ALFRED ARMSTRONG
Engineering in Norwood, MA

4765152, Aug 23, 1988

Apr 13, 1987

7/037944

Alfred Armstrong - Norwood MA

Crathco, Inc. - Canton MA

B67D 562

62389

In a compact beverage dispenser of the type in which the conditioned beverage is chilled and displayed in a plastic bowl atop a stand which houses a compression system of refrigeration, ambient air intake is fan-driven through and along the heat-exchange fins of a condenser grid which extends horizontally fully across spaces between lateral sidewalls of the stand. A single vertical-axis motor both pumps the beverage and rotates the refrigeration-system axial-flow fan in an upper region of the stand, above the horizontal condenser; a separately-motorized compressor package is disposed in the lower region of the stand, below the horizontal condenser, where it is bathed by heat-removing air flow forced downwardly by the fan in the upper region. Walls on at least two opposite sides of the stand are provided with openings allowing essentially free lateral flow of cooling air into and out of the upper and lower regions of the stand and between the condenser-grid fins; in a narrow-dispenser construction having an elongated rectangular condenser grid, fins necessarily lying beyond the periphery of the fan are actively swept by air forced laterally through the stand.

4505409, Mar 19, 1985

May 20, 1983

6/496409

Alfred Armstrong - Norwood MA

Crathco, Inc. - Canton MA

B67D 302

222509

In a beverage dispenser of the type in which conditioned liquid is to be tapped through a bottom opening of a bowl normally closed from within by a valve member, unseating of the valve member and attendant gravitational release of liquid are conveniently brought about by tilting a wider Z-shaped sheet-metal handle which is keyed with the valve member to form an interlocked valving assembly further including only a spring and a suspension provided by external bowl flanges. The valve member, which has a flattened end projecting through the bowl to key itself locked within an opening of cooperating shape in the center portion of the handle, is biased closed by the surrounding spring trapped in a compressed condition between the handle and the underside of the bowl, and the keyed interlocking with the end of the valve member holds the handle in a desired lateral fit within frontal notches of the flanges for pivotal movements allowing it to raise the valve member in its sleeving for release of beverage through a lower center opening fed by upper lateral openings. Once it is angularly keyed into place, the valve member cannot be accidentally dislodged, because small tabs struck integrally from the handle are disposed to engage and align its flattened end each time the handle is tilted either by pulling an upstanding end or pushing its other depending end. Advantageously, sealing of the valve may be tightened, against constrictions offered by solids from the liquid, for example, by forcing the handle ends in directions opposite to those which cause liquid to be dispensed.

4362028, Dec 7, 1982

Jan 14, 1981

6/224941

Alfred Armstrong - Norwood MA

Crathco, Inc. - Canton MA

B67D 562

62390

In a refrigerated beverage dispenser having a plurality of coplanar circular cooling plates closing the bottoms of an array of beverage bowls, each concentric turn of a single multi-turn sinuous coiling of evaporator tubing is bonded in intimate heat-exchange relationships with all of the cooling plates and directs flow of the refrigerant serially across and part way around each cooling plate, and back, in succession. Tubing which interconnects across the spaces between adjacent cooling plates is clustered, to promote maximum arcuate spanning of the plates by those more active portions of the tubing best disposed to provide the cooling.