JP2010196906A - Water heater - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a water heater with superior energy saving performance and user-friendliness accurately detecting presence or absence of a bathing person in a bathroom, and properly carrying out hot water supply or heating to a bathtub on the basis of the detection result. <P>SOLUTION: The water heater includes a man detection sensor 8 detecting existence or nonexistence of presence of a person in the bathroom, and a remote control 9, and the man detection sensor 8 is disposed in the remote control 9 such that a front end face of the man detection sensor 8 is positioned at the same height as a front end face of the remote control 9 or the front end face of the man detection sensor 8 is positioned in an inward side than the front end face of the remote control 9. By arranging the front end face of the man detection sensor 8 such that it does not protrude toward a front side than the front end face of the bathroom remote control 9, failure of the man detection sensor 8 due to wrong operation of the bathroom remote control 9 of the bathing person can be prevented. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a water heater having a function of heating water in a bathtub or heating water in the bathtub and having a human sensor in the bathroom remote controller that detects the presence or absence of a person in the bathroom.

  Conventionally, there are more documents than the past as hot water heaters that detect bathing of a person in a bathtub and control hot water supply or heating operation to the bathtub (see, for example, Patent Document 1). In patent document 1, the rise of the bath water level accompanying a person's bathing is detected with a water level sensor, and the bath temperature at the initial stage of bathing is controlled to be gradually heated from 40 ° C. to a high temperature (eg 43 ° C.). This improves the comfort of bathers and the energy saving of hot water heaters.

  Moreover, as a hot water heater in which the detection means of the bathing of the person in the bathtub is mounted on the bathtub remote controller, for example, there is one as shown in FIG. 4 (see, for example, Patent Document 2).

As shown in Fig. 4, for the purpose of improving safety, a human sensor consisting of a pyroelectric infrared element and a lens is mounted on the bathtub remote controller, and this human sensor detects abnormalities of bathers and automatically It has a function to report to.
JP 63-306352 A JP 2001-133040 A

  However, although it has been described that the human body sensor for detecting the bather is provided in the bathroom remote control in the conventional configuration, in the bathroom environment, it is possible to prevent a failure caused by an erroneous operation of the bathroom remote controller by the bather. In addition, the structure of a human sensor for ensuring human detection accuracy and the specifications for mounting on a bathroom remote controller are not sufficiently described.

  In other words, there are various places where the bathroom remote control is installed in the bathroom, and it is necessary to increase the viewing angle of the human sensor as it should be taken into consideration because the human sensor can detect where the bather is in the bathroom. . As a specification for increasing the viewing angle of the human sensor, first, it is conceivable that the human sensor is arranged so that the front surface of the human sensor protrudes outside the front surface of the bathroom remote controller.

  However, the structural problem that the human sensor may break down due to an erroneous operation such as pressing the human sensor misunderstood as an operation button due to the difference that the bather operates the bathroom remote control alone. was there.

  The present invention solves the above-mentioned conventional problems, and detects the presence or absence of a person in the bathroom with high accuracy while preventing failure of the human sensor due to erroneous operation of the bath remote control of the bather. It aims at providing the hot water heater excellent in the reliability, energy saving property, and comfort which performs the hot water supply to a bathtub, or the water in a bathtub appropriately.

In order to solve the conventional problems, a water heater of the present invention includes a bathtub, a bathtub heating means for heating hot water in the bathtub, a human sensor for detecting presence or absence of a person in the bathroom, and a remote controller The front end surface of the human sensor and the front end surface of the remote controller are flush with each other, or the front end surface of the human sensor is located on the inner side of the front end surface of the remote controller. The human sensor is disposed on the remote controller.

  As a result, although the viewing angle of the human sensor is smaller than when the front end surface of the human sensor protrudes forward from the front end surface of the bathroom remote controller, Failure can be prevented, and it is possible to ensure detection accuracy and improve reliability of the bather's bathroom.

  ADVANTAGE OF THE INVENTION According to this invention, detecting the presence or absence of the person's presence in a bathroom accurately, preventing the human sensor failure by bather's bathroom remote control mistake operation, Based on it, the hot water supply to a bathtub or the water in a bathtub It is possible to provide a hot water heater that performs heating appropriately and is excellent in reliability, energy saving, and comfort.

  1st invention is equipped with the bathtub, the bathtub heating means which heats the hot water in the said bathtub, the human sensor which detects the presence or absence of the person in the bathroom, and the remote control, The front end surface of the said human sensor And the front end surface of the remote control are the same height, or the human sensor is arranged on the remote control so that the front end surface of the human sensor is located inward of the front end surface of the remote control Since the front end surface of the human sensor does not protrude forward from the front end surface of the bathroom remote control, the human sensor malfunctions due to an erroneous operation of the bath remote control of the bather. The necessary minimum bath heating operation, such as quickly raising the temperature of the water in the bathtub to the set value only when the bather enters the bathroom, depending on the presence or absence of the bather by the presence sensor Can be saved It can be improved value and comfort.

  In the second invention, the human sensor of the first invention is configured to detect infrared rays emitted by a bather, and the cost is increased by using an infrared sensor which has become available at a relatively low cost in recent years. Can be suppressed.

  3rd invention is equipped with the hot water storage tank and the hot water tank heating means which heats the hot water of the said hot water tank in the water heater of 1st or 2nd invention, and the bathtub heating means is the hot water in the said hot water tank. The hot water in the bathtub is configured to be heated, and the hot water is used for hot water supply, and the heat can be effectively used for heating the bathtub, thereby improving convenience. .

  In the fourth aspect of the invention, in particular, the hot water storage tank heating means of the third aspect of the invention is configured using a heat pump cycle, thereby realizing a water heater excellent in energy saving.

  The fifth aspect of the invention is particularly characterized in that the heat pump cycle of the fourth aspect of the invention is a supercritical refrigerant circuit that is boosted to a supercritical pressure during operation, and the boiling temperature can be increased. The increase in the amount of heat that can be used and the ability to prevent running out of hot water can be improved.

  In particular, the sixth aspect of the present invention uses carbon dioxide as the refrigerant of the heat pump cycle of the fifth aspect of the invention, and uses relatively inexpensive and stable carbon dioxide as the refrigerant to reduce product cost and reliability. Can be improved. In addition, carbon dioxide has an ozone depletion coefficient of zero and a global warming coefficient of about 1/700 of the alternative refrigerant HFC-407C, which is very small.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. Note that the present invention is not limited to the embodiments.

(Embodiment 1)
FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a water heater in the first embodiment of the present invention.

  In FIG. 1, a heat pump unit 2 as a hot water tank heating means stores hot water in the hot water tank 1 by heating the water at the bottom of the hot water tank 1 with a high efficiency heat pump cycle and then returning it to the upper part of the hot water tank 1.

  The hot water supply means from the hot water supply terminal 13 such as hot water filling to the bathtub 3 or a currant shower employs a method of mixing the hot water in the upper part of the hot water storage tank 3 and tap water with the mixing valve 11. It consists of components such as a hot water supply thermistor 12 that detects temperature. The hot water supply temperature is controlled by the hot water supply control means 14 and is controlled by changing the mixing ratio of the mixing valve 11 so that the detected temperature of the hot water supply thermistor 12 becomes the set temperature.

  The bathtub heating means for heating the water in the bathtub 3 is a heat exchanger 4 for exchanging heat between the hot water in the hot water tank 1 and the hot water in the bathtub 3, and the hot water in the upper part of the hot water tank 3 is conveyed to the heat exchanger 4. Components such as a first circulation pump 5 that returns to the bottom of the hot water tank 1 later, a second circulation pump 6 that returns water from the bathtub 3 to the heat exchanger 4 and then returns to the bathtub 3, and a bath thermistor 7 that detects the water temperature of the bathtub 3 have.

  FIG. 2 is a front external view of the bathroom remote controller 9. FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram of the infrared sensor 8 as a human sensor.

  Operation operations such as filling the bathtub 3, setting the hot water supply temperature from the hot water supply terminal 13, heating the bathtub 3, and setting the temperature are performed by operating buttons of the bathroom remote controller 9 installed in the bathroom. An infrared sensor 8 is mounted inside the bathroom remote control 9 as a human sensor that detects the presence or absence of a person in the bathroom.

  Here, a general configuration of the infrared sensor 8 will be described. As shown in FIG. 3, the infrared sensor 8 has an infrared element 15 that detects infrared rays emitted from a bather, a lens 16 that collects infrared rays, and a light receiving surface 17 provided on the top surface of the infrared element 15. ing.

  Infrared light emitted from the bather is detected by the light receiving surface 17 through the infrared sensor light receiving window 9b and the lens 16 provided on the bathroom remote control front panel 9a. The infrared sensor 8 is installed on an infrared sensor installation reference plane 18 such as a substrate inside the bathroom remote control 9.

  As shown in FIG. 3, the infrared sensor 8 is arranged so that the front end face of the infrared sensor 8 does not protrude forward from the front end face of the bathroom remote control 9. Therefore, when the bather operates the bathroom remote control 9, the infrared sensor 8. It is possible to accurately detect the presence / absence of a bather with a simple configuration while preventing a malfunction due to an erroneous operation such as pressing the button with an operation button.

  About the hot water heater comprised as mentioned above, the operation | movement and an effect | action are demonstrated below.

  In the conventional automatic warming operation of the bathtub 3, the heating operation of the bathtub 3 is repeated every predetermined time. However, by using the infrared sensor 8, the heating operation of the bathtub 3 can be efficiently performed.

  First, when the infrared sensor 8 detects that a person has entered the bathroom, the bathtub heating control means 10 starts the heating operation of the bathtub 3. Specifically, the hot water in the upper part of the hot water tank 1 is conveyed to the bottom of the hot water tank 1 via the heat exchanger 4 by the first circulation pump 5 and at the same time the water in the bathtub 3 is heated by the second circulation pump 6. The operation | movement of returning to the bathtub 3 after conveying to the exchanger 4 is performed.

At this time, heat exchange is performed in the heat exchanger 4 to heat the water in the bathtub 3. The heating operation of the bathtub 3 is stopped when the water temperature detected by the bath thermistor 7 becomes equal to or higher than the bath set temperature (for example, 42 ° C.). Can be eliminated.

  As described above, the front end surface of the infrared sensor 8 does not protrude forward from the front end surface of the bathroom remote control 9, that is, the front end surface of the infrared sensor 8 and the front end surface of the bathroom remote control 9 are the same height, or By arranging the infrared sensor 8 in the bathroom remote control 9 so that the front end face of the infrared sensor 8 is located inward of the front end face of the bathroom remote control 9, the bath remote control 9 of the bather It is possible to accurately detect the presence or absence of a bather with a simple configuration while preventing a failure of the human sensor 8 due to an erroneous operation.

  Furthermore, by controlling the heating operation of the bathtub 3 in accordance with the output of the infrared sensor 8, energy saving and improvement in comfort and convenience can be achieved.

  The refrigeration cycle of the heat pump unit 2 preferably uses carbon dioxide as a refrigerant and is operated at a pressure exceeding the critical pressure. Since the boiling temperature can be increased by using carbon dioxide as a refrigerant, it is possible to increase the amount of heat that can be used and to prevent the hot water from running out.

  By using relatively inexpensive and stable carbon dioxide for the refrigerant, the product cost can be reduced and the reliability can be improved. In addition, carbon dioxide has an ozone depletion coefficient of zero and a global warming coefficient of about 1/700 of the alternative refrigerant HFC-407C, which is very small.

  Moreover, as a hot water supply means to the bathtub 3 or the hot water supply terminal 13 or a heating means for the bathtub 3, it is also possible to use a combustion heat source of gas or oil instead of the heat pump cycle.

  As described above, since the water heater according to the present invention can achieve high energy saving, comfort and convenience, it can be applied to a household water heater as described above, and has a large-scale use such as business use. It is also possible to provide high convenience for equipment managers.

Configuration diagram of a water heater in Embodiment 1 of the present invention Front view of the bathroom remote control Configuration diagram of the bathroom remote control Configuration of a conventional water heater

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Hot water tank 2 Heat pump unit 3 Bathtub 4 Heat exchanger (bathtub heating means)
8 Infrared sensor (human sensor)
9 Bathroom remote control 15 Infrared element 16 Lens 17 Light receiving surface 18 Infrared sensor installation reference surface

Claims (6)

A bathtub, a bathtub heating means for heating hot water in the bathtub, a human sensor for detecting presence or absence of a person in the bathroom, and a remote controller, and a front end surface of the human sensor and a front end surface of the remote controller And the human sensor is disposed on the remote controller so that the front end surface of the human sensor is located inward of the front end surface of the remote controller. Water heater. The water heater according to claim 1, wherein the human sensor is configured to detect infrared rays emitted by a bather. A hot water storage tank and hot water storage tank heating means for heating hot water in the hot water storage tank are provided, and the bathtub heating means is configured to heat the hot water in the bathtub with hot water in the hot water storage tank. Item 3. A water heater according to item 1 or 2. The hot water storage device according to claim 3, wherein the hot water tank heating means uses a heat pump cycle. The water heater according to claim 4, wherein the heat pump cycle is a supercritical refrigerant circuit that is boosted to a supercritical pressure during operation. The hot water supply apparatus according to claim 5, wherein the refrigerant of the heat pump cycle is carbon dioxide.