KR0136975B1 - Refrigerator having a chamber for kimchi - Google Patents

Abstract

A refrigerator compartment and a kimchi chamber in the form of an independent room are arranged below this refrigerator compartment, and a freezer compartment is located below this kimchi chamber.

In addition, the outer wall of the kimchi room is surrounded by a heater.

The steam generated from the evaporator on the rear wall of the freezer compartment is supplied to the kimchi chamber by a kimchi chamber damper that is opened and closed according to the temperature conditions of the kimchi chamber.

The present invention relates to a refrigerator that keeps kimchi at an optimal uniform temperature range by aging the kimchi in a kimchi room with a heater and then sending it to the kimchi room.

Description

Refrigerator with Kimchi room

1 is a side view of a refrigerator to which the present invention is applied

2 is a front sectional view of a refrigerator to which the present invention is applied.

3 is a cross-sectional view taken along the line I-I of FIG.

4 is a cross-sectional view taken along the line II-II of FIG.

5 is a cross-sectional view taken along line III-III of FIG.

6 is a side cross-sectional view of a refrigerator according to the prior art

* Explanation of symbols for main parts of the drawings

15 freezer 16: cold storage room

21: fresh room 23: kimchi room

24: heater 25: cold air outlet

50: main cooling passage 51: main damper

52: Kimchi thread damper

The present invention relates to a kimchi chamber independently installed in the refrigerator, and more particularly to a refrigerator having a kimchi chamber damper that is independently opened and closed according to the temperature conditions of the kimchi chamber.

Refrigerator is used to store various foods in the frozen and cooled state to maintain freshness for a long time. The cooling method is a direct cooling method and an evaporator for direct heat exchange with the air in the storage space by installing an evaporator in the food storage space. There is an indirect cooling method in which cold air heat-exchanged through an evaporator is circulated to a food storage space using a blower fan by installing on a passage separated from the storage space.

In addition, the refrigerator is generally divided up and down by a freezer compartment installed at the top and a refrigerating compartment installed at the bottom, and the refrigerator compartment maintains a temperature space of a temperature difference between the refrigerator compartment temperature, that is, a vegetable compartment, or a temperature range of about -1 ° C. It is equipped with a special storage room for storing and selectively storing according to the storage temperature of the food. The front door of the refrigerating chamber and the freezing chamber is installed at the center of one side, and the evaporator and the blower fan are arranged on the rear wall of the freezing chamber. It is installed in the cold passage.

However, the refrigerator as described above has the advantage of increasing the storage area and the convenience of opening and closing, but has caused a number of problems by storing various kinds of fermented foods, that is, kimchi in the refrigerating room with other foods.

The container containing kimchi is relatively bulky and heavy, taking up a lot of space, and there was a defect in handling it because it interfered with the kimchi container when storing or withdrawing foods stored with kimchi.

In particular, the unique smell that occurs when the kimchi is aged in the refrigerating chamber is doubled to other foods, and also frequently open and close the door to put the kimchi into the refrigerator to lose the cold air in the refrigerator to reduce the cooling efficiency.

In order to improve this, a refrigerator having an independent room for storing kimchi exclusively is disclosed in Utility Model No. 92-18148.

6 is a side cross-sectional view of the refrigerator to which the prior art is applied, in which the freezer compartment 1, the refrigerating compartment 2, the kimchi chamber 3, and the vegetable compartment 4 are sequentially separated from the top.

The rear wall of the freezing chamber 1 is provided with an evaporator 5 and a blowing fan 6 to supply cold air to each of the chambers 1, 2 and 4 except for the kimchi chamber 3.

The kimchi chamber (3), which is prepared for aging kimchi at high temperature and stored at a low temperature, forms a closed space separate from the freezing chamber (1), the refrigerating chamber (2) and the vegetable chamber (4), and the heater (7) and the evaporator (8). Equipped with.

Heater (7) is a device for heating the air in the kimchi chamber (3) in order to ripen the stored kimchi, and has a rectangular plate heating plate bent the outer edge except the front to a predetermined height to zigzag the heating wire on the outer wall surface It is arranged.

Evaporator (8) is a device for storing the mature kimchi at low temperature, wrap the left and right outer wall and the rear outer wall of the kimchi chamber (3) with a cooling plate and arranged the refrigerant pipes on the left and right and rear of the outer wall surface in order to the vegetable compartment ( 4) is connected to the second compressor (9) and the second condenser (not shown) installed on the rear wall of the second capillary tube (not shown).

In order to ripen and store the kimchi as described above, an evaporator must be installed separately in the kimchi chamber in addition to the evaporator and the compressor for cooling the refrigerating chamber and the freezing chamber, and also a compressor, a condenser and a capillary tube are required to purify the refrigerant with the evaporator. This requires extra installation cost and installation space.

In addition, the refrigerator compartment of such a conventional refrigerator is located in the lower part of the freezer compartment, and the consumer generally has to bear and store the core in the refrigerator compartment in an uncomfortable position in view of using the refrigerator compartment more frequently than the freezer compartment.

Accordingly, the present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned general defects, and an object thereof is to provide a refrigerator having a kimchi chamber damper that is formed separately from the refrigerator compartment in the kimchi chamber and independently opened and closed according to the temperature conditions of the kimchi chamber. will be.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a refrigerator for low temperature storage of kimchi matured by an indirect cooling method of cooling the kimchi chamber with a common evaporator.

Another object of the present invention is to present a refrigerator having a refrigerating compartment at the top, a freezer compartment at the bottom and a kimchi chamber located between the refrigerating compartment and the freezing compartment.

The refrigerator of the present invention comprises a refrigerator compartment, a freezer compartment located at the bottom of the refrigerator compartment, an evaporator located at the rear wall of the freezer compartment, and an independent room located between the refrigerator compartment and the freezer compartment and surrounded by a heater on its outer wall. And the main damper for adjusting the flow of cold air passing through the evaporator into the refrigerating chamber, and the independent chamber damper for adjusting the flow of cold air passing through the evaporator into the independent chamber.

Here, the independent chamber is used as a kimchi chamber for aging kimchi at a high temperature with the heater, and storing the kimchi that has been aged at a low temperature by cold air passing through the independent chamber damper.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1 is a side cross-sectional view of a refrigerator to which the present invention is applied, and FIG. 2 is a front sectional view of a refrigerator to which the present invention is applied.

The refrigerator is divided into a refrigerator compartment 16, an independent compartment 20, a freezer compartment 15, and a vegetable compartment 32 in order from the top, and the doors are opened and closed around both sides in front of the freezer compartment 15 and the refrigerator compartment 16. (UD) is configured, the independent chamber 20 is configured with a door (LD) to open and close up and down about the lower both sides, the vegetable chamber 32 is a door that slides forward and backward integrally with the vegetable box 34 ( VD) is configured.

A first intermediate wall 40 partitioning the refrigerator compartment 16 and the freezer compartment 15 is disposed between the refrigerator compartment 16 and the freezer compartment 15, and a second intermediate wall partitioning the freezer compartment 15 and the vegetable compartment 32. 20 is disposed between the freezer compartment 15 and the vegetable compartment 32.

The independent room 20 is installed by being surrounded by a heat insulating wall at the lower part of the refrigerator compartment 16 so as to be isolated from the space of the refrigerator compartment 16. As shown in FIG. It consists of a fresh room 21 for keeping fresh at a certain temperature and humidity and a kimchi room 23 for aging kimchi, a Korean native food, at a high temperature and storing it again at a low temperature.

The rear wall 15W of the freezing chamber 15 includes a refrigerating chamber 16, an independent chamber 20, and a heat exchange chamber H communicating with the freezing chamber 15, and an evaporator 17 is mounted thereon, and a freezing chamber thereon. The blower fan 18 is installed toward 15.

A vertical wall 19 is provided in front of the fan 18 and the evaporator 17, and a cold air outlet 54 to the freezing chamber 15 is formed in the vertical space 19.

In addition, the blower fan 18 vertically penetrates the first intermediate wall 40 through the main cold air passage 50 that guides the cool air to the freezer compartment 15, as well as the refrigerator compartment 16 and the independent compartment 20. To form.

The upper part of the main cold passage 50, the main damper 51 for adjusting the flow rate of the cold air passing through the main cold passage 50 to the refrigerating chamber 16, and each chamber 21 of the independent chamber 20 Independent chamber dampers 52 and 53 for adjusting the amount of cold air flowing into the 23 are arranged in parallel.

In the refrigerator of the present invention configured as described above, a part of the cold air heat exchanged in the evaporator 17 is sent to the cold air discharge port 54 formed in the vertical wall 19 by the blowing fan 18. At the same time, the other part of the cold air is sent to the main cold air passage 50 by the blowing fan 18.

The cold air sent to the main cold passage 50 is advanced to the refrigerator compartment damper 51, the kimchi chamber damper 52, and the fresh chamber damper 53, which are opened according to the temperature conditions of each chamber. The cold air passing through the refrigerating compartment damper 51 is discharged to the refrigerating compartment 16 through the cold air outlet 66 provided in the rear wall of the refrigerating compartment, circulates in the refrigerating compartment 16, and then, as illustrated in FIG. 4, the first intermediate wall ( Through the cold compartment cold air outlet (41, 42) formed in the upper front of the 40 proceeds to the vegetable compartment (32) along the cold air passage (80) connecting the cold passage of the refrigeration compartment (16) and the vegetable compartment (32).

In addition, the cold air passing through the kimchi chamber damper 52 through the evaporator 17 is introduced through the kimchi chamber cold air discharge port 25, as shown in FIG. 3, circulates in the kimchi chamber 23, and then of the kimchi chamber 23. It is formed in the right side wall is introduced into the kimchi chamber cold air passage 70 through the cold air outlet (26). The cold air that proceeds to the kimchi chamber cold air passage 70, as shown in FIG. 4, is the cold room coolant and the cold air inflow path 80 (shown in FIG. 2) passing through the cold compartment cold air outlets 41 and 42. After being mixed in, proceeds to the vegetable compartment (32). Accordingly, the low temperature cold of the refrigerating chamber 16 and the high temperature cold air of the kimchi chamber 23 are uniformly mixed to flow into the vegetable chamber 32 so that the cold air suitable for storage of the vegetables stored in the vegetable chamber 32 is supplied.

Air circulating in the vegetable compartment 32 and the temperature slightly raised flows into the lower suction part 65 of the second intermediate wall 30 and proceeds to the second induction path 75 (FIGS. 2 and 5).

On the other hand, the cold air circulated in the freezing chamber 15 flows into the upper suction port 61 of the second intermediate wall 30 as shown in FIG. 2 and proceeds to the first induction road 71.

The cold air passing through the first and second induction paths 71 and 75 is combined in the mixing unit 77, as shown in FIG. The temperature of the air passing through is lowered.

Furthermore, the cold air introduced through the rear suction port 67 of the freezer compartment 15 is also combined with the mixed air whose air temperature is slightly lowered, which flows into the evaporator 17 while the mixed air is further lowered. As a result, the relatively high temperature air passing through the vegetable chamber 32 is sufficiently mixed with the cold passed through the freezing chamber 15 before reaching the evaporator 17, thereby preventing the occurrence of frost in the evaporator 17.

Kimchi room 23, which is a feature of the present invention, occupies the right side of the independent room 20 located between the refrigerator compartment 16 and the freezer compartment 15.

On the rear wall of the kimchi chamber 23, a cold air outlet 25 is provided for supplying cold air cooled through the evaporator 17 through the kimchi chamber damper 52 by the blower fan 18 into the kimchi chamber 23. .

In addition, a cold air outlet 26 is provided on the right side wall of the kimchi chamber 23 for circulating the inside of the kimchi chamber 23 to discharge cold air that has cooled the room.

The left and right sides of the kimchi chamber 23, and the outer wall of the upper portion is surrounded by a heater 24 for aging the stored kimchi at a high temperature.

After the kimchi stored in the kimchi chamber 23 configured as described above is aged in a high temperature state and stored in a low temperature state is as follows.

First, when the immature kimchi stored in the kimchi chamber 23, the kimchi chamber damper 52 for adjusting the cold air flow into the kimchi chamber 23 is closed, the heater 24 is operated.

The apparatus capable of adjusting the time and temperature at which the heater 24 is operated is configured separately.

When the kimchi is fully matured, the operation of the heater 24 is stopped, and the kimchi chamber damper 52 is opened to store the aged kimchi at a low temperature.

Accordingly, by the operation of the blowing fan 18 cooled through the evaporator 17, the kimchi chamber 23 is supplied into the kimchi chamber 23 through the kimchi chamber damper 52.

Therefore, the kimchi is gradually reduced in temperature, the opening and closing of the kimchi chamber damper 52 is adjusted by a temperature sensor (not shown) in order to maintain an appropriate storage temperature.

As described above, the common chamber 23 is a common evaporator for supplying cold air to the refrigerating chamber 16, the freezing chamber 15, and the vegetable chamber 32 without the need for a separate cooler, compressor, condenser and capillary tube. Since the cold air is supplied by the 17 and the blower fan 18, the installation cost and the installation space of the apparatuses for cooling the kimchi chamber 23 are not required as compared with the related art.

Claims (1)

A refrigerating compartment 16, a freezing compartment 15 positioned below the refrigerating compartment 16, a first intermediate wall 40 separating the freezing compartment 15 and the refrigerating compartment 16, and the freezing compartment 15; An evaporator 17 positioned on the rear wall 15W of the chamber, an independent space disposed below the refrigerating chamber 16, and a kimchi chamber 23 surrounded by a heater 24 on the outer wall thereof, and the evaporator 17. Main damper 51 for adjusting the cold air passing through the) into the refrigerating chamber 15, and the kimchi chamber damper 52 for adjusting the cold air passing through the evaporator 17 flows into the kimchi chamber (23). And a vegetable chamber 32 disposed below the freezing chamber 15 and separated from the freezing chamber 15 through a second intermediate wall 30, and on one side wall of the kimchi chamber 23, a kimchi chamber cold air outlet. A plurality of refrigerating chamber cold air outlets 41 and 4 are formed at the first intermediate wall 40 to discharge cold air circulated in the refrigerating chamber 16. 2) is formed in the rear wall (15W) of the freezing chamber 15, the cold air passage (70) for mixing the cold air passing through the kimchi chamber cold air outlet 26 and the cold air passing through the refrigerator compartment cold air outlet (41, 42). And a cold air flow path (80) for sending the mixed cold air to the vegetable compartment (32).