Nestable Pill-administering Drinking Vessel

Abstract

Nestable pill-administering vessels and nests thereof. Each vessel has an interior pill support, and the vessel wall is dished in beneath the support to allow nesting.

Description

The invention relates to nestable, pill-administering cups or other drinking vessels and to a nest of such drinking vessels.

My U.S. Pat. No. 2,919,694 relates to a drinking vessel with an open-work support for a pill. After a pill has been placed on the support and a drink--usually water--has been placed in the vessel, when the vessel is raised to one's mouth and tipped for drinking, the drink washes the pill into the mouth with it.

This invention relates to nestable drinking vessels designed for the same purpose. The vessel may be molded of plastic, or it may be glass or porcelain, etc. Ordinarily, there is no handle on it. A paper vessel with handles foldable against the vessel might be used.

One side of the bottom portion of the vessel is dished in to make the vessel nestable with other identical vessels, the dished portion permitting two or more of the vessels to be nested. Aside from the dished-in portion, the vessel is usually the shape of a tumbler. To be nestable, the wall at the top is of a larger radius than at the bottom.

The dished-in portion of the vessel usually extends from the bottom up, but it is conceivable that it may start above the bottom. This would not usually be practical for two vessels that are nestable when in the upright position. It is conceivable that two vessels could be nested by providing a dished-in portion somewhat larger than the support and nesting two vessels by tipping one or both of them. For example, the vessels may not be very tall, and by tipping the upper of two vessels so that its dished-in portion is above the support, and then bringing the upper vessel to the upright position while enclosing the sides and bottom of the support of the lower vessel within the dished-in portion of the upper vessel, the two may be nested. This would not be practical for cups, for instance, which are to be nested in large quantities.

The invention is further described in connection with the accompanying drawing, in which -

FIG. 1 is a plan view of a cup, and

FIG. 2 is an elevation of a nest of two of the cups, the lower being a section.

The cross sections of each cup are circular and increase in diameter from the bottom to the top, except that the bottom portion of the wall of cup 1 is dished-in at 2. The wall portion 2 is flat or otherwise shaped to accommodate the openwork support of a like cup when the two are vertically nested. The nest may comprise as many as 10 or 20 or more identical cups or other vessels.

Any sort of open-work support may be used which supports the pill and allows the drink to wash it from the support when the drink is drunk. The support shown comprises a plurality of separate fins 5 which project from the wall of the cup in parallel spaced relation with spaces 6 between them for the liquid being drunk to flow through. The fins extend upward at their inner edges to prevent the pill from rolling over the edge of the support when the vessel is placed upright. The support may be provided with sides to make it generally cup-shaped and this might be desirable for large spherical pills, but usually the fins are spaced sufficiently to hold a spherical pill against lateral roll. However, a cup-shaped support may be desirable when several pills are to be taken at one time.

The vessels shown in the drawings are molded of plastic. The wall 2, under the support, is flat and slants outward. This allows a core to be withdrawn from the cup after molding, and this makes the cup of a very attractive design. Also it decreases the volume content of the cup a minimum amount. If the fronts of the fins are flat or curved, the wall 2 beneath them is advantageously flat or curved, but this is not necessary. The wall 2 need not extend from the bottom of the cup to the bottom of the support in a flat plane, but it may be any shape. The cup may be molded with an attractive design printed into it or embossed on it. It need not be shaped as a tumbler, but may be of any design suitable for a drinking vessel, with the open-work support located within it at any desirable location, but preferably above the bottom half of the cup.

FIG. 2 shows two of the cups nested together. The wall 2 of the upper vessel, under the fins, is in a plane with the front of the fins. The front of the fins need not extend in a straight line from the wall on one side of the vessel to the wall on the other side, but if it does the vessel nests more readily than if the cup must be turned so that the wall 2 embraces the front of a support which does not extend from the wall on one side of it to the wall on the other side.

Claims

I claim:

1. In an open-ended pill administering drinking vessel of plastic, glass or porcelain with an open-work support having passages therethrough, which support projects inwardly from one side of the vessel for the support of a pill, cross-sections throughout the height of the vessel increasing toward the open end thereof, the improvement which comprises the wall directly under the support of the vessel being dished in to fit over the support of an identical vessel when nested below it, so that a plurality of said identical vessels are nestable.

2. The vessel of claim 1 in which the support is located above the bottom half of the vessel.

3. The vessel of claim 1 in which the wall directly under the support is substantially flat.

4. A nest of interengaged identical drinking vessels defined in claim 1.

5. A nest of interengaged identical drinking vessels defined in claim 2.

6. A nest of identical drinking vessels defined in claim 3.

7. The vessel of claim 1 in which only the wall directly under the support is dished in.

8. In an open-ended pill-administering drinking vessel which comprises an open-work support having passages therethrough, a support projecting inwardly from only one side of the vessel for the support of a pill, cross-sections of the vessel increasing toward the open end of the vessel, the improvement in which a portion of the wall which is the width of said support is dished in from substantially the level of the bottom of said support to substantially the end of the vessel opposite said open end so as to fit over the support of an identical vessel when nested below it, so that a plurality of said identical vessels are nestable.

9. A nest of interenaged identical drinking vessels defined in claim 8.