The present invention relates generally to the field of spraying apparatuses. More specifically, the present invention is related to a spraying apparatus with an improved lock mechanism.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Spraying apparatuses are well-known in prior art . Known spraying apparatuses comprise a housing in which a valve assembly is in ^¬ cluded for providing controlled liquid flow through the spraying apparatus. For enabling a continuous liquid flow through the spraying apparatus, a lock mechanism may be provided which in ^¬ teracts with a control button for keeping a liquid valve ar- ranged in the valve assembly in an open state.

Known locking mechanisms usually comprise a plurality of compo ^¬ nents, for example, a button for operating the locking mecha ^¬ nism, a locking key, a return spring and clamping elements.

Therefore, spraying apparatuses are often expensive because of high assembling costs. In addition, known spraying apparatuses are often unergonomic and not user-friendly because multiple op ^¬ erating steps (executed by multiple finger movements) have to be done in order to activate/deactivate the lock mechanism.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is an objective of the embodiments of the invention to pro ^¬ vide a spraying apparatus which can be assembled easily and which enables an ergonomic handling. The objective is solved by the features of the independent claims. Preferred embodiments are given in the dependent claims. If not explicitly indicated otherwise, embodiments of the invention can be freely combined with each other. According to an aspect of the invention, the invention relates to a hand-held spraying apparatus . The spraying apparatus com ^¬ prises a housing, a liguid valve for providing a controlled liq ^¬ uid flow through the spraying apparatus and a control button for controlling the liquid valve. A portion of said housing may con ^¬ stitute a grip portion. The control button may be a pushbutton arranged at the front side of said grip portion. The control button may comprise a lock mechanism including a lock portion. Said lock portion is an integral part of the control button and pivotally mounted at the control button for locking the control button in a first pivot position in which the liquid valve com ^¬ prise an open state. So, by operating the lock portion, the lock mechanism can be transferred from the unlocked state into the locked state and vice versa.

Advantageously, the production costs are reduced because of a reduced number of parts included in the spraying apparatus and therefore a reduced assembling effort. In addition, due to the pivotally mounting of the lock portion at the control button, an ergonomic handling of the lock mechanism is achieved.

According to embodiments, the lock portion is provided at the top of the control button. Thereby, the lock mechanism can be easily operated by means of the index finger. In addition, also an ergonomic handling for left-handers and right-handers is achieved .

According to embodiments, the lock portion is coupled with the control button by means of a film hinge or by means of an in- mould assembling technique. Preferably, the pivot coupling be ^¬ tween the lock portion and the control button may be achieved by means of the mould process of the control button and the lock portion. Still preferably, the control button and the lock por ^¬ tion provided at the control button may be made of polypropylene (PP) which shows appropriate material properties for forming a film hinge. In an alternative embodiment, the lock portion is coupled with the control button by means of a hinge or swivel joint. Preferably, said hinge or swivel joint may be obtained by an assembly injection moulding process. Alternatively, the lock portion and the control button are separate components which are coupled via the hinge or swivel joint in an assembling process.

According to embodiments, the lock portion is adapted to inter ^¬ act with a snap-in hook for maintaining the open state of the liguid valve. The snap-in hook may at least partially extend in ^¬ to a cavity of the lock portion. In other words, the lock mecha ^¬ nism is provided in the interior of the lock portion. Thereby, an improved insensitivity of the lock mechanism against dirt is achieved .

According to embodiments, the snap-in hook is provided at the valve housing including the liguid valve and/or the snap-in hook is an integral part of the valve housing. Preferably, the snap- in hook is integrally formed at the valve housing by means of an injection moulding process. According to another embodiment, the snap-in hook may be fixed as a separate part at the valve hous ^¬ ing. The snap-in hook may be adapted to protrude from the wall of the valve housing towards the lock portion. In other words, the snap-in hook may be orientated in the spraying direction of the spraying apparatus .

According to embodiments, the lock portion is pressed by a spring into a first pivot position. The spring may interact with an area of the lock portion and may be preloaded such that the elastic force of the spring presses the lock portion into said first pivot position. Preferably, the spring may be leaf spring. Thereby, an undesired movement of the lock portion is prevented.

According to embodiments, the spring is adapted to pivot the lock portion into a lower position in which the lock portion abuts against the control button, said lower position being as ^¬ sociated with the unlocked state of the lock mechanism. Thereby, an undesired penetration of dirt into a gap formed between the lock portion and the control button is avoided.

According to embodiments, a lock bar is provided within the cav ^¬ ity of the lock portion, said lock bar extending from the inner side wall into said cavity. Said lock bar may be a web, i.e. may comprise a planar shape. Said lock bar may form the counterpart of the snap-in hook for realizing the lock mechanism.

According to embodiments, a snap-in hook is adapted to engage behind an edge of the lock bar in order to maintain the locked state thereby maintaining the open state of the liguid valve . The snap-in hook may comprise a snap-in portion including an undercut. The edge may be inversely shaped than the edge of the lock bar in order to achieve a form-fit coupling between the snap-in hook and the lock bar. According to embodiments, the spring is a leaf spring being adapted to interact with the lock bar for pressing the lock portion into a lower position. The leaf spring may rest against the upper portion of the lock bar and may be preloaded such that the lock portion (which includes the lock bar) is pressed downwardly towards the control button. Thereby, an undesired operating of the lock mechanism is avoided because the lock bar is kept at a distance to the snap-in hook.

According to embodiments, the leaf spring is provided at a valve housing including the liguid valve and/or is an integral part of said valve housing. Preferably, the leaf spring is integrally formed at the valve housing by means of injection moulding.

Thereby an inexpensive lock mechanism with a reduced number of parts is achieved. According to embodiments, the spring is adapted to slide along the lock bar when actuating the control button. Specifically, at least a portion of the spring may rest against the top portion of the lock bar and said spring portion may slide along the top surface of said top portion. Thereby a permanent pressing of the lock portion into a lower pivot position independent of the po ^¬ sition of the control button (pressed in or released) is ob ^¬ tained. According to embodiments, a pair of snap-in-hooks is provided and one snap-in hook is located at each side of the leaf spring. In other words, at least two snap-in hooks are arranged at a distance to each other and the leaf spring is arranged within the gap provided between said snap-in hooks . Thereby, an im- proved fixing of the locked state and an optimized application of the elastic spring force onto the lock bar is obtained.

According to embodiments, the housing of the spraying apparatus provides a stop portion for said lock portion, the stop portion interacting with an upper side of said lock portion for limiting the pivotal movement of the lock portion. Thereby an undesired overstretching of the film hinge, the spring and/or the snap-in hook is avoided. According to embodiments, the lock portion comprises a concave grip portion for handling and/or pivoting the lock portion. In other words, the lock portion forms an upper part of a prefera ^¬ bly bar-shaped control button which comprises its own grip por ^¬ tion. The grip portion may be arranged at the front side oppo- site to the grip portion of the housing. So, when pressing the control button in order to enable a liguid flow through the spraying apparatus, the lock portion may be operated by an up ^¬ ward-directed sliding of the index finger. In addition, due to the lock portion forming an integral part of the control button, the control button can also be operated by pressing the portion into the housing.

The term "essentially" or "approximately" as used in the inven ^¬ tion means deviations from the exact value by +/- 10%, prefera ^¬ bly by +/- 5% and/or deviations in the form of changes that are insignificant for the function.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The various aspects of the invention, including its particular features and advantages, will be readily understood from the following detailed description and the accompanying drawings, which : shows an example embodiment of a spraying apparatus with a closed liguid valve based on a lateral side view;

shows an example embodiment of a spraying apparatus with an opened liguid valve based on a lateral side view;

shows an example embodiment of a spraying apparatus with a closed liguid valve based on a lateral sec ^¬ tional side view;

shows an example embodiment of a spraying apparatus with an opened liguid valve in an unlocked state based on a lateral sectional side view; shows an example embodiment of a spraying apparatus with an opened liguid valve in a locked state based on a lateral sectional side view;

illustrates the valve assembly in a closed state to gether with the control button including the lock portion in an unlocked state based on a lateral sec ^¬ tional side view;

illustrates the valve assembly in an open state to ^¬ gether with the control button including the lock portion in an unlocked state based on a lateral sec ^¬ tional side view;

illustrates the valve assembly in an open state to ^¬ gether with the control button including the lock portion in a semi-locked state based on a lateral sectional side view;

illustrates the valve assembly in an open state to ^¬ gether with the control button including the lock portion in a locked state based on a lateral section al side view; and

illustrates the valve housing including the spring and a pair of snap-in hook in a perspective side view .

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

The present invention will now be described more fully with ref ^¬ erence to the accompanying drawings, in which example embodi ^¬ ments are shown. However, this invention should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein. Throughout the following description similar reference numerals have been used to denote similar elements, parts, items or features, when ap ^¬ plicable . Fig. 1 shows a side view of a spraying apparatus 1. The spraying apparatus 1 may be a handheld device, e.g. a spray gun, for providing liquid, specifically water to liquid receiving ob ^¬ jects, for example, flowers or plants. The spraying apparatus 1 comprises a housing 2 with a grip portion for manually holding the spraying apparatus 1. The spraying apparatus 1 may further comprise a valve assembly with a valve assembly housing compris ^¬ ing at least one liguid valve 3. The valve assembly housing is in the following also referred to as valve housing 3.1. In addi- tion, the spraying apparatus 1 may further comprise activation means for enabling a liguid flow through the liguid valve 3. Specifically, the activation means may constituted by a control button 4, said control button 4 being coupled with the liguid valve 3 for enabling/disabling or controlling a liguid flow through the spraying apparatus 1.

According to the present embodiment, the control button 4 has a longitudinal shape and extends along the handling portion of the spraying apparatus 1. The control button 4 may be pivotally mounted at the housing 2 of the spraying apparatus 1. More in detail, the control button 4 may be mounted at the lower free end of the spraying apparatus housing 2, for example, by means of a fulcrum pin. The control button 4 is preloaded by means of a spring towards an outer position in which the liguid flow through the liguid valve 3 and therefore also the liguid flow through the spraying apparatus 1 is deactivated. The spring may be an internal part of the liguid valve 3 or may be a spring di ^¬ rectly interacting with the control button 4. When pressing the control button 4 towards the grip portion of the spraying apparatus 1, said control button 4 is pivoted by a certain angle thereby enabling a liguid flow through the spray ^¬ ing apparatus 1. The flow rate (volume of liguid) flowing through the spraying apparatus 1 depends on the pivoting angle.

In order to lock the control button 4 at least in an end posi ^¬ tion thereby enabling a liguid flow through the spraying apparatus 1 without applying external forces onto the control button 4, the spraying apparatus 1 further comprises a lock mechanism 5. Said lock mechanism 5 is adapted to fix the control button 4 in the pushed-in position without applying external forces onto the control button 4. So, after pressing the control button 4 into the grip portion of the housing 2, the lock mechanism 5 can be activated by operating a lock portion 6 of said lock mecha- nism 5 thereby avoiding a backwardly directed movement (pivoting back into the initial position) of the control button 4. Fig. 2 shows the locked state of the control button 4.

In the following, the lock mechanism 5 is described in closer detail based on Fig. 3 to 5. The lock portion 6 forms an inte ^¬ gral part of the control button 4 and is arranged at the upper portion of said control button 4. More in detail, the control button 4 and the lock portion 6 are constituted by a single one- piece element. So when pivoting the control button 4, the lock portion 6 is also moved towards the housing 2, respectively, at least the free end of the lock portion 6 is inserted into an opening provided in the housing 2 of the spraying apparatus 1. The lock portion 6 may be a lock button. The lock portion 6 is pivotally mounted at the top portion of the control button 4. For example, the lock portion 6 is coupled with the control button 4 by a pivot point 6.1, said pivot point 6.1 being located at the rear side of the control button 4 which is close to the valve assembly. In other words, the pivot point 6.1 is located at the rear side of the control button 4 opposite to the front side at which an external force is applied for piv ^¬ oting said control button 4. The control button 4 and the lock portion 6 may be pivotally coupled by means of a film hinge. Al ^¬ ternatively, an in-mould assembling technigue may be used for integrally forming the lock portion 6 at the control button 4. Still alternatively, the lock portion 6 may be coupled with the control button 4 by means of a hinge or swivel joint. Said hinge or swivel joint may be obtained, for example, by an assembly in ^¬ jection molding process. In the unlocked state shown in fig. 3 and 4, the lock portion 6 is positioned in a first pivot position, in which the lock por ^¬ tion 6, specifically, a lower edge of the lock portion 6 abuts against an upper edge of the control button 4. The lock portion 6 may be pressed into said lower position by means of a spring 9. Said spring 9 is provided in the interior of the lock portion 6, specifically in a cavity 11 within the lock portion 6. The spring 6 may be a leaf spring interacting with a lock bar 10. The lock bar 10 may be constituted by a web extending in the in- terior of the lock portion 6. For example, the lock bar 10 may be integrally formed within said lock portion 6 and may protrude from an inner side wall into said cavity 11. The spring 9 may be located above the lock bar 10 and may be preloaded such that pressure is applied by the spring 9 to the top portion of the lock bar 10 thereby pivoting the lock portion 6 downwardly towards the control button 4. When pressing the control button 4, the free end of the spring 9 moves, respectively, slides along the top surface of the lock bar 10 keeping the lock portion 6 pressed downwardly.

Preferably, said spring 9 may be integrally formed at or at ^¬ tached to the valve housing 3.1 which comprises said liguid valve 3. According to another embodiment, the spring may be in ^¬ tegrally formed at or attached to the housing 2. The spring may be integrally formed at the valve housing 3.1 or the housing 2 by injection moulding process or may be a metal spring which is fixed at the valve housing 3.1 or the housing 2.

As also shown in Fig. 5, similar to the spring 9, also at least one hook may extend into the cavity 11 of the lock portion 6.

Said hook may be a snap-in hook 8 which interacts with the lock bar 10 in order to lock the control button 4 in the pushed-in state thereby enabling a permanent irrigation by the spraying apparatus 1 without applying external forces to the control but- ton 4. The snap-in hook 8 comprises a snap-in portion 8.1 at its free end which interacts with the free end of the lock bar 10. The snap-in hook 8 may be attached to the valve housing 3.1 or the housing 2. Preferably, the snap-in hook 8 is integrally formed at the valve housing 3.1 by means of an injection mould ^¬ ing process. The snap-in hook 8 may be arranged such that in the initial position of the control button 4 (without applying ex ^¬ ternal force onto the control button 4) the snap-in hook 8 is arranged slightly above the lock bar 10. The snap-in hook 8 may form a stop portion thereby avoiding an undesired overstretching of the film hinge 7, respectively, the spring 9.

In the pushed-in state of the control button 4, also the lock portion 6 is at least partly inserted into the housing 2. So when pressing the control button 4, there is a relative movement of the lock bar 10 with respect to the snap-in hook 8. In the pushed-in state, the snap-in portion 8.1 of the snap-in hook 8 protrudes beyond the edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10. Thus, when pushing the lock portion 6 up, the snap-in portion 8.1 of the snap-in hook 8 is able to encompass the edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10. When pushing-up the lock portion 6, the elastic force of the spring 9 has to be overcome. The shapes of the snap-in por ^¬ tion 8.1 and the edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10 are chosen such that the edge 10.1 locks into the snap-in portion 8.1 thereby avoiding a movement of the control button 4 into its initial po ^¬ sition (Fig. 3) which would result in a closing of the liguid valve 3. In the pushed- in state, a portion of the housing 2 may form a stop portion 12 for avoiding an overstretching of the film hinge 7, respectively, the spring 9 and the snap-in hook 8.

Fig. 6 to 9 show the lock mechanism in closer detail, wherein fig. 6 shows the initial position of the control button 4 with ^¬ out applying any external force onto said control button 4 (closed state of the liguid valve 3), fig.7 shows the pushed-in state of the control button 4 (open liguid valve 3), fig. 8 shows an intermediate position when pushing the lock portion 6 up and fig. 9 shows the locked state.

As shown in Fig. 6, at the initial position, the edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10 protrudes over the snap-in hook 8. The spring 9 may press the lock portion 6 towards a lower pivot position in which the front edge (opposite to the pivot point 6.1) abuts against the upper edge of the control button 4. In the pushed-in state of the control button 4, the snap-in hook 8 protrudes with its snap-in portion 8.1 beyond the edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10. Thus, it is possible to push the lock portion 6 upwardly in order to push the edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10 into the snap-in portion 8.1 of the snap-in hook 8 thereby activating the lock mechanism 5.

As shown in Fig. 8, the snap-in portion 8.1 comprises an undercut 8.2. The edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10 may be form-matched to said undercut 8.2. So, in the locked state of the locking mecha- nism 5, there is a form-fitted connection between the lock bar 10 and the snap-in hook 8. By means of said form-fitted connec ^¬ tion, a pushing out of the lock bar 10 by means of the spring 9 is avoided. The locked state shown in Fig. 9 can be released in at least two different ways. First, an unlocking may be achieved by pressing the control button 4. Due to the coupling of the control button 4 and the lock portion 6, also the lock portion 6 may be pressed into the housing. Thereby the form-fit connection between the lock bar 10 and the snap-in hook 8 is released. The spring 9 may press by its elastic force the lock portion 6 in a lower pivot position. Thereby, an offset between the edge 10.1 of the lock bar 10 and the snap-in portion 8.1 of the hook 8 is achieved. When releasing the control button 4, the lock bar 10 may move below the snap-in hook 8 and the control button 4 may be pivoted into the initial position (closed liquid valve 3) .

A second possibility for releasing the locked state is that the lock portion 6 is directly pushed downwardly thereby releasing the lock mechanism.

Preferably, the pivot movement of the lock portion 6 between the unlocked state and the locked state is limited to an angular range between 5° and 15°, preferably in the range between 8° and 12°, specifically 9°, 10° or 11°. Thereby, the material stress for the film hinge 7 is reduced and the life-time of the film hinge 7 is increased. Fig. 10 shows an example embodiment of a valve housing 3.1 which comprises an integrally formed spring 9. According to the pre ^¬ sent embodiment, a pair of snap-in hooks 8, 8' are integrally formed at the valve housing 3.1. Alternatively, it may be possi ^¬ ble to attach said spring 9 and/or said hooks 8, 8' as separate components at the valve housing 3.1. The hooks 8, 8' are ar ^¬ ranged at a distance from each other thereby forming a gap be ^¬ tween said hooks 8, 8' . Within said gap, the spring 9 is ar ^¬ ranged. In other words, the spring 9 is arranged between the pair of hooks 8, 8' . Thereby, an optimized encompassing ofthe lock bar 10 and an optimized application of the elastic force of the spring 9 onto the lock bar 10 is obtained.

It should be noted that the description and drawings merely il ^¬ lustrate the principles of the proposed methods and systems. Those skilled in the art will be able to implement various ar ^¬ rangements that, although not explicitly described or shown herein, embody the principles of the invention. List of reference numerals

1 spraying apparatus

2 housing

3 liguid valve

3.1 valve housing

4 control button

5 lock mechanism

6 lock portion

6.1 pivot point

7 film hinge

8, 8' snap-in hook

8.1 snap-in portion

8.2 undercut

9 spring

10 lock bar

10.1 edge

11 cavity

12 stop portion