DE20110447U1 - Tiles for the combinatorial generation of random shapes - Google Patents

Description

DESCRIPTION

- Tiles for the combinatorial generation of random shapes -

The invention relates to tiles which have the geometric shape of a regular polygon and with which a surface (e.g. floor, wall, ceiling) can be covered without gaps; they are equilateral triangles, squares and regular hexagons.

Tiles produced in the traditional way and provided with a pattern are subject to disadvantages and limitations in terms of pattern effect, production, storage and installation, which arise from the structure of their patterns. On the one hand, this applies to those tiles where sophisticated overall patterns can only be created by producing, storing and installing several types of tiles with different tile patterns at the same time, observing strict installation instructions. On the other hand, if only one type of tile with only one tile pattern is produced, stored and installed, the overall pattern is subject to the disadvantage of limited variability and, in this case too, to the obligation to observe strict installation instructions.

Even the pattern concept that overcomes these limitations by being able to achieve a high overall pattern variability with a tile pattern using any linear structure that reaches the tile edge at precisely defined transfer points (reference number DE: 201 OO 320.1) has the disadvantage that the overall pattern variability mentioned results from a structure that is always connected and touches all the tiles laid together - with this concept there is therefore always an overall structure or shape.

The invention specified in the protection claim is based on the problem of creating a type of tile that combines a large variety of independent shapes and diverse laying options with minimal production and storage costs and thus overcomes the disadvantages of the outlined conventional tile pattern designs

This problem is solved with the feature listed in the protection claim, in which a partial shape is fused with another partial shape in an area of the tile edge defined as a transfer zone to form an isolated overall shape (or random shape) that is structurally and optically independent of all other overall or random shapes created by the tile ensemble. The transfer zones are sections of the same length on the tile edges. These sections are symmetrical with respect to the perpendicular bisectors of the tile edges.

The invention enables a variety of laying options to be combined with low production and storage costs using just one tile pattern. The low production costs are made possible by the fact that the production machines only need to be set up once. Storage can be designed to save space and is easy to organize, as only one tile pattern needs to be kept in stock. In addition, new perspectives arise in advertising and marketing, as creatively oriented buyer groups can be addressed through the diverse laying options.

The principle of the transfer zones and two installation examples are shown in Figures 1 to 4. In detail:

Fig. 1 the generation of overall shapes (random shapes) from partial shapes in the square tile;

Fig. 2 a laying example for the same square tile with the tiles in different laying positions (rotation by 0°, 90°, 180° or 270°);

Fig. 3 the generation of overall shapes (random shapes) from partial shapes in the regular hexagonal tile;

Fig. 4 shows an example of laying the same hexagonal tile with the tiles in different laying positions (rotation by 0°, 60°, 120°, 180°, 240° or 300°).

Fig. 1 and Fig. 3 (sheets 1 to 3) show how changing overall shapes can be created from the partial shapes. The number of possible overall shapes is calculated using the formula

m ² -[m.(ml)]/2
where

= Number of possible total shapes (random shapes) m = Number of tile edges

For an equilateral triangle, 6 total shapes can be created, for a square, 10 total shapes, and for a regular hexagon, the number of total shapes is 21.

In addition, this variety of shapes is supported by the different technically possible laying positions (3 for a triangle, 4 for a square, 6 for a hexagon) of each individual tile. Fig. 2 and Fig. 4 show an example of laying for the square and regular hexagonal tiles, which illustrate the variety of shapes and flexibility of the design options.

Claims (1)

Tiles in the shape of equilateral triangles, squares and regular hexagons to generate random shapes where - the tile design is characterized by partial shapes ( 1 ) which are fused with the partial shapes of the adjacent tiles to form overall shapes or random shapes ( 4 ) at sections arranged symmetrically around the median perpendiculars ( 2 ) of the tile edges, the transfer zones ( 3 ), - the partial forms are all or at least partially different.