GB890558A - Improvements in water spray steam irons - Google Patents

Abstract

890,558. Steam irons. GENERAL ELECTRIC CO. June 18, 1958 [June 19, 1957], No. 19489/58. Class 138 (2). A steam iron has a water sprayer device and a steam generating chamber 10 which is electrically-heated and a valve assembly 21, 26 providing a flow of water from a reservoir 14 into the chamber to be flashed into steam for discharge through a nozzle 38 of a tube 37, water being discharged through a tube 41 into the steam flow and atomized thereby. The valve assembly includes a valve member 26 manually adjustable to have positions in which water flows (1) only into the chamber 10, (2) into the chamber 10 and the tube 41 or (3) does not flow from the reservoir 14, so that the appliance may be (1) a steam iron, (2) a spray iron or (3) a dry iron, by means of a button 32 engaging a shoulder 35 on the handle 3 to obtain steam, the member 26 being normally closed by the action of a spring 31 on the valve stem 27. A pressurebalancing tube 40 leads from the chamber or cavity 10 into the top of the reservoir 14 to maintain both under the same pressure. The valve assembly includes a valve body 21 having (1) a throughway for water formed of a passageway 24 and corrugations 29 on its interior walls and an orifice 23 and (2) a passage therefrom to the tube 41, the outlet of which, like the nozzle 38, is located in an opening 39 in the soleplate 1, the temperature of which is controlled by a link 6 manually operable to be rotated by a member 8 movable over a temperature scale 9. The reservoir 14 is filled from a tube 16 with a funnel 17 having a valve seat member 42 sealingly engaged by a check valve, e.g. a ball 43. A modification comprises a liquid pump chamber, a one-way valve providing liquid flow from the reservoir into it, and from it a second one-way valve communicating with the steam cavity, having a discharge passage terminating in a nozzle, water supply into the steam-flow path being as before. In this construction the fill funnel need not be closed, the pressure-equalizing tube is absent, and the spring on the valve stem is outside and above the fill tube. The reservoir can be located at any point, even externally of the iron body, if desired.