KR20060067735A - Thawing apparatus in refrigerator and thawing method thereof - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a thawing apparatus of a refrigerator, and a separate thawing chamber is formed in one of the refrigerating chamber and the freezing chamber, and when food is present in the thawing chamber even after the thawing of the food, the cold air is supplied to the thawing chamber, Even if it is stored in the thawing room for a long time, it can maintain the freshness and maintain the optimal flavor of food.

Refrigerator, thawing room, convection heater, heating plate, freshness maintenance, cold air supply

Description

Thawing apparatus in refrigerator and thawing method

1 is a perspective view of the thawing chamber is applied to the refrigerator according to the present invention.

2 is a schematic cross-sectional view of a thawing chamber according to the present invention.

3 is an operation flowchart of the thawing chamber according to the present invention.

Explanation of symbols on main parts of drawing

10: refrigerator body 20: refrigerator

30: freezer compartment 40: refrigerator compartment door

50: freezer door 60: machine room

100: thawing room 102: thawing room door

110: convection heater 112: power supply

114: fan 116: bulkhead

118: suction discharge flow path 120: heat transfer plate

122: heating wire 130: temperature detection unit

140: cold air supply passage 142: damper

The present invention relates to a refrigerator, and more particularly to a thawing apparatus of the refrigerator. More specifically, the food freeze-stored in the freezer can be thawed to the optimum state before eating, and to maintain freshness even after thawing, thereby increasing the flavor of the food and improving the user's convenience in the thawing apparatus of the refrigerator. It is about.

A typical refrigerator includes a refrigerator compartment for storing food at a low temperature of an image, and a freezer compartment for freezing and storing food at a low temperature below zero. In addition, meat, instant food, and long-term storage food are generally stored in the freezer compartment, and the food stored in these freezer compartments is eaten after thawing when the user eats.

However, when the food is stored in the freezer for a long time, the moisture of the food is evaporated to lower the flavor of the food itself, and when the food is cooked, the surface is first cooked and the inside is not cooked.

As such, the frozen food is extremely frozen after being cooked due to its own factor of being frozen. Due to this problem, frozen foods are usually first thawed before cooking is performed.

In the thawing process of the food, it is important that both the inside and the outside of the food are thawed and the thawing process is performed quickly so that the user can eat quickly. In view of these factors, the conventional method of thawing has been applied such that food is gradually heated by external air at room temperature, or a high frequency of low output is applied by putting it inside a microwave oven.

However, during the process of slowly thawing frozen food at room temperature, since food is exposed to the outside, it is often easy to rot and become impossible to eat. And while the food is cooked by the high frequency in the inside of a microwave oven, the surface of the food is cooked by the high frequency, and the flavor of the food falls. In addition, the user's inconvenience is further increased because the food must be taken out of the freezer compartment and moved to a thawed place.

In addition, in the thawing room provided in the refrigerator separately, if stored in the thawing room for a long time even after the thawing of the frozen food is completed due to user's carelessness, the flavor of food is reduced, furthermore, the contamination of the entire refrigerator due to food decay This causes contamination of other food items stored in the refrigerator.

The present invention is to solve the above problems, it is an object of the present invention to provide a thawing apparatus of the refrigerator having a separate thawing room inside the refrigerator to increase the convenience of the user.

In addition, it is an object of the present invention to provide a thawing apparatus of a refrigerator which allows the frozen food to be thawed quickly and correctly by making an appropriate temperature and environment inside the refrigerator. In particular, it is an object of the present invention to provide a thawing apparatus of a refrigerator capable of quickly and correctly performing a thawing process of food and maintaining freshness even after thawing is completed by allowing heat applied to the food to be transferred to the food in multiple ways.

According to the technical idea of the present invention for achieving the above object, a separate thawing chamber formed inside the refrigerator, a convection heater installed in the thawing chamber, a heat transfer plate installed in the thawing chamber, and the thawing chamber It is achieved by the thawing apparatus of the refrigerator including a cold air supply passage connected to the evaporator side to supply cold air to the side wall.

Here, it is preferable to include a temperature detector installed on the heat transfer plate to detect the surface temperature of the frozen food stored in the thawing chamber.

In addition, it is preferable to include a temperature detection unit provided on the side wall of the thawing chamber to detect the internal temperature of the thawing chamber.

In addition, the cold air supply passage preferably includes a damper installed to open and close the inflow of cold air.

On the other hand, in another technical concept of the present invention for achieving the above object, the step of starting the operation of the refrigerator thawing chamber, determining whether the frozen food is thawed, the presence or absence of food in the thawing chamber It is achieved by the thawing method of the thawing chamber of the refrigerator comprising the step of determining and the step of introducing cold air into the thawing chamber.

Here, the step of the operation of the thawing chamber is preferably started, the step of heating the convection heater installed above the inside of the thawing chamber and the step of heating the heat transfer plate installed in the lower portion of the inside of the thawing chamber.

In addition, the surface temperature of the frozen food is detected, the convection temperature inside the thawing chamber is detected, and the detected temperature is compared with the input temperature change inside the thawing chamber to determine whether food is present in the thawing chamber. It is preferable.

In addition, the step of determining the presence or absence of the food is preferably determined by the opening and closing of the thawing chamber door.

In addition, it is preferable to include the step of setting the thawing temperature and / or time according to the weight of the frozen food loaded into the thawing chamber and the step of controlling the convection heater and the heating plate by the set temperature and / or time.

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

1 is a perspective view of a thawing room applied to the refrigerator according to the present invention. Referring to the drawings, the refrigerator body 10, the refrigerating chamber 20 and the freezing chamber 30 formed on the left and right sides of the refrigerator body 10, respectively, and the front surfaces of the refrigerating chamber 20 and the freezing chamber 30. A refrigerator compartment door 40 and a freezer compartment door 50 may be additionally opened and closed to allow food to be taken out. In addition, the thawing chamber 100 in which the thawed food is stored is placed on one side of the refrigerating chamber 20, and the thawing chamber door 102 for opening the thawing chamber 100 is installed at the front of the thawing chamber 100. do.

The thawing chamber 100 is a place where the frozen food stored in the freezing chamber 30 is temporarily stored before cooking to thaw food. In addition, a predetermined heat source is further formed in the thawing chamber 100 to allow food to thaw rapidly.

2 is a schematic cross-sectional view of a thawing chamber according to the present invention. Referring to the drawings, the thawing chamber 100 is formed adjacent to the machine room 60 formed at the rear lower side of the refrigerator main body 10, and has an accommodation space with one side open to store frozen food. do. And, the thawing room door 102 is installed so as to open and close one side of the accommodation space has a structure that is partitioned from other parts of the refrigerator body (100).

As the heat source of the thawing chamber 100, the convection heater 110 and the heat transfer plate 120 is installed, and the convection heater 110 by the current applied from the power supply unit 112 installed in the machine room for thawing frozen food. The heat transfer plate 120 is heated.

The convection heater 110 heats the air in the thawing chamber 100 to evenly supply the heated air to the surface of the frozen food to quickly thaw the frozen food, and the heat transfer plate 120 has a surface of the frozen food. It is directly thawed and thawed.

Here, the fan 114 is installed so that the convection inside the thawing chamber 100 is smoothly performed to evenly spray the heated air generated by the convection heater 100 to the frozen food. The fan 114 is installed above the convection heater 110 and is installed to blow air heated by the convection heater 110 to the frozen food. In addition, the suction air discharge passage 118 is formed so that the heated air blown into the frozen food by the fan 114 is convection smoothly in the thawing chamber 100. In order to form the suction discharge flow path 118, a partition wall 116 is formed to partition the convection heater 110 and the frozen food, and a plurality of holes are formed in the partition wall 116 so that the suction discharge flow path 118 is formed. Is composed.

On the other hand, the heating plate 120 is installed on the lower side inside the thawing chamber 100, the heating wire 122 is embedded in the heat transfer plate 120 so that the frozen food directly abuts to heat the frozen food. The heating wire 122 installed on the heat transfer plate 120 heats the heat transfer plate 120 by using the electrical resistance generated by the current applied from the power supply unit 112, similar to the convection heater 110. The frozen food in contact with the heat transfer plate 120 is directly heated.

In addition, a temperature detector 130 is installed on the inner sidewall of the thawing chamber 100 and the heat transfer plate 120. The temperature detector 130 measures the temperature at the time of thawing of the frozen food and sends the measurement temperature to a controller (not shown) to determine the degree of thawing of the frozen food.

In addition, a cold air supply passage 140 is formed on a side wall of the thawing chamber. The cold air supply passage 140 is a flow path is formed so that the cold air convection into the refrigerating chamber 20 to maintain the freshness of the food when the thawed food is stored for a long time due to the carelessness of the user into the thawing chamber 100 do.

In addition, the cold air supply passage 140 is installed to be connected to the refrigerating chamber 20. In this case, a damper 142 is provided to open and close the inflow of cold air controlled by a controller (not shown). Here, the cold air supply passage 140 may be connected to the refrigerating chamber 20, but may be connected to an evaporator (not shown) for supplying cold air of the refrigerating chamber 20 to receive cold air from the thawing chamber 20.

The operation of the breaker of the refrigerator having the above configuration will be described with reference to FIG. 3. 3 is an operation flowchart of the thawing chamber according to the present invention. Referring to the drawings, in order to thaw the frozen food stored in the freezer compartment 30 of the refrigerator body 10 by opening the thawing chamber door 102 formed on one side of the thawing chamber 100 on the heat transfer plate 120 Place frozen food. In addition, a current is applied to the heating wire 122 embedded in the convection heater 110 and the heating plate 120 by the power supply unit 112 by a predetermined control unit (not shown) that controls the operation of the thawing chamber 100. Heated. As the convection heater 110 is heated, the fan 114 installed above is driven to heat the air inside the thawing chamber, and the heated air defrosts the frozen food and circulates inside the thawing chamber. In addition, since the heating plate on which the frozen food is seated is also heated to perform thawing more quickly (S10).

Here, the thawing temperature and / or time may be set according to the weight of the frozen food loaded into the thawing chamber to thaw the frozen food. This is set by the user according to the type and weight of the frozen food and the frozen state of the frozen food to control the operation of the convection heater and the heating plate by the set temperature and / or time.

On the other hand, the frozen food thawed by the convection heater 110 and the heat transfer plate 120, the temperature of the frozen food is measured by the temperature detector 130 installed so as to determine the degree of thawing, and the predetermined control unit (not shown) When the temperature reaches the set thawing temperature compared to the set thawing temperature, the current of the power supply unit 112 is cut off to stop the heat generation of the convection heater 110 and the heating wire 122 (S20).

When the thawing of the frozen food is completed as described above, the user takes out the food from the thawing room and cooks it or keeps it in the thawing room. At this time, when food is stored in the thawing room for a long time due to carelessness of the user, the flavor of the food may be degraded or may deteriorate in severe cases. Therefore, when the thawed food is stored in the thawing chamber 100, cold air is maintained to maintain its freshness.

At this time, in order to determine whether food is present in the thawing chamber 100, when a predetermined time elapses after thawing is completed, a temperature change inside the thawing chamber 100 is measured. In order to measure the temperature change in the thawing chamber 100, the temperature value measured by the temperature detector 132 provided on the sidewall of the thawing chamber 100 and the temperature detector 130 installed on the heat transfer plate 120 may be used. It is sent to the controller. The control unit compares the temperature change value measured by the temperature detectors 130 and 132 with the internal temperature change value previously input.

Here, when no food is present in the thawing chamber 100, the internal temperature of the thawing chamber 100 is rapidly lowered, whereas when food is present in the thawing chamber 100, the food is emitted from the heated food. By the temperature, the internal temperature of the thawing chamber 100 shows a slow temperature change value. When the difference between the temperature change values is calculated by the control unit and the internal temperature of the thawing chamber shows a difference from the internally changed thawing chamber internal temperature value, the food is stored in the thawing chamber (S30).

When it is determined that food is being stored in the thawing chamber 100, the control unit opens the damper 142 installed in the cold air supply passage 140, and the cold air flows along the cold air supply passage 140. Flows into). When cold air flows into the thawing chamber 100 as described above, the cold air is transferred to the food stored in the thawing chamber 100 to maintain freshness (S40).

On the contrary, when the internal temperature of the thawing chamber 100 does not show a difference from the internal temperature change value of the thawing chamber 100 previously input, the control unit considers that there is no food in the thawing chamber 100 and opens the damper 142. It won't let you.

Here, as another embodiment for determining whether the thawing chamber 100 has food after thawing frozen food, the damper 142 may be operated by opening or closing the thawing chamber door 102. When the thawing room door 102 has completed thawing of the frozen food, the user opens the thawing room door 102 to take out the food from the thawing room 100. In this case, the thawing room door 102 is opened or closed. When the sensor (not shown) is installed to confirm that the thawing chamber door 102 is opened, the damper 142 is operated to allow the cold air of the refrigerating chamber 20 to flow into the thawing chamber. Keep food fresh.

Referring to the process in which cold air flows into the thawing chamber 100 by opening or closing the thawing chamber door 102 as described above, frozen food is loaded into the thawing chamber 100, and the user has a predetermined control unit (not shown). Time) to operate the thawing chamber (100). When the control unit sends a signal to the power supply unit 112 and a current is applied to the heating wire 122 installed on the convection heater 110 and the heating plate 120, the convection heater 110 and the heating wire 122 are heated to thaw room ( 100) thawing the frozen food by heating the air and the heat transfer plate 120 inside.

In addition, if the frozen food is thawed by the temperature detectors 130 and 132 to detect whether the frozen food is thawed, the current supply of the convection heater 110 and the heating wire 122 is cut off. If the door 102 of the thawing chamber is not opened so that a predetermined time elapses after the operation of the convection heater 110 and the heating wire 122 is stopped, the controller determines that food is stored in the thawing chamber 100. In addition, the damper 142 installed in the cold air supply passage 140 opens the cold air into the thawing chamber 100.

In such a state in which cold air flows into the thawing chamber 100, when the thawing chamber door 102 is opened, it is determined that the user takes out food from the thawing chamber 100 to eat and closes the damper 142 to thaw the chamber ( 100) It blocks the inflow of cold air.

As described above, the thawing apparatus of the refrigerator according to the present invention allows the frozen food to be thawed by heat conduction and convection, so that the heat conduction to the inside of the food is faster, and if food is stored in the thawing chamber for a long time even after thawing is completed, cold air is stored. Entering the thawing room, it can be obtained to maintain the freshness of the food.

In the refrigerator thawing apparatus according to the present invention, since a separate thawing chamber is provided inside the refrigerator, it is not necessary to move the frozen food to a device equipped with another thawing chamber (for example, a microwave oven). Has the advantage of being promoted.

In addition, by ensuring that the appropriate temperature and environment for thawing the frozen food is formed in the thawing chamber formed inside the refrigerator, the frozen food is thawed quickly and correctly, and in particular, the heat applied to the food is transferred to the food in multiple ways, Not only does the thawing process proceed more quickly, but when the food has been thawed by the user's carelessness for a long time in the thawing room, the food remains fresh so that the user can take it out of the thawing room and eat it at any time. Enjoy the flavor.

On the other hand, the present invention is not limited only to the above-described embodiment, but can be modified and modified within the scope not departing from the gist of the present invention, the technical idea that such modifications and variations are also included in the claims Should be seen.

Claims (9)

A separate thawing chamber formed inside the refrigerator; A convection heater installed in the thawing chamber; A heat transfer plate installed inside the thawing chamber; A thawing apparatus of a refrigerator including a cold air supply passage installed to supply cold air into the thawing chamber. The method of claim 1, The thawing apparatus of the refrigerator including a temperature detector installed on the heat transfer plate to detect the surface temperature of the frozen food stored in the thawing chamber. The method of claim 1, And a temperature detector installed on the sidewall of the thawing chamber to detect the internal temperature of the thawing chamber. The method of claim 1, And a damper installed to open and close the inflow of cold air to the cold air supply passage. Initiating operation of the refrigerator thawing chamber; Determining whether the frozen food has been thawed; Determining whether food is present in the thawing chamber; And Thawing method of the thawing chamber of the refrigerator comprising the step of introducing cold air into the thawing chamber. The method of claim 5, Operation of the thawing chamber is started, Heating the convection heater installed above the inside of the thawing chamber; And Method for thawing the refrigerator thawing room comprising the step of heating the heating plate installed in the lower inside of the thawing room. The method of claim 5, Defrosting the frozen food to detect the presence of food in the thawing chamber by detecting the surface temperature of the frozen food, by detecting the convection temperature inside the thawing chamber, and comparing the detected temperature with the input temperature change in the thawing chamber. How to thaw a thread. The method of claim 5, The determining of the presence or absence of the food, thawing method of the thawing chamber of the refrigerator is determined by the opening and closing of the thawing chamber door. The method of claim 5, Setting a thawing temperature and / or time according to the weight of the frozen food loaded into the thawing chamber; And And thawing the convection heater and the heating plate by the set temperature and / or time.

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