the adjacent gearsets; and
a housing having a battery receiving compartment in an upper portion thereof, a condiment reservoir in a lower portion of
the housing adjacent the grinding rotor and stator, an intermediate compartment between the condiment reservoir and battery
compartment, a pair of coupling parts receiving the motor and gearbox, the coupling parts being joined to form a module in
which the motor and gearbox are in drivingly connected, at least one of the coupling parts having a jaw slidably mounted thereto
for movement between an extended position in which the jaw extends from an outer surface of the at least one coupling part
to be received in a recess in the housing for holding the module in position within the Intermediate compartment; and a retracted
position in which the jaw is retracted within the outer surface
wherein the gearsets are formed from a melt processable polymer, the adjacent sun gears and planet carriers of adjacent gearsets
being integral, the planet carriers having a disc portion with first and second opposing parallel faces extending perpendicularly
to the central axis, a plurality of axle portions protruding from the first face for supporting planet gears, with the sun
gear protruding from the second face; and
wherein the gearsets are held between an end wall and a closure at axially opposing ends of the ring gear to form a gearbox,
the end wall being formed integrally with the ring gear and the closure being fixed to the ring gear.
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