CN114737837A - Hinge device and refrigerator - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention discloses a hinge device and a refrigerator, wherein the hinge device comprises an upper hinge shell, a lower hinge shell, a fixed shaft, a swinging shaft, a sliding shaft, a connecting piece, a limiting part and an elastic supporting part, the hinge device is in a standing state, and in the standing state, the distance from the fixed shaft to the lower end of an upper connecting wall is greater than the distance from the fixed shaft to the upper end of the upper connecting wall. The door body of the freezer that utilizes this hinge means is at the in-process of opening, because the at least part region who goes up the connection wall is in the fixed axle below, so at the door body round fixed axle pivoted in-process, the door body upwards opens the in-process and has the weight of forward motion simultaneously, thereby when the door body is opened, the space that the door body was to the freezer rear was taken has been reduced, the freezer can be more close to the wall body and put, on the other hand has also reduced the freezer rear reserved space not enough to open the influence of angle to the door body, user's use experience has been improved.

Description

Hinge device and refrigerator

Technical Field

The invention relates to a hinge device, in particular to a refrigerator with the hinge device.

Background

As shown in figures 1-4, in figures 1-2, a door body of a conventional refrigerator is closed, and in figures 3-4, the door body of the refrigerator is turned upwards to be opened to expose an opening of a box body below the refrigerator. In daily use, the user hopes to put the freezer as far as backward by the wall to reduce the space occupation of freezer, but receive the thickness of hinge itself and the structural limitation of hinge, make the rear of freezer need reserve sufficient space and just can ensure the normal opening of the door body, make the rear of freezer must reserve out sufficient space then. As shown in fig. 4, the freezer is at least d1+ d2 from the back, where d1 is the distance from the end of the door body to the outer surface of the hinge and d2 is the thickness of the hinge. Even if the thickness d2 of the hinge itself is reduced, the distance d1 is difficult to change. Correspondingly, when a user places the refrigerator closer to the wall, the door body cannot be completely opened, and normal use of the refrigerator is affected. The waste of the space behind the refrigerator influences the use experience of users.

Disclosure of Invention

In order to solve the problem of space waste in the prior art, the invention aims to provide a refrigerator with a hinge device occupying the space behind the refrigerator as little as possible.

In order to achieve the above object, one embodiment of the present invention provides a hinge device including:

the upper hinge shell comprises an upper connecting wall for connecting the door body;

a lower hinge case including a lower connection wall for connecting the case;

the upper hinge shell and the lower hinge shell are connected to the fixed shaft and rotate around the fixed shaft relatively;

a swing shaft fixedly connected to the upper hinge housing and parallel to the fixed shaft;

a sliding shaft slidably connected to the lower hinge housing and parallel to the swing shaft;

a link pivotally connected to both the swing shaft and the slide shaft;

the limiting part is used for limiting the motion direction of the sliding shaft to be parallel to the lower connecting wall;

the elastic supporting part comprises a fixed end fixedly connected with the lower connecting wall and a sliding end connected with the sliding shaft;

the hinge device has a standing state and a turning state, and in the standing state, the distance from the fixed shaft to the lower end of the upper connecting wall is greater than the distance from the fixed shaft to the upper end of the upper connecting wall.

As a further improvement of the present invention, the hinge device has a flip state, and a region below the fixed shaft in the closed position has a component of forward movement in the process of switching the hinge device from the rest state to the flip state.

As a further improvement of the present invention, in the resting state, both the lower connecting wall and the upper connecting wall are located on a first plane; during the process of switching the hinge device from the rest state to the turnover state, at least part of the upper connecting wall moves to the front side of the first plane.

As a further improvement of the present invention, the stopper portion includes a slide groove, the slide groove includes a pair of stopper surfaces parallel to each other, and the slide shaft is disposed between the pair of stopper surfaces.

As a further improvement of the present invention, the lower hinge housing includes a pair of lower side walls, and the lower side walls are provided with the slide grooves.

As a further improvement of the present invention, the hinge device further includes a cover plate, the limiting portion includes a first limiting member disposed on the cover plate or the lower hinge housing, and a second limiting member disposed on the sliding shaft, one of the first limiting member and the second limiting member is provided as a limiting block, and the other is provided as a limiting groove, and the first limiting member and the second limiting member are matched.

As a further improvement of the present invention, the elastic support portion includes a support beam, a support rod, and an elastic member sleeved outside the support rod, the support beam includes the fixed end connected to the lower hinge shell, one end of the elastic member is fixed to the support beam, the other end of the elastic member abuts against the support rod, and the support rod includes the sliding end connected to the sliding shaft.

As a further improvement of the present invention, in the rest state, the fixed shaft, the swing shaft, and the slide shaft are all on a vertical plane parallel to the upper connecting wall.

In order to achieve one of the above objects, an embodiment of the present invention provides a refrigerator, which includes the above hinge device.

As a further improvement of the invention, the refrigerator comprises a refrigerator body connected with the lower hinge shell and a door body connected with the upper hinge shell, the door body is provided with a closing position, and in the closing position, the axis of the fixed shaft is higher than the horizontal center line of the rear wall of the door body.

Compared with the prior art, the invention has the following beneficial effects: the door body of the freezer that utilizes this hinge means is at the in-process of opening, because the at least part region who goes up the connection wall is in the fixed axle below, so at the door body round fixed axle pivoted in-process, the door body upwards opens the in-process and has the weight of forward motion simultaneously, thereby when the door body is opened, the space that the door body was to the freezer rear was taken has been reduced, the freezer can be more close to the wall body and put, on the other hand has also reduced the freezer rear reserved space not enough to open the influence of angle to the door body, user's use experience has been improved.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a side view of a prior art freezer with a door closed;

FIG. 2 is an enlarged view of a portion of FIG. 1 at A';

fig. 3 is a side view of a prior art cooler with the door open;

FIG. 4 is an enlarged view of a portion of FIG. 3 at B';

FIG. 5 is a schematic structural view of a hinge device in a resting state according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 6 is a partial structural schematic view of a refrigerator according to an embodiment of the present invention when a door is closed;

fig. 7 is a partial structural schematic view of the refrigerator according to an embodiment of the present invention when the door is opened;

FIG. 8 is an enlarged view of a portion of FIG. 7 at A;

FIG. 9 is a schematic structural view illustrating a hinge device according to an embodiment of the present invention in a flipped state;

1000, a refrigerator; 100. a hinge device; 200. a box body; 300. a door body; 10. an upper hinge shell; 11. an upper connecting wall; 111. an upper end; 112. a lower end; 20. a lower hinge shell; 21. a lower connecting wall; 22. a lower sidewall; 30. a fixed shaft; 50. a swing shaft; 61. a linkage section; 611. a connecting member; 612. a sliding shaft; 613. a limiting part; 62. a support bar; 63. an elastic member; 64. and supporting the cross beam.

Detailed Description

The present invention will be described in detail below with reference to specific embodiments shown in the drawings. These embodiments are not intended to limit the present invention, and structural, methodological, or functional changes made by those skilled in the art according to these embodiments are included in the scope of the present invention.

It will be understood that terms used herein such as "upper," "above," "lower," "below," and the like, refer to relative positions in space and are used for convenience in description to describe one element or feature's relationship to another element or feature as illustrated in the figures. The spatially relative positional terms may be intended to encompass different orientations of the device in use or operation in addition to the orientation depicted in the figures.

According to the hinge device and the refrigerator with the hinge device, the structure of the hinge is redesigned, so that the occupation of the rear space of the refrigerator in the opening process of the door body can be controlled, the refrigerator can be placed closer to a rear wall, and the waste of the rear space of the refrigerator is reduced.

This hinge means 100 also can install on equipment such as refrigerator, vertical freezer, gradevin, dish washer, microwave oven, provides a freezer 1000 in this embodiment, including door body 300 and box 200, the inside refrigeration space that encloses of box 200, door body 300 seals the refrigeration space, is connected through hinge means 100 between door body 300 and the box 200, and hinge means 100 supports opening and closing of door body 300.

As shown in fig. 5 to 9, an embodiment of the present invention discloses a hinge device 100, which includes a lower hinge housing 20, an upper hinge housing 10, a fixed shaft 30, a swing shaft 50 and an elastic support part, wherein the lower hinge housing 20 is used for connecting a box body 200; the upper hinge case 10 includes an upper connection wall 11 for connecting the door body 300; the upper hinge housing 10 and the lower hinge housing 20 are both connected to the fixed shaft 30 and relatively rotate around the fixed shaft 30. The upper connection wall 11 is a wall of the upper hinge case 10 for connecting the door 300, and the upper connection wall 11 is attached to the door 300 and rotates together with the door 300. The upper hinge housing 10 is rotatably coupled to the lower hinge housing 20 by a fixed shaft 30.

Since the rotation of the upper hinge housing 10 and the lower hinge housing 20 around the fixed shaft 30 is opposite, it is possible that the lower hinge housing 20 is fixedly coupled to the fixed shaft 30 and the upper hinge housing 10 is rotatably coupled to the fixed shaft 30, or the lower hinge housing 20 is rotatably coupled to the fixed shaft 30 and the upper hinge housing 10 is fixedly coupled to the fixed shaft 30, or the lower hinge housing 20 is rotatably coupled to the fixed shaft 30 and the upper hinge housing 10 is rotatably coupled to the fixed shaft 30. In this embodiment, the lower hinge housing 20 is rotatably coupled to the fixed shaft 30, and the upper hinge housing 10 is fixedly coupled to the fixed shaft 30.

In order to clearly express the positions and directions described in the present embodiment, taking the horizontal refrigerator 1000 as an example, the refrigerator 1000 is defined such that the opening of the refrigerator 1000 faces upward, and the reverse direction is defined as downward, the door 300 is located above the refrigerator 200, the user is located on one side of the refrigerator 200 away from the hinge device 100 to operate the refrigerator 1000, the user is defined to be located in front of the refrigerator 1000, the hinge device 100 is located behind the refrigerator 200, and the left and right sides of the refrigerator 200 from the front are defined as right and left sides respectively.

The hinge device 100 has a standing state, as shown in fig. 5 to 6, and the standing state of the hinge device 100 corresponds to the door 300 being at the closing position. In addition, the hinge device 100 has a turning state, and the turning state of the hinge device 100 corresponds to the door 300 being at the opening position, as shown in fig. 7 to 9.

Here, referring to fig. 2 and 4 of the prior art, in the conventional hinge device 100, the upper connecting wall 11 is located above the fixed shaft 30, the fixed shaft 30 is located between the upper connecting wall 11 and the lower connecting wall 21 of the lower hinge housing 20 for connecting the cabinet 200, and when the door body 300 is opened, the upper connecting wall 11 makes an upward tilting motion around the fixed shaft 30.

In this embodiment, in the standing state, the distance from the fixed shaft 30 to the lower end 112 of the upper connecting wall 11 is greater than the distance to the upper end 111 of the upper connecting wall 11; at least a partial region of the upper connecting wall 11 is located below the fixing shaft 30, as shown in fig. 5 and 6, the fixing shaft 30 is located above a center line of the upper connecting wall 11, a plurality of regions of the upper connecting wall 11 are located below the fixing shaft 30, and as many partial positions as possible of the upper connecting wall 11 may be located below the fixing shaft 30, unlike the conventional structure in which the upper connecting wall 11 is located above the fixing shaft 30.

In the process of switching the hinge device 100 from the rest state to the reversed state, a partial region located below the fixed shaft 30 in the closed position has a component of forward movement. During the rotation of the door 300 around the fixed shaft 30, since the upper connecting wall 11 is located in front of the fixed shaft 30, and the upper connecting wall 11 has a tendency to move upwards, the area of the upper connecting wall 11 located below the fixed shaft 30 has a forward movement component, which corresponds to the upward opening of the door 300 and has a forward movement component at the same time, that is, during at least part of the opening of the door 300, the part of the structure of the door 300 connected with the upper connecting wall 11 moves forwards relative to the closed position. This causes the door body 300 to move forward in the area below the fixed shaft 30 in the rest state, as shown in fig. 8, when opened.

The movement to the front here means that the movement locus of the same point on the door is a forward movement with respect to the rest state, and then the area where the door body 300 moves backward is reduced. As can be seen from comparing fig. 4 and 8, the distance that the door 300 is farthest away from the hinge rear wall is reduced from d1 in the prior art to d3 in the present embodiment. The space occupation behind the cooler 1000 is greatly reduced.

At this moment, the refrigerator 1000 can be placed closer to the wall body at the rear, and in addition, the heat dissipation structures of the refrigerator 1000 can be arranged on the side surfaces, the bottom surface and the front surface of the left side and the right side of the refrigerator 1000, so that the problem that the heat dissipation is influenced when the refrigerator 1000 is placed close to the wall body is solved.

The swing shaft 50 is connected to the lower hinge housing 20, and the elastic support portion includes a fixed end fixedly connected to the lower hinge housing 20, a receiving end connected to the swing shaft 50, and an elastic support member disposed between the fixed end and the receiving end. The elastic support portion may play a role of supporting the door 300 to hover.

Further, in the standing state, the lower connecting wall 21 and the upper connecting wall 11 are both located on the first plane; when the door 300 corresponding to the stationary state is closed, both the rear wall of the door 300 and the rear wall of the cabinet 200 may be on the first plane.

In the process of switching the hinge device 100 from the resting state to the turning state, at least part of the structure of the upper connecting wall 11 moves to the front side of the first plane, as shown in the change from fig. 6 to fig. 8, the region of the upper connecting wall 11 originally located below the fixed shaft 30 moves to the front side of the first plane. In fig. 8, part of the upper hinge wall is positioned to move forward of the first plane in which the lower connecting wall 21 lies.

Furthermore, the elastic support member includes a supporting beam 64, a supporting rod 62, and an elastic member 63 sleeved outside the supporting rod 62, the supporting beam 64 includes a fixed end connected to the lower hinge housing 20, one end of the elastic member 63 is fixed to the supporting beam 64, and the other end of the elastic member abuts against the supporting rod 62. The two ends of the supporting beam 64 are respectively connected to a pair of opposite side walls of the lower hinge shell 20, an opening is formed in the supporting beam 64, the supporting rod 62 penetrates through the opening, the elastic member 63 can be a spring, supporting sleeves can be arranged at the upper end and the lower end of the spring, as shown in fig. 5, the supporting sleeve at the lower part is abutted against the supporting beam 64 around the opening, and the supporting sleeve at the upper part is abutted against a protrusion extending from the supporting rod 62.

The spring is always in a compressed state, under the elastic action of the spring, when the upper hinge shell 10 turns upwards, the support rod 62 moves upwards under the driving of the spring, the spring releases partial elastic force, and the spring is still in a compressed state, so that the upper hinge shell 10 can be supported to be opened, the labor-saving effect of opening the door is achieved, and the hovering effect of the door body 300 is supported.

Further, as shown in fig. 5, the elastic support portion further includes a linkage portion 61, the linkage portion 61 includes a sliding shaft 612, a connecting piece 611 and a limiting portion 613, the sliding shaft 612 is slidably connected to the lower hinge housing 20 and parallel to the swinging shaft 50, and the supporting rod 62 is connected to the sliding shaft 612; the link 611 includes a receiving end pivotally connected to the swing shaft 50, and the link 611 is also pivotally connected to the slide shaft 612; the stopper 613 is provided to the lower hinge housing 20 and defines a moving direction of the sliding shaft 612.

Two groups of round holes are formed in the connecting piece 611, the sliding shaft 612 penetrates through one group of round holes, the swinging shaft 50 penetrates through the other group of round holes, the swinging shaft 50 and the sliding shaft 612 can rotate in the round holes, when the supporting rod 62 moves upwards under the action of the spring, the sliding shaft 612 is pushed to move upwards along the limiting portion 613, the sliding shaft 612 pushes the connecting piece 611 to move, and the connecting piece 611 is connected with the swinging shaft 50 to drive the swinging shaft 50 to move, so that the movement of the upper hinge shell 10 is supported.

The stopper 613 is formed as a slide groove formed in a pair of side walls of the lower hinge case 20 which are provided to face each other, and the slide groove includes a pair of stopper surfaces which are parallel to each other, and the slide shaft 612 is provided between the pair of stopper surfaces. The sliding shaft 612 slides along the sliding groove, the sliding groove may be a through hole or a blind hole, the longitudinal section of the sliding groove may be waist-shaped, the width between the pair of limiting surfaces is equal to or slightly larger than the diameter of the sliding groove shaft, and the sliding shaft 612 slides between the pair of limiting surfaces.

The lower hinge housing 20 includes a pair of lower sidewalls 22, and the lower sidewalls 22 are provided with sliding grooves. The lower side walls 22 are respectively arranged at two sides of the connecting plate of the box body 200, the pair of lower side walls 22 are arranged in parallel relatively, correspondingly, the sliding grooves on each lower side wall 22 are also correspondingly parallel to each other, and the sliding shaft 612 moves on the sliding grooves of the lower side walls 22 which are parallel to each other, so that the sliding shaft is always parallel to the connecting plate and the rotating shaft of the box body 200 in the moving process.

The extending direction of the slide groove is the vertical direction, and the slide shaft 612 moves up and down in the slide groove in the vertical direction. The stopper 613 may be provided on a bottom wall connecting the two side walls.

The hinge device 100 further includes a cover plate, the limiting portion 613 includes a first limiting member disposed on the cover plate or the lower hinge housing 20 and a second limiting member disposed on the sliding shaft 612, one of the first limiting member and the second limiting member is configured as a limiting block, the other one is configured as a limiting groove, and the first limiting member and the second limiting member are matched. When the limiting block moves in the limiting groove, the limiting block and the limiting block are limited mutually, the limiting block can only slide along a certain direction, the limiting groove and the limiting block are both parallel to the box body 200 connecting plate, and the movement direction of the elastic supporting part is limited and can only be parallel to the box body 200 connecting plate and fixed.

When the sliding shaft 612 moves to the uppermost end 111 in the sliding groove, the door 300 is opened to the maximum angle, and the opening angle of the door 300 of the horizontal refrigerator 1000 can be limited to 0-80 ° by limiting the length of the sliding groove.

Further, in the rest state, the fixed shaft 30, the swing shaft 50, and the slide shaft 612 are all on a vertical plane parallel to the upper connecting wall 11. This can minimize the thickness of the hinge device 100.

The elastic support portion is supported by the fixed end, and the sliding end moves parallel to the connecting plate of the box body 200 along with the movement of the sliding shaft 612, i.e. the movement in the direction perpendicular to the connecting plate of the box body 200 is avoided, so that the required moving space inside is reduced, and the thickness of the hinge device 100 can be made thin.

Through the above arrangement, the thickness of the hinge device 100 can be reduced, so that the distance from the door 300 to the hinge rear wall is reduced from d2 in the prior art to d4 in the embodiment, and the space occupation behind the refrigerator 1000 is further greatly reduced by referring to the comparison between fig. 2 and fig. 8.

Compared with the prior art, the embodiment has the following beneficial effects:

the door body 300 of the refrigerator 1000 of the hinge device 100 is in the opening process, because at least partial region of the upper connecting wall 11 is below the fixing shaft 30, so in the process that the door body 300 rotates around the fixing shaft 30, the door body 300 has the component of forward motion simultaneously in the upward opening process, thereby when the door body 300 is opened, the space occupation of the door body 300 to the rear of the refrigerator 1000 is reduced, the refrigerator 1000 can be placed closer to the wall body, on the other hand, the influence of insufficient reserved space at the rear of the refrigerator 1000 on the opening angle of the door body 300 is also reduced, and the use experience of users is improved.

It should be understood that although the present description refers to embodiments, not every embodiment contains only a single technical solution, and such description is for clarity only, and those skilled in the art should make the description as a whole, and the technical solutions in the embodiments can also be combined appropriately to form other embodiments understood by those skilled in the art.

The above-listed detailed description is only a specific description of a possible embodiment of the present invention, and they are not intended to limit the scope of the present invention, and equivalent embodiments or modifications made without departing from the technical spirit of the present invention should be included in the scope of the present invention.

Claims (10)

1. A hinge device, comprising:

the upper hinge shell comprises an upper connecting wall for connecting the door body;

a lower hinge case including a lower connection wall for connecting the case;

the upper hinge shell and the lower hinge shell are connected to the fixed shaft and rotate around the fixed shaft relatively;

a swing shaft fixedly connected to the upper hinge housing and parallel to the fixed shaft;

a sliding shaft slidably connected to the lower hinge housing and parallel to the swing shaft;

a link pivotally connected to both the swing shaft and the slide shaft;

the limiting part is used for limiting the motion direction of the sliding shaft to be parallel to the lower connecting wall;

the elastic supporting part comprises a fixed end fixedly connected with the lower connecting wall and a sliding end connected with the sliding shaft;

the hinge device has a standing state in which a distance from the fixed shaft to a lower end of the upper connecting wall is greater than a distance to an upper end of the upper connecting wall.

2. The hinge assembly of claim 1, wherein the hinge assembly has a flipped state, and wherein a region below the fixed axis in the closed position has a component of forward movement during switching of the hinge assembly from the resting state to the flipped state.

3. The hinge assembly of claim 2, wherein in the rest state, the lower connecting wall and the upper connecting wall are both located in a first plane; during the process of switching the hinge device from the rest state to the turnover state, at least part of the upper connecting wall moves to the front side of the first plane.

4. The hinge device according to claim 1, wherein the stopper portion includes a slide groove including a pair of stopper surfaces parallel to each other, the slide shaft being disposed between the pair of stopper surfaces.

5. The hinge apparatus of claim 4, wherein the lower hinge housing comprises a pair of lower sidewalls, the lower sidewalls providing the sliding slot.

6. The hinge device according to claim 1, further comprising a cover plate, wherein the limiting portion comprises a first limiting member disposed on the cover plate or the lower hinge housing, and a second limiting member disposed on the sliding shaft, one of the first limiting member and the second limiting member is configured as a limiting block, the other is configured as a limiting groove, and the first limiting member and the second limiting member are engaged with each other.

7. The hinge assembly of claim 1, wherein the elastic support comprises a support beam, a support rod, and an elastic member sleeved outside the support rod, the support beam comprises the fixed end connected to the lower hinge housing, one end of the elastic member is fixed to the support beam, the other end of the elastic member abuts against the support rod, and the support rod comprises the sliding end connected to the sliding shaft.

8. The hinge device according to claim 1, wherein in the rest state, the fixed shaft, the swinging shaft and the sliding shaft are all on a vertical plane parallel to the upper connecting wall.

9. A refrigerator comprising the hinge device according to any one of claims 1 to 8.

10. The cooler of claim 9, including a cabinet connected to the lower hinge shell and a door connected to the upper hinge shell, the door having a closed position in which an axis of the stationary shaft is higher than a horizontal centerline of a rear wall of the door.

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