Drinks container for hot and cold uses thermocouple sensor responding to infra-red radiation from contents for temperature measurement passed to evaluator signaling taste assessment to fitted indicator.

摘要

Drinks container (1) has a sensor (3) taking the temperature of the contents for passing to an evaluator (4). An indicator (5) on the container informs the user of contents, temperature and taste. The temperature sensor receives the infra-red radiation from within the container (1) and measures the temperature of the fluid contents. The container lid (1.2) contains sensor, evaluator and indicator, and the sensor uses two thermocouples at two contact points. One couple is heated by the irradiation and the second acts as heat sink. The sensor can also be an NTC resistance, thermocouple or Pt temperature resistance sensor. For hot drinks the evaluator (4) passes a good signal to the indicator in the temperature bracket 85-70 deg C and uses a fitted actuator (9) to switch from hot to cold drinks for taste evaluation purposes. Evaluation signals passed to the indicator are indicated by respective LEDs.