KR20080097107A

KR20080097107A - Dust compressing apparatus of vacuum cleaner

Info

Publication number: KR20080097107A
Application number: KR1020070059497A
Authority: KR
Inventors: 오장근; 이진곤; 차승용
Original assignee: 삼성광주전자 주식회사
Priority date: 2007-04-30
Filing date: 2007-06-18
Publication date: 2008-11-04
Also published as: KR101309796B1; KR20080097105A; KR20080097109A; KR20080097108A; KR101370822B1; KR20080097104A; KR101349204B1; KR20080097106A; KR20080097110A

Abstract

A dust compressing apparatus of a vacuum cleaner is provided to automatically compress and to easily throw away sewage compacted within a dust collection unit. The dust compressing apparatus of the vacuum cleaner comprises a compression board(51) which compresses the dust collected in the dust collection unit(11); a movable part(54) which is connected to the compression board at one side of the dust collection unit, and moves the compression board; a elastic part which elastically pressurizes the compression board for the dust which is positioned in the compression position; and a drive motor which operates a movable part for moving the compression board. The elastic part is arranged between the main body of the dust collection unit and the compression board and includes one or more compressed spring for pressurizing the compression board to the compression position.

Description

Dust compressing apparatus of vacuum cleaner

1 is a partial cutaway perspective view illustrating an example of a cyclone dust collector of a vacuum cleaner to which a dust compression device according to the present invention is applied;

2A and 2B are cross-sectional views illustrating the operation of the dust compression unit of the cyclone dust collector of FIG. 1, and

3A and 3B are partial sectional views illustrating the dust compression unit shown in FIGS. 2A and 2B, respectively.

10. Cyclone Dust Collector 11. Dust Collector

14. Cyclone 17. Top cover

35. Dust collection unit 36. Dust collection box

50. Dust Compaction Unit 51. Compression Plate

54: moving part 55. elastic part

56.Rope 57.Pulle

60. Drive motor

The present invention relates to a vacuum cleaner, and more particularly, to a cyclone dust collector of a vacuum cleaner that separates dirt or dust (hereinafter referred to as 'dirt') contained in the air from air by sucking external air.

Cyclone dust collector used in the vacuum cleaner is a device that separates the dirt contained in the air by rotating the air containing the dirt, and has been used in recent years because it can be used semi-permanently without the inconvenience of having to replace the dust bag every time. .

Such cyclone dust collectors typically include a cyclone for separating the dust by turning the sucked air into a swirling air flow, an air intake unit for allowing the sucked air to flow in a tangential direction of the cyclone, and a dust container for collecting dirt separated from the cyclone. It has a cyclone structure containing. In this cyclone structure, the dirt collected in the dust container is randomly accumulated in the dust container by the air which is turned by the cyclone. Therefore, the dirt is easily blown back with the turning air back to the cyclone, as a result, there is a problem that the dust collection efficiency is lowered. In addition, since the dust accumulates loosely in the dust container, the time to fill the dust container is shortened, so that the dust container must be emptied frequently, and when the dust container is emptied, loose dust accumulated in the dust container is blown to contaminate the surroundings. Can cause problems.

In order to prevent this problem, Korean Patent Registration No. 10-0606794 proposes a vacuum cleaner having a dust compression device for compressing the waste collected in the dust collector. The dust compressor of the vacuum cleaner includes a pressing plate for pressing dirt in the dust collecting container, a plunger connected to the pressing plate, a solenoid portion for driving the plunger up and down, and a restoring member for restoring the lowered plunger. Therefore, when the solenoid portion is operated to move the plunger downward, the pressure plate is lowered to compress the dirt in the dust collecting container. However, in this dust compression device, since the plunger and the restoring member are disposed through the dust collecting container under the pressure plate, when the dust of the dust collecting container is emptied, the plunger and the restoring member must be disassembled together with the dust collecting container. There is a problem that is difficult to do.

In addition, Korean Patent Registration No. 10-634805 proposes a vacuum cleaner having a dust compression device for compressing dirt in the dust collecting case. The dust compression device of the cleaner is provided with a button installed to slide on the dust collecting tank cover of the dust collecting case. It is provided with an elastic member for elastically supporting the button in the direction in which the button protrudes from the dust collecting case, and a pressure plate which is slidably installed inside the dust collecting knives, and compresses the dirt in the dust collecting case. Thus, as the user presses the button, the pressure plate compresses the dirt in the dust collecting case. However, such a dust compression device is cumbersome to the user to operate the button when compressing the dirt in the dust collecting case.

The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, the object of the present invention can automatically compress the dust collected in the dust collecting unit and at the same time dust in the vacuum cleaner can easily discard the compressed dust in the dust collecting unit To provide a compression device.

Dust compression device of a vacuum cleaner for achieving the object of the present invention as described above, the compression plate for compressing the dirt collected in the dust collecting unit, the moving part is connected to the compression plate on one side of the dust collecting unit, moving the compression plate, dirt It characterized in that it comprises an elastic portion for elastically pressing the compression plate to be located in the compression position to be compressed, and a drive motor for driving the moving unit to move the compression plate.

The moving part may be composed of a rope connected to the compression plate, and a pulley connected to the drive shaft so as to rotate by the drive shaft of the drive motor and wound or unwound the rope. In this case, the compression plate is moved to a release position spaced apart from dirt against the elastic portion when the pulley is wound around the rope, and is moved to the compression position by the elastic force of the elastic portion when the rope is released.

The elastic part may be at least one compression spring disposed between the compression plate and the main body of the dust collecting unit to elastically press the compression plate to the compression position.

The dust collecting unit may include at least one cyclone, and a dust collecting unit collecting dust or dirt separated by the cyclone. At this time, the cyclone is a cyclone body including an air inlet and an air outlet, a guide member disposed on one side in the cyclone body and guides the air introduced through the air inlet, and an exhaust pipe disposed on the other side in the cyclone body and communicating with the air outlet. And a dust discharge opening formed at the other end of the cyclone body to face the dust collection unit. In addition, the dust collection unit includes a distant still water barrel disposed side by side with the cyclone body and having an end portion communicating with the dust discharge opening. In this case, the compression plate may be composed of a plate having a shape that matches the shape of the cross section so that the dust container can move in the dust container. In addition, the dust container may have a dust container cover for opening and closing the dust container at an end opposite to the end communicating with the dust discharge opening.

The drive of the drive motor can be controlled by a load switch of the drive motor or a limit switch provided at the compression position and the release position of the compression plate.

Hereinafter, a dust compression apparatus of a vacuum cleaner according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1, 2A and 2B are partial cutaway perspective views and cross-sectional views showing a cyclone dust collector of a vacuum cleaner to which a dust compression device according to the present invention is applied.

1, 2a and 2b, the cyclone dust collector 10 of the vacuum cleaner of the present invention is a dust collecting unit for collecting the dust in the air by using the suction power of the suction motor (not shown) of the vacuum cleaner (11), and the dust compression unit 50 of the present invention for compressing the dust collected in the dust collecting unit (11).

The dust collecting unit 11 includes a cyclone 14 and a dust collecting unit 35.

The cyclone 14 separates the dirt in the air sucked by the suction motor by centrifugal force. To this end, the cyclone 14 has a cyclone body 16 disposed vertically on one side of the body 11. The cyclone body 16 is formed in a cylindrical shape having an air inlet 18 and an air outlet 19 (refer to FIGS. 2A and 2B) at one lower end and an upper center thereof. At this time, the upper end of the cyclone body 16 is defined by the intermediate wall 13a of the main body 13. As shown in Figure 2a and 2b, the guide member 20 for guiding the air introduced through the air inlet 18 is disposed at the lower end of the cyclone body (16). The guide member 20 includes a guide pipe 21 and a spiral blade 23 to guide the air sucked into the cyclone body 16 to spiral. The discharge pipe 25 is installed in the air discharge port 19 formed on the upper side of the cyclone body 16. The discharge pipe 25 guides the air turning in a spiral shape by the guide member 20 in a spiral shape and guides the air through the air discharge port 19 at the same time.

The air discharge port 19 communicates with the air discharge passage 26 of the upper cover 17. The top cover 14 has an exhaust port 28 (see FIG. 1) directly or indirectly connected to the suction motor of the vacuum cleaner. A filter (not shown) for separating fine dirt not separated by the cyclone 14 may be disposed in the air discharge passage 26 of the upper cover 17. In this case, the filter may be composed of a sponge filter, a high efficiency particulate arrestor (HEPA), or a combination thereof.

The dust discharge opening 31 is formed at one end of the cyclone body 16. The dust discharge opening 31 communicates with the dust container 36 of the dust collecting unit 35, which will be described later, to discharge the dirt separated from the air by the cyclone 14 to the dust container 36.

The dust collection unit 35 collects the dirt discharged through the dust discharge opening 31. The dust collection unit 35 is composed of a dust container 36 disposed vertically on the body 13 in parallel with the cyclone body 16. The dust container 36 is formed in the form of a roughly tetrahedral cylinder enclosing the cyclone body 16. The upper end of the dust container 36 is defined by the middle wall 13a of the main body 13, and the lower part of one side thereof is opened to communicate with the dust discharge opening 31. The dust container cover 37 is disposed at the lower portion of the dust container 36 to open and close the dust container 36 so that the dirt collected in the dust container 36 is discarded. The dust container cover 37 has a hook 40, one end of which is hinged to the hinge shaft 38 of the lower surface of the main body 13, and the other end of which is locked in a hook groove 39 formed in the lower portion of the main body 13. . Accordingly, the dust container cover 37 opens or closes the lower portion of the dust container 36 by being pivoted about the hinge shaft 38 by being coupled to or separated from the hook groove 39.

2A to 3B, the dust compression unit 50 is disposed above the dust container 36. The dust compression unit 50 includes a compression plate 51, a moving part 54, an elastic part 55, and a drive motor 60. Compression plate 51 is to compress the dirt collected in the dust container 36, the plate having a shape that matches the shape of the cross section of the dust container 36 to move up and down in the dust container 36 It is composed. The moving part 54 is connected to the compression plate 51 at the upper side of the dust container 36, and the compression position for compressing the dirt in the compression plate 51 in conjunction with the elastic part 55 to be described later (FIGS. 2B and 3B). And a release position (see FIGS. 2A and 3A) spaced from dirt. To this end, the moving part 54 has a rope 56 and a pulley 57. The rope 56 has one end connected to a fixing hanger 58 formed at the center of the compression plate 51, and the other end fixed to the pulley 57. The pulley 57 is integrally formed on the drive shaft 63 so as to rotate by the drive shaft 63 of the drive motor 60.

The elastic part 55 has a plurality of, for example, three protruding upwards at predetermined intervals on the intermediate wall 13a of the main body 13 constituting the upper end of the cyclone body 16 and the dust container 36. It consists of three compression springs which are arranged in the spring receiving portion 59 so as to face the compression plate 51. The elastic portion 55 presses the compression plate 51 such that the compression plate 51 is held at the compression position (see FIGS. 2B and 3B).

Therefore, when the rope 56 is wound around the pulley 57 by the rotation of the drive shaft 63, the compression plate 51 is moved to the released position against the elastic force of the elastic portion 55 (see FIGS. 2A and 3A). When the rope 56 is released from the pulley 57 by the rotation of the drive shaft 63, the rope 56 is moved to the compression position (see FIGS. 2B and 3B) by the elastic force of the elastic portion 55.

The drive motor 60 drives the moving part 54 to move the compression plate 51, and is installed on the fixing bracket 13b formed on the middle wall 13a of the main body 13. The drive motor 60 has a drive shaft 63 coaxially connected with the pulley 57. Rotation of the drive motor 60 may be controlled by a controller (not shown). That is, when the rope 56 is completely wound on the pulley 57, the drive motor 60 can no longer rotate, and is overloaded. At this time, the control unit detects an overload of the drive motor 60 by detecting a current change according to the load change of the drive motor 60, and stops the drive of the drive motor 60. On the contrary, when the rope 56 is completely released from the pulley 57, the driving motor 60 receives almost no load. At this time, the control unit circuits the current change according to the load variation of the driving motor 60 in a circuit manner. Detects that the drive motor 60 is not loaded by sensing, and drives the drive motor 60 in the reverse direction. Optionally, the rotation of the drive motor 60 may be controlled by a limit switch (not shown) disposed in the dust container 36 to sense the release position and the compression position of the compression plate 51.

In the above, the cyclone dust collector 10 to which the dust compression device of the present invention is applied is illustrated and described as having the cyclone body 16 of the cyclone 14 and the dust container 36 of the dust collection unit 35 installed vertically. The present invention is not limited to this. For example, the dust compression unit 50 of the present invention may also be applied to the cyclone dust collector (not shown) in which the cyclone body 16 and the dust container 36 are horizontally arranged.

As described above, the cyclone dust collector 10 of the present invention automatically raises or lowers the compression plate 51 through the pulley 57 and the rope 56 operated by the drive motor 60. A compression unit 50 may be provided to compress dirt collected in the dust container 36. Therefore, there is no need for the user to manually operate the compression plate 51 through the button to compress the dirt as in the prior art. In addition, the cyclone dust collector 10 of the present invention, the rope 57 and the pulley 57 of the dust compression unit 50 is located on the compression plate 36 on the upper side of the dust container 36, dust container cover 37 ) Is located below the dust container 36, it is not necessary to disassemble the dust compression unit 50 as in the prior art in order to empty the compressed dirt in the dust container 36, thus the dirt of the dust container 36 Emptying the job becomes easier.

The operation of the cyclone dust collector 10 to which the dust compression device according to the present invention configured as described above will be described in detail with reference to FIGS. 1 to 3B.

First, the compression plate 51 of the dust compression unit 50 is located at the release position shown in FIGS. 2A and 3A in the initial state. At this time, the rope 56 is completely wound on the pulley 57.

In this state, as power is applied to the vacuum cleaner, the air containing the dirt on the surface to be cleaned is introduced into the air inlet by the suction force of the suction motor connected directly or indirectly to the air exhaust port 28 of the upper cover 17. It is introduced into the cyclone body 16 through 18). The introduced air forms a swirling airflow through the guide member 20 and the discharge pipe 25. As a result, the dirt contained in the air is discharged to the dust container 36 through the dust discharge opening 31 by the centrifugal force and collected in the dust container 36. Then, the air from which the dirt is removed passes through the discharge pipe 25 and passes through the air discharge passage 26 and the air exhaust passage 28 of the upper cover 17 to the cleaner body (not shown) in which the suction motor is installed. .

After the cleaning is completed in this way, the user presses the compression execution button (not shown) of the operation panel (not shown) of the vacuum cleaner to compress the dirt collected in the dust container 36 with the compression plate 51, The control unit drives the drive motor 60 in one direction, for example clockwise. Here, the control unit installs a dust sensor (not shown) having a light emitting unit and a light receiving unit at a predetermined height of the dust container 36, instead of driving the driving motor 60 when the compression execution button is operated by the user. When the dust sensor is operated may be set to automatically drive the drive motor (60).

As the drive motor 60 is driven clockwise, the pulley 57 coaxially formed with the drive shaft 63 also rotates clockwise to release the rope 56 wound thereon. As a result, the compression plate 51 is lowered to the compression position (see FIGS. 2B and 3B) by the elastic force of the elastic portion 55 to compress the dirt in the dust container 36.

2B and 3B, when the compression plate 51 almost compresses the dirt in the dust container 36, the rope 56 is completely released from the pulley 57, and as a result, the drive motor ( 60 is hardly subjected to a load. At this time, the controller detects that the driving motor 60 is not loaded according to the current change caused by the load change of the driving motor 60, and reverses the driving motor 60. In other words, it runs counterclockwise.

When the drive motor 60 rotates counterclockwise, the rope 56 is again wound on the pulley 57. Then, when the rope 56 is completely wound on the pulley 57 by the rotation of the drive shaft 63, the drive motor 60 is overloaded, at this time, the control unit is subjected to the load fluctuation of the drive motor 60 In response to the current change, the driving motor 60 is detected to be overloaded, and the driving of the driving motor 60 is stopped. As a result, the dust compression operation of the dust compression unit 50 is completed.

After the dust compression is completed in this way to empty the compressed dirt in the dust container 36, the user removes the hook 40 of the dust container cover 37 from the hook groove 39, and then the dust container cover ( 37) pivots around the hinge shaft 38 to open the lower portion of the dust container 36 to remove dirt from the dust container 36. Then, the dust container cover 37 is operated in the reverse order to seal the dust container 36.

As described above, the cyclone dust collector of the vacuum cleaner according to the embodiment of the present invention includes a dust compression unit for automatically raising or lowering the compression plate through a pulley and a rope operated by a driving motor in the dust container. The collected dirt can be compressed. Therefore, there is no need for the user to manually compress the dirt by operating the compression plate through the button as in the related art.

In addition, the cyclone dust collector of the vacuum cleaner according to an embodiment of the present invention, the rope and the pulley of the dust compression unit is located on one side of the dust container, that is, on the compression plate on the upper side, the dust container cover is located on the lower side of the dust container, dust It is not necessary to disassemble the dust compression unit as in the prior art to empty the compressed dirt in the container, thereby making it easier to empty the dirt in the dust container.

While the invention has been shown and described with respect to preferred embodiments for illustrating the principles of the invention, the invention is not limited to the construction and operation as shown and described. Rather, those skilled in the art will appreciate that various changes and modifications can be made to the present invention without departing from the spirit and scope of the appended claims. Accordingly, such appropriate changes and modifications and equivalents should be considered to be within the scope of the present invention.

Claims

Compression plate for compressing the dirt collected in the dust collecting unit;

A moving unit connected to the compression plate at one side of the dust collecting unit and moving the compression plate;

An elastic portion for elastically pressing the compression plate to be located at a compression position where dirt is compressed; And

And a drive motor for driving the moving unit to move the compression plate.

The method of claim 1,

The moving part includes a rope connected to the compression plate, and a pulley connected to the drive shaft to wind and unwind the rope so as to rotate by the drive shaft of the drive motor.

The compression plate is moved to a release position spaced apart from dirt against the elastic portion when the pulley is wound around the rope, and when unwinding the rope is moved to the compression position by the elastic force of the elastic portion Dust compressor of the vacuum cleaner.

The vacuum cleaner of claim 1, wherein the elastic part includes at least one compression spring disposed between the compression plate and the main body of the dust collecting unit to elastically press the compression plate to the compression position. Dust compressor.

According to claim 1, wherein the dust collecting unit,

At least one cyclone; And

And a dust collecting unit collecting dust or dirt separated by the cyclone.

The method according to claim 4, wherein the cyclone is

A cyclone body including an air inlet and an air outlet;

A guide member disposed at one side of the cyclone body to guide the air introduced through the air inlet;

A discharge pipe disposed on the other side of the cyclone body and in communication with the air discharge port; And

And a dust discharge opening formed at the other end of the cyclone body to face the dust collection unit.

The dust compaction apparatus according to claim 5, wherein the dust collecting unit comprises a dust collecting container disposed in parallel with the cyclone body and having an end portion communicating with the dust discharge opening.

The dust compression apparatus of claim 6, wherein the compression plate comprises a plate having a shape that matches the shape of the cross section of the dust container so as to move within the dust container.

The dust compressor of claim 6, wherein the dust container further comprises a dust container cover disposed at an opposite end of the end portion communicating with the dust discharge opening to open and close the dust container.

The dust compressor of claim 1, wherein the driving of the driving motor is controlled by one of a load change of the driving motor and a limit switch installed at a compression position and a release position of the compression plate.