KR101833924B1 - Heating device having multiple heaters connected in series - Google Patents

Abstract

A first stage and a second stage for supplying predetermined operating power; A heating body that self-generates heat or heats the object by the operating power, the heating body comprising: at least three heating elements connected in series between the first end and the second end; A plurality of relays connected between each of the connection points and the second stage between the serially connected heaters; And a microcomputer controlling at least one of the plurality of relays to supply the operating power to at least one of the three or more heating bodies to thereby control the heating operation .

Description

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention [0001] The present invention relates to a heating device having a plurality of heating elements connected in series,

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a heating apparatus having a plurality of heating elements, and more particularly, to an electric range equipped with a plurality of working coils connected in series.

There is known a heating device, particularly an electric range, which cooks food contained in a cooking container by generating heat by itself or by applying energy to the cooking container or food by self-heating.

On the other hand, an electric range equipped with at least two openings has been developed in accordance with a user's demand for performing various kinds of cooking at the same time.

In such an electric range equipped with a plurality of culverts, separate control means are required for each culter, so that there are problems such as difficulties in designing, cost of parts, and increasing probability of failure. Therefore, by connecting a plurality of fireboxes in combination with relays in various ways, the maximum number of fireboxes can be operated in various ways by a minimum number of control means.

Further, when the user actually uses the electric range, the position at which the cooking container is adjusted to the position of the cooking cavity, the size or shape of the cooking container to be used may be different. Accordingly, a single burning zone is divided into a plurality of small burning zones, a small burning zone is disposed in each of the plurality of burning zones, and a small burning zone is selectively operated to perform the heating operation with optimum efficiency according to various usage methods of the user.

And it is an object of the present invention to provide a heating device capable of selecting and operating a plurality of craters in various ways.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a heating apparatus including a plurality of heating elements connected in series, including: a first stage and a second stage for supplying predetermined operating power; A heating body that self-generates heat or heats the object by the operating power, the heating body comprising: at least three heating elements connected in series between the first end and the second end; A plurality of relays connected between each of the connection points and the second stage between the serially connected heaters; And a microcomputer controlling at least one of the plurality of relays to control the heating operation by supplying the operating power to at least one of the three or more heating bodies.

Here, the operating power may be a high frequency direct current power, and the heating means may be a working coil for induction heating the cooking vessel by the high frequency direct current power.

Further, the three or more heating bodies may be disposed in one heating area for heating one object.

According to another embodiment of the present invention, there is provided a heating apparatus including a plurality of heating elements connected in series, comprising: a first stage and a second stage for supplying predetermined operating power; A heating body for generating heat by itself or generating heat by the operating power, the heating body comprising: first to fourth heating elements, one end and the other end of which are connected to each other in series; First to third relays connected between respective connection points of the first to fourth heating elements connected in series and the second stage; A fourth relay for connecting the other end of the fourth heating body to the second end; A fifth relay having an input coupled to the first end and a first and a second selected end; And a second selection stage connected to a connection point between the first heating element and the second heating element, and a second selection stage connected to the connection point between the first heating element and the second heating element, A sixth relay; An input connected to a second selection terminal of the fifth relay, a first selection stage connected to a connection point between the second heating body and the third heating body, and a second selection stage connected to a connection point between the third heating body and the fourth heating body, A seventh relay having two select stages; And a microcomputer for controlling the heating operation by controlling the first to seventh relays to supply the operating power to at least one of the four heating elements.

The heating apparatus including the plurality of heating elements according to the present invention may include an induction heating type electric range and may be operated by adding or removing a plurality of heating elements serially connected to each other have. As a result, the amount of output of the heating operation can be controlled step by step.

Also, at least one of the plurality of heating elements connected in series may be arbitrarily selected and operated.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a structure of a heating apparatus according to the present invention.
2 is a view showing a part of a circuit structure of a heating apparatus having a plurality of heating bodies according to an embodiment of the present invention.
Fig. 3 shows an example of a top plate structure of a heating apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.
4 is a view showing a part of a circuit structure of a heating apparatus having four heating bodies according to another embodiment of the present invention.
5 is a view showing the structure of the circuit structure shown in FIG. 4 except for the fourth working coil.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of a heating apparatus having a plurality of heating bodies according to various embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. It is to be understood that the terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments of the invention only and is not intended to be limiting.

First, the structure of the heating apparatus according to the present invention will be briefly described with reference to the block diagram of FIG.

The power supply unit 10 converts the input power into a voltage or a current required by each part of the heating apparatus and supplies the converted voltage or current.

The heating unit 20 generates heat by itself or generates a heating object, for example, a cooking container or food, by operating power provided by the power supply unit 10. [ The heating section 20 may include one or a plurality of heating bodies 21, 22, 23, and 24. Examples of the operation method of each heating body include a method of self-heating by electric resistance, a method of generating electromagnetic waves to induce self-heating of the cooking container (induction heating method), a method of generating electromagnetic waves to heat the food itself, And a method of transmitting heat energy to the food by irradiating light waves.

The microcomputer 30 operates by the DC voltage provided by the power supply unit 10 and controls the electric power provided to each part of the heating apparatus, particularly, the heating unit 20, thereby processing the food cooking function of the heating apparatus.

Particularly, in the heating apparatus according to the present invention, the heating section 20 includes a plurality of heating elements 21, 22, 23 and 24, and the heating elements 21, 22, 23 and 24 are connected in series And a relay for bypassing power to be applied to the series connection point of the heating elements is coupled.

Then, the microcomputer 30 controls the operation of each relay so that at least one of the heating elements connected in series can perform the heating operation at the same time.

Fig. 2 is a view showing a part of a circuit structure of a heating apparatus according to an embodiment having a plurality of, in particular, three or more heating elements in the heating apparatus as described above. In the present embodiment, an electric range equipped with an induction heating type heater will be used.

The electric range generates high-frequency DC power by high-frequency switching the input DC power using a high-side switching device (QH) and a low-side switching device (QL). The high-frequency switching signals HIGH_SIDE and LOW_SIDE generated by the microcomputer 30 may be input to the switching elements QH and QL, respectively.

A plurality of working coils 21, 22, 23, and 24 (working in the present invention) are provided in the first stage 11 and the second stage 12, which constitute output sides of the respective switching devices QH and QL, At least three coils are preferably included, and four working coils are shown in the drawing) are connected in series.

In particular, the connection point between each of the working coils is coupled to the relay for bypassing current to the second stage 12, respectively. Of course, each of the relays 31, 32, 33 may be connected to bypass the current to the first stage 11.

The microcomputer 30 can individually control the ON or OFF operation of each of the relays 31, 32,

In this configuration, when the microcomputer 30 turns on the first relay 31 by the signal SW1, the high-frequency power from the switching elements can be supplied only to the first working coil 21. When the microcomputer 30 turns off the first relay 31 and turns on the second relay 32 by the signals SW1 and SW2, the high frequency power is supplied to the first working coil 21 and the second working And can be supplied to the coil 22. When the first relay 31 and the second relay 32 are turned off by the signals SW1, SW2 and SW3 and the third relay 33 is turned on, the high frequency power is supplied to the first to third working coils 21 and 22 , 23).

On the other hand, turning off all the relays 31, 32, 33 will cause the first to fourth working coils 21, 22, 23, 24 to operate simultaneously.

According to such a circuit construction method and a control method, the first working coil 21 always operates in the heating operation, and the second to fourth working coils 22, 23, 24 can be turned on sequentially or turned off in the reverse order have.

Accordingly, the working coils can be operated sequentially according to the step of heating the heating coil, or selectively operated according to the size of the cooking vessel.

Fig. 3 is a view showing an example of a manner of arranging a working coil in an electric range configured as in the above embodiment. Fig. The upper surface of the electric range is usually composed of a flat upper plate 28. A working coil for performing induction heating may be disposed below the upper plate 28, and an area corresponding to the shape and position of the working coil may be visually displayed on the upper plate 28. The user can place the cooking container or the cooking object on the heating area and start induction heating.

The left portion of the top plate 28 in the figure shows an example having a large heating area 25 including a plurality of small heating areas 21, 22, 23 and 24. In this configuration, the user can place the heating object at any position within the heating zone 25, and the micom 30 can select and operate at least one of the small heating zones corresponding to the size and position of the object have.

Here, since the working coils in this embodiment can be sequentially operated from the first working coil 21, the user is preferentially placed in the small-scale heating area 21 to which the first working coil is applied, If the object is to be added or a larger object is to be heated, the heating area 21 corresponding to the first working coil may be used as a reference to guide the object to be placed over the peripheral area.

On the other hand, in the drawing, the right side portion of the upper plate 28 shows a plurality of small heating regions 21, 22, 23, 24 arranged concentrically. Particularly, the first to fourth working coils are disposed outward from the center of the concentric circle.

According to such a configuration, when the user uses a small cooking vessel, the micom 30 identifies the size of the cooking vessel, and correspondingly operates only the first working coil 21 to perform heating. Also, the second to fourth working coils 22, 23, 24 can be sequentially operated as the cooking vessel is enlarged or shaped. Accordingly, the optimum heating operation can be performed according to the size of the cooking vessel.

When the cooking is started, the microcomputer 30 operates all of the four working coils 21, 22, 23 and 24, identifies the working coil in which the induction heating is performed among the working coils, (The working coil not participating in the induction heating), the heating operation can be controlled to be performed at the optimum efficiency.

Further, when the user selects the output stage of the heating operation, it is possible to select and operate the working coils corresponding to the output.

For example, when the user selects the first-stage heating output, only the first working coil 21 can be operated. When the user selects the second stage, the first and second heating coils 21 and 22 can be operated. The third heating coil and the fourth heating coil may be sequentially operated by selecting the third or fourth step.

4 is a view showing a part of a circuit structure of a heating apparatus having a plurality of heating bodies according to another embodiment of the present invention. In this embodiment, three relays 45, 46, and 47 are added to implement each of the heating bodies, that is, the first to fourth working coils 21, 22, 23, and 24, One example is disclosed.

Referring to FIG. 1, seven relays are connected to four first through fourth working coils 21, 22, 23, and 24 connected in series.

The first to third relays 41, 42 and 43 are connected to each of the series connection points of the first to fourth working coils 21, 22, 23 and 24 and the power supply unit 10, And the second end 12 of the connector.

A fourth relay 44 is disposed at the other end of the fourth working coil 24 from the connecting point with the third working coil 23 so as to be connected to the second end 12 .

Meanwhile, the fifth to seventh relays 45, 46 and 47 can be added, which can connect the input terminal to one of the two selection stages.

The input of the fifth relay 45 may be connected to the first end 11 of the power supply 10.

The input of the sixth relay 46 may be connected to the first selected end of the fifth relay 45. The first selection terminal of the sixth relay 46 may be coupled to one end of the first working coil 21 (i.e., the other end from the connection point with the second working coil). The second selection end of the sixth relay 46 may be coupled to the other end of the first working coil 21 (i.e., the connection point with the second working coil).

The input of the seventh relay (47) is connected to the second selection terminal of the fifth relay (45). The first selection end of the seventh relay 47 is coupled to the connection point of the second working coil 22 and the third working coil 23. The second selection end of the seventh relay 47 is coupled to the connection point of the third working coil 23 and the connection point of the fourth working coil 24.

Each of the selection operations of the first to seventh relays can be controlled by the microcomputer 50. In addition to selecting and operating any one of the working coils, it is also possible to arbitrarily select and operate a plurality of two or more working coils Lt; / RTI >

Fig. 5 is a view showing the circuit structure shown in Fig. 4 except for the fourth working coil. As shown in the figure, when one working coil, for example, the fourth working coil is excluded, the fourth relay and the seventh relay can be eliminated.

Conversely, if another working coil, for example, a fifth working coil is to be connected in series to the other end of the fourth relay, an additional relay must be coupled between the other end and the second end of the fifth working coil. The first selecting end is coupled to the connection point of the third working coil and the fourth working coil and the second selecting end is connected to the fourth working coil and the fifth working coil, Lt; RTI ID = 0.0 > relay < / RTI >

The embodiments of the present invention described above are merely illustrative of the technical idea of the present invention, and the scope of protection of the present invention should be interpreted according to the claims. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made in the present invention without departing from the essential characteristics thereof, It is to be understood that the invention is not limited thereto.

Claims (4)

A first stage and a second stage for supplying predetermined operating power;
At least three heating elements connected in series to each other without any relay being interposed between the first end and the second end;
A plurality of relays connecting each of the connection points between the serially connected heating elements to the second stage;
And a microcomputer controlling at least one of the plurality of relays to control the heating operation by supplying the operating power to at least one of the three or more heating bodies. The method according to claim 1,
Wherein the operating power is high frequency direct current power,
Wherein the heating body is a working coil for induction heating the cooking vessel by the high frequency direct current power. 3. The method according to claim 1 or 2,
Characterized in that the three or more heating elements are arranged in one heating area for heating one object. A first stage and a second stage for supplying predetermined operating power;
First, second, third, and fourth heating elements connected in series to each other without any relays at one end and the other end of the heating body for self-heating or generating heat by the operating power;
First, second and third relays connecting each of the series connection points of the first, second, third and fourth heating elements to the second end;
A fourth relay for connecting the other end of the fourth heating body to the second end;
A fifth relay having an input coupled to the first end and a first and a second selected end;
And a second selection stage connected to a connection point between the first heating element and the second heating element, and a second selection stage connected to the connection point between the first heating element and the second heating element, A sixth relay;
An input connected to a second selection terminal of the fifth relay, a first selection stage connected to a connection point between the second heating body and the third heating body, and a second selection stage connected to a connection point between the third heating body and the fourth heating body, A seventh relay having two select stages;
And a microcomputer for controlling the heating operation by controlling the first to seventh relays to supply the operating power to at least one of the first to fourth heating bodies, .

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