JP2856606B2 - Drum type clothes dryer - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a drum type clothes dryer, and more particularly, to a clothes storage drum having an intake port and an exhaust port, an air circulation duct provided outside the drum, and this duct. The present invention relates to a structure of a drum-type clothes dryer provided with an air heater provided inside the drum.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a drum-type clothes dryer as shown in FIGS. 3 and 4 is generally known. Hereinafter, the clothes dryer will be described with reference to the overall configuration diagram of FIG. 3 and the perspective view of FIG.

[0003] 1 is an outer box. On the front side of the outer box 1, there is provided a circular clothing slot 2 for inserting clothing, and a door 3 for opening and closing the clothing slot 2. Further, a door packing 4 having elasticity is attached to the periphery of the clothing inlet 2 to seal a gap between the clothing inlet 2 and the door 3. 5 is an inlet packing,
This is for sealing the gap between the outer box 1 and the drum support plate 6.

[0004] Reference numeral 7 denotes a clothes storage drum provided in the outer box 1. The drum 7 is rotatably supported by a horizontal drum shaft 8 provided on the back side thereof, and is rotationally driven by a belt 9 wound around the outer periphery. 10
Is a motor for driving the drum 7.

[0005] An exhaust port 11 for discharging air from the drum 7 is formed behind the rear side wall of the drum 7, and is used for collecting lint and cotton dust generated from the inside of the drum 7. A dust collection filter 12 is provided.

Reference numeral 13 denotes a heat exchange fan provided coaxially with the drum shaft 8. The heat exchange fan 13 discharges the air in the drum 7 from the exhaust port 11 and exchanges heat between the discharged air and the outside air to cool and dehumidify the discharged air. A fan casing 14 is provided around the heat exchange fan 13.

Reference numeral 15 denotes an air circulation duct connected to the exhaust port 11 of the drum 7 via a fan casing 14. The duct 15 is provided so as to extend from the back surface of the drum 7 to the front surface of the drum 7 through the lower side of the drum 7, and the outlet thereof is provided at the hot air intake port 1 on the front surface of the drum 7.
6 is connected.

Reference numeral 17 denotes an air heater provided near the outlet in the duct 15. The heater 17 heats the air that has passed through the duct 15 and supplies warm air into the drum 7. 18 is the fan casing 1
4 and a sliding portion of the fan 13.

The operation of the clothes dryer having such a configuration will be described. For wet clothing, open the door 3 and open the clothing
From the drum 7. Here, when the clothes dryer is driven, the drum 7 rotates and the fan 13 also rotates. Then, the air that has passed through the heater 17 and has become high-temperature hot air is introduced into the drum 7. Then the clothing
Tumbled by the baffle 19 in the drum 7,
It is dried by contact with the supplied hot air.

The air that has become humid during the drying process is supplied to the drum 7
And is introduced into the duct 15. Also,
By contacting the fan 13, the air is cooled and dehumidified and becomes low humidity air. Then, the drum 7 is heated again by the heater 17.
Supplied within. Drying is performed by repeating the above cycle.

[0011]

As described above, the heater for heating the air is generally disposed at a position facing the lower front surface of the drum. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 5, high-temperature air for drying a relatively large amount of clothes is
When sucked by the heat exchange fan, it flows through the inner surface of the peripheral wall of the drum to the exhaust port while staying near the intake port due to the rotation of the drum and tumbling by the baffle, as indicated by the arrow. Also, due to long-term tumbling, the clothes in the center of the drum are heavily entangled and twisted with each other. For this reason, the clothes are hardly dried near the center of the drum (A zone) in FIG.
There were also many drying irregularities.

Conversely, when the amount of clothes in the drum is relatively small, the air in the drum flows straight from the center of the drum to the exhaust port, so that the waste of the heated high-temperature air increases, and the drying efficiency increases. In addition, there is a problem that the running cost is increased as well as the running cost.

In order to solve such inconvenience, the flow of hot air may be controlled and circulated depending on the amount of clothes to be dried. From such a concept, in the fully automatic washing and drying machine disclosed in Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-Open No. 58-794, the end surface of the door glass is inclined to supply hot air to the lower portion inside the drum in a concentrated manner. It has become.

However, the invention disclosed in this publication relates to a fully automatic washing and drying machine, and has not solved the above-mentioned problem due to differences in a circulating air path and overall structure from a clothes dryer.

The present invention has been made in view of the above-described circumstances, and has as its object to prevent drying unevenness without being influenced by the amount of clothes to be dried, and to improve drying efficiency. Another object of the present invention is to provide a drum-type clothes dryer capable of reducing running costs.

[0016]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention provides an outer case, a clothes storage drum rotatably supported inside the outer case, and having a suction port and an exhaust port, and an outer drum inside the outer case. A duct for air circulation provided in, and a heater for air heating provided inside the duct, and the drying air warmed by the heater is introduced into the inside of the drum from the intake port, while drying the clothes. In a drum-type clothes dryer equipped with a heat exchange fan that is discharged from the exhaust port to the outside of the drum and circulated again through the duct to the inside of the drum, between the heater in the duct and the suction port of the drum,
A drum-type clothes dryer characterized in that a guide plate for distributing and flowing drying air in a lower part direction and a central part direction in a drum is provided.

That is, in the drum-type clothes dryer according to the present invention, a guide plate is provided between the heater in the duct and the suction port of the drum, and the guide plate allows the drying air to flow in the lower direction and in the center of the drum. The gist of the present invention is to distribute and flow in the direction of the part.

It is more preferable that the position of the guide plate is changed by position changing means for flowing drying air at an arbitrary flow rate in a lower direction and a center direction in the drum. As the position changing means, for example, a solenoid or a motor is used.

[0019]

The position of the guide plate is freely changed by the position changing means. Then, when the drying amount measured by the drying amount detecting means for detecting the drying amount (the amount of the clothes to be dried) is large, the drying air in the direction toward the center in the drum is increased. Conversely, when the amount of drying is small, the amount of drying air in the lower direction in the drum is increased. In this way, drying unevenness is reduced, and a drying operation optimal for clothing is performed.

As an example of the dry amount detecting means, there is a method of measuring a change in the load current value to the motor depending on the magnitude of the dry amount, and calculating the dry amount by an arithmetic processing based on the measured change.
Based on the result detected by such a method, the guide plate between the heater and the air inlet is moved by an arbitrary amount in a predetermined direction.

That is, if the drying amount is large, the guide plate is lowered by a solenoid or a motor. Then, much of the heated air passing through the heater flows to the central portion in the drum. Conversely, if the amount of drying is small, raise the guide plate. Then, a large amount of the air flows downward in the drum, and moves along the inner surface of the peripheral wall of the drum.

[0022]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention will be described below with reference to the embodiments shown in FIGS. Note that the present invention is not limited to this. In this embodiment, the same parts as those of the related art are denoted by the same reference numerals, and description thereof will be omitted or simplified.

In the outer box 1, a drum 7 rotatably supported and containing clothes to be dried is pivotally supported. The circulation path of the drying air heated by the air heating heater 17 is divided into two duct intermediate portions 15b and 15d by a horizontal guide plate 20 which is moved up and down by a solenoid 22 as position changing means. That is, the duct 15 includes a duct lower part 15a, a duct middle part 15b
d and a duct upper part 15c. The duct intermediate portions 15b and 15d are further divided into a lower intermediate portion 15d and an upper intermediate portion 15b.

The lower duct portion 15a is a portion extending from the lower side of the drum 7 to the lower front portion. The lower intermediate portion 15d is guided by the guide plate 20 after the air rising in the duct lower portion 15a is heated by the heater 17, and is guided by the guide plate 2.
0 is a portion to be introduced into the drum 7 from below. The upper intermediate portion 15b is connected to the guide plate 2 after the air rising in the lower portion 15a of the duct is heated by the heater 17.
This is a part for flowing upward by being guided by 0.

The duct upper part 15c is provided inside the door 3 by utilizing its thickness. This duct upper part 15c
When the door 3 is closed,
Is a part where the air that has risen up flows into the drum 7 and is then introduced into the inside of the drum 7. The upper intermediate portion 15b of the duct 15 and the upper portion 15c of the duct are divided to open and close the door 3, but when the door 3 is closed, it is sealed by the duct packing 23.

The air flowing through the upper intermediate portion 15b of the duct 15 is introduced from the upper intermediate portion 15b toward the center of the drum 7 through the duct upper portion 15c. Then, the clothes in the center of the drum 7 are dried. Meanwhile, duct 1
The air flowing through the lower intermediate portion 15 d of the drum 5 is introduced downward in the drum 7. Then, the clothes near the inner surface of the peripheral wall of the drum 7 are dried.

Duct upper part 15c and lower intermediate part 15d
The humid air that has been introduced into the inside of the drum 7 to dehumidify the clothes is discharged from the drum 7 by the suction action of the heat exchange fan 13 and collected in the exhaust port 11. Then, after the heat is exchanged by the fan 13 into low-humidity air, the cycle of circulating again from the duct lower portion 15a to the heater 17 is repeated.

The operating portion of the guide plate 20 is the drum support plate 6
And is provided in a guide plate case 21 provided with a sliding portion of the guide plate 20. Further, a solenoid 22 as a position changing means for operating the guide plate 20 is fixed to the guide plate case 21.

In the dry air circulation path as described above, when the dry amount detected by the dry amount detecting means is large,
The guide plate 20 is moved downward by the solenoid 22. Then, as described above, the upper intermediate portion 15 of the duct 15
b and the flow rate of the drying air flowing to the central portion in the drum 7 through the duct upper portion 15c. This prevents uneven drying of the clothes. Conversely, when the drying amount is small, the guide plate 20 is moved upward to concentrate the drying air entering the drum 7 from the lower intermediate portion 15d of the duct 15 near the inner surface of the peripheral wall of the drum 7.

[0030]

As described above, in the drum-type clothes dryer of the present invention, the high-temperature drying air heated by the heater is heated depending on the amount of the clothes to be dried. (In the direction of the inner peripheral surface of the drum) at a set flow rate. Therefore, not only can the drying unevenness, which is a drawback of the conventional clothes dryer, be eliminated, but also the drying efficiency can be increased and the running cost can be reduced. Furthermore, since the drying air comes into contact with each garment almost uniformly, the effect of reducing the damage to the cloth is also achieved.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is an explanatory view of the overall configuration of a drum-type clothes dryer according to one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram of a main part configuration of the drum-type clothes dryer.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory view of the entire configuration of a conventional drum-type clothes dryer.

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of the drum-type clothes dryer.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing a flow state of circulating air in the drum-type clothes dryer when the clothes have a large capacity.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Outer box 2 Clothing input port 3 Door 4 Door packing 5 Input port packing 6 Drum support plate 7 Drum 8 Drum shaft 9 Belt 10 Motor 11 Exhaust port 13 Heat exchange fan 14 Fan casing 15 Duct 16 Intake port 17 Heater 18 Sliding Part 19 Baffle 20 Guide plate 21 Guide plate case 22 Solenoid (Position changing means)

Continued on the front page (72) Noriaki Miyoshi, Inventor 22-22, Nagaikecho, Abeno-ku, Osaka-shi, Osaka Inside (72) Inventor Kazutoshi 22-22, Nagaike-cho, Abeno-ku, Osaka-shi, Osaka 72) Inventor Yuji Onishi 22-22 Nagaike-cho, Abeno-ku, Osaka City, Osaka Prefecture Inside Sharp Corporation (56) References JP-A-5-317584 (JP, A) JP-A-57-49498 (JP, A) JP-A-57-100000 (JP, A) JP-A-3-94798 (JP, A) JP-A-60-109595 (JP, U) (58) Fields investigated (Int. Cl. ⁶ , DB name) D06F 58 / 02

Claims (2)

(57) [Claims] 1. An outer case, a clothes storage drum rotatably supported inside the outer case, and having a suction port and an exhaust port, and an air circulation duct provided inside the outer case outside the drum. And a heater for air heating provided inside the duct, and the drying air heated by the heater introduced into the interior of the drum from the intake port, and from the exhaust port to the outside of the drum while drying the clothes. In a drum type clothes dryer equipped with a heat exchange fan for discharging and circulating again through the duct to the inside of the drum, drying air is supplied between a heater in the duct and a suction port of the drum. 1. A drum-type clothes dryer characterized in that a guide plate for distributing and flowing in a direction and a central direction is provided. 2. The guide plate according to claim 1, wherein the position of the guide plate is changed by position changing means for flowing drying air at an arbitrary flow rate in a lower direction and a center direction in the drum. Drum type clothes dryer.