Sealing Device

The present invention relates to a sealing device for lead- throughs through walls, ceilings, or floors. More specifi- cally, the present invention relates to a sealing cuff for sealing a lead-through of for example a pipe through a wall, ceiling, or floor.

During new construction, refurnishing, interior decoration, etc., of various types of rooms, such as sanitary rooms, the need commonly arises for creating a so-called lead-through through a wall, the ceiling of the room or its floor. In this context, a lead-through often refers to a hole intended to accommodate a pipe, a cable or the like, which is being led through the wall, ceiling, or floor, and where the pipe for example is arranged to carry a liquid into or out from the room.

Examples of such lead-throughs are lead-throughs of sewer pipes, comprising various types of drainage gutters, hot- and cold water pipes, pipes for circulating water, cables being part of electrical installations, and so on. However, it should be realized that such lead-throughs may be used in a great number of contexts in which pipes, cables or the like are being led into various rooms.

A commonly occurring problem, especially in applications in sanitary spaces, is that the lead-through must be tightly sealed in order to prevent liquid from leaking into the wall, ceiling, or floor. Such leakage may occur either from the liquid being led into or out from the room, or from another liquid, located inside or outside of the room.

Conventionally, this problem is solved by the help of a so- called sealing cuff. In general, such a sealing cuff comprises a disc-shaped part, arranged to lie against a part of the surface of the wall, ceiling, or floor which surrounds the lead-through, as well as a projecting part being arranged to surround the first part of the pipe or cable being led through the wall, ceiling, or floor. Generally, the discshaped part is arranged to be mounted between the surface of the wall, ceiling, or floor, and an existing surface layer, or between two existing surface layers, such as between the support and clinker in the case of a lead-through of a draining gutter in a clinker floor. This arrangement between the surface and a surface layer or between two surface layers leads in part to that the sealing cuff adheres in a satisfac- tory manner to the support, in part to it not being visible in the final assembly. Also, the sealing will be tight when the disc-shaped part is surrounded by the adhesive agent between the surface and the surface layer or between the two surface layers. The projecting part is generally arranged to be mounted pointing into the support, for reasons similar to the ones described above for the disc-shaped part. With such a conventional sealing cuff, satisfactory sealing with a long useful life is generally achieved.

However, a problem exists with this conventional sealing cuff. Namely, the projecting part is generally manufactured from a rigid material, such as rigid plastic. The various types of pipes and cables, whose lead-throughs need to be sealed, often have very different dimensions. As an example, it can be mentioned that the lead-throughs occurring in a usual sanitary room in an apartment may vary between small copper pipes with diameters of 10 mm for water, to large floor drains with diameters of 120 mm. Also, a great number

of commonly occurring pipes and cables have other diameters between these two extremes. Since a tight sealing necessitates that the projecting part fits relatively snugly about the led-through pipe or cable, there is a demand for a number of sealing cuffs with different diameters of the projecting part in an assortment of sealing cuffs for it to be useful in most applications.

Furthermore, the installer of sealing cuffs must, for each specific application in which a pipe, a cable, etc., is to be led through a wall, ceiling, or floor, always find a sealing cuff having exactly the required dimension for precisely the pipe or the cable to be led through.

The present invention solves the above described problems.

Thus, the present invention relates to a sealing device for a lead-through of a pipe or the like through a wall, ceiling or floor into or out from a room, comprising a disc-shaped part with a through hole, arranged to be permanently installed between the surface of the wall, ceiling or floor, alternatively between two surface layers of the wall, ceiling or floor, where the through hole is arranged to accommodate the pipe to be led through, and where the disc-shaped part is essentially impermeable to liquids, and is characterized in that the disc-shaped part comprises an elastic flexible sheet material arranged in the through hole and impermeable to liquids, which sheet material is tight-fittingly fastened to the disc-shaped part and covers the whole through hole except for an opening whose largest diameter is less than the smallest outer diameter of the pipe, whereby the sheet material, because of its elasticity, seals the lead-through of a pipe which runs through the opening.

Below, the invention will be described in closer detail, with reference to an exemplifying embodiment of the invention and to the enclosed drawings, in which:

Figure 1 is a general perspective view of a sealing cuff according to a preferred embodiment of the invention.

Figure 2 is a section view from the side of a sealing cuff according to a preferred embodiment of the invention.

Figure 1 as well as Figure 2 show a sealing cuff 1 according to the invention, where reference numerals are shared for both of these figures. For the sake of clarity, some of the dimensions of the sealing cuff 1 are somewhat exaggerated, why it is not depicted according to scale. Figure 1 shows the sealing cuff 1 in a perspective view, installed to seal a lead-through of a water pipe 2. Figure 2 shows the sealing cuff 1 in section, and without the water pipe 2.

The sealing cuff 1 comprises a disc-shaped part 3, which in turn consists of an upper 3a and a lower 3b layer of non- woven fabric. The non-woven fabric 3a, 3b is preferably manufactured from polypropylene fibres, but it should be realized that any material complying with the demands on rigidity, durability, chemical stability, endurance, heat resistance, cost efficiency, etc., that may occur in various applications in various types of rooms may be used, including materials not being non-woven fabric, such as various plastic fabrics.

Between the layers 3a, 3b of non-woven fabric, a piece of elastic flexible sheet material 4 is arranged. Preferably, the piece of sheet material 4 is made of rubber, preferably

so-called TPE (TermoPlastic Elastomer) rubber, but it may be manufactured from any suitable elastic material complying to the current demands on durability, chemical stability, endurance, heat resistance, cost efficiency, etc., and which at the same time is impermeable to liquids. Furthermore, the piece of sheet material 4 is arranged between the layers 3a, 3b of non-woven fabric across essentially the whole surface of these layers 3a, 3b, whereby the disc-shaped part 3 as a whole is impermeable to liquids.

The disc-shaped part 3 is intended for installation between the surface of a wall, a ceiling or a floor and a surface layer in a room, alternatively between two surface layers on a wall, a ceiling or a floor in a room. In the present em- bodiment, it is installed between the support and the tiles in a tiled wall in a sanitary room. However, for reasons of clarity the different parts of the wall and the surface layers are not shown in the drawings. By using such an assem ^¬ blage between a surface and a surface layer or between two surface layers, the binding agent between the surface and the surface layers or between the surface layers will also guarantee a liquid proof connection between the disc-shaped part 3 and the wall.

The disc-shaped part 3 comprises a centered through hole 3c in the non-woven fabric, arranged so that the pipe 2 may run therethrough. However, the through hole 3c needs not necessarily be centered in the disc-shaped part 3, but may be adjusted to be suitable for the application at hand in terms of geometrical limitations as a consequence of neighbouring walls, etc. The through hole 3c may have various sizes and forms, but needs to be dimensioned to accommodate of the pipe 2.

The elastic flexible sheet material 4 is arranged to also cover the through hole 3c, except for in an opening 4a in the sheet material 4. The opening 4a may be centered in the through hole 3c or it may be arranged eccentrically in the through hole 3c, depending on the geometrical conditions of the application at hand. Nevertheless, the largest diameter of the opening 4a is always less than the smallest outer diameter of the pipe 2.

Thus, the pipe 2 runs through the opening 4a in the elastic flexible sheet material 4. Since the opening 4a is smaller than the pipe 2, and because of the elastic action of the sheet material 4, the opening 4a will close around the enve- lope surface of the pipe 2. Thus, the elastic flexible sheet material 4 guarantees a liquid proof connection between the pipe 2 and the disc-shaped part 3. To sum up, since the part of the through hole 3c not being occupied by the pipe 2, as well as the rest of the disc-shaped part 3, are impermeable to liquid, and because the disc-shaped part 3 is water- tightly fastened in the wall according to what has been described above, the sealing cuff 1 will guarantee a liquid proof lead-through of the pipe 2 through the wall.

For example, the pipe 2 may have an outer diameter of about 15 mm. The opening 4a may have a diameter of about 10 mm. The hole 3c has a diameter of about 30 mm. Consequently, the opening 4a is stretched so that its diameter becomes equally large as the outer diameter of the pipe 2, that is, about 15 mm, when the sealing cuff 1 is installed. However, it is possible to stretch the opening 4a so that it becomes larger, even to such an extent so that it becomes essentially as large as the through hole 3c. In other words, the sealing

cuff 1 may be used to seal lead-throughs of pipes or cables having outer diameters of up to about 30 mm using the indicated dimensions.

Furthermore, and as a consequence, the sealing cuff 1 may be used to seal lead-throughs of pipes or cables having diameters essentially varying over a continuous spectrum between 10 mm and 30 mm. For the sealing of lead-throughs of larger pipes or cables, a sealing cuff with larger dimensions is needed, for example a sealing cuff having a through hole diameter of 70 mm and an opening diameter of 25 mm. Such a sealing cuff may, according to the above said, seal lead- throughs of pipes or cables whose outer diameters essentially vary over a continuous spectrum between 25 mm and 70mm. For even larger pipes or cables, a sealing cuff having a through hole diameter of 110 mm and an opening diameter of 65 mm may for example be used, with the corresponding capacity in terms of the diameter of the pipe or the cable whose lead-through is to be sealed. This way, one may cover the need for the sealing of lead-throughs of pipes or cables with such diverse outer diameters as essentially between 10 mm and 110 mm, and the whole continuous spectrum there between, with as little as three different sealing cuffs.

Thus, there is no longer any need to find exactly the right cuff diameter for a certain pipe, a certain cable, etc., and neither is there any longer a need to manufacture a special sealing cuff for each specifically occurring diameter for pipes, cables, etc., that are to be led through walls, ceil- ings or floors. These circumstances do not only lead to more convenient and simpler installation, but also to substantial cost savings in terms of manufacturing, distribution, etc., of sealing cuff assortment ranges.

When choosing which sealing cuff to be used for a specific sealing application, it is preferred, however not necessary, to choose a sealing cuff the through hole of which has a largest diameter which is smaller than twice as large as the smallest diameter of the pipe, and whose opening has a largest diameter which is smaller than half of the size of the smallest diameter of the pipe. The purpose of choosing such a combination of diameters is to secure sufficient sealing both in the area of the through hole which is covered by the elastic flexible sheet material, as well as between the elastic flexible sheet material and the envelope surface of the pipe.

During installation, it is also possible to cover the hole with some type of surface layer, such as by way of example tile, clinker, paint, wallpaper, etc. for aesthetical reasons, preferable the same surface layer as is arranged around the lead-through, so that the lead-through becomes as discrete as possible.

In the above described embodiment, a sealing of a lead- through of a water pipe through a wall has been described. However, it is to be understood that the present invention is useful for the sealing of any lead-through of any pipe, any cable, etc., through any wall, any ceiling or any floor. Thus, this is in particular true also regarding lead-throughs of sewer pipes through floors, comprising for example drainage gutters and outlets for toilets and washbasins, lead- throughs of ventilation and electrical installations, and so on.

Above, an exemplifying embodiment has been described. However, the invention may be varied without departing from the

inventive idea. Therefore, the present invention should not be considered limited to this exemplifying embodiment, but only by the frame as given by the enclosed claims.