KR20110103577A - Laundry machine - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a laundry machine, and a laundry machine according to the present invention is provided in a tub for accommodating wash water, a drum rotatably provided inside the tub, and a relative movement to the drum. It is characterized by including a balancer for reducing the vibration generated when the drum rotates. According to such a washing apparatus, it becomes possible to reduce vibration and noise of the washing apparatus by the balancer of a comparatively simple structure.

Description

Washing machine {Laundry machine}

The present invention relates to a laundry machine.

In general, the washing apparatus rotates a drum that accommodates a laundry object to process the laundry object. However, vibration and noise are generated in the washing apparatus as the drum rotates, and in particular, the vibration and noise of the washing apparatus become very large in a stroke such as dehydration in which the drum rotates at high speed.

An object of the present invention is to provide a washing apparatus that can reduce the noise and vibration that may occur in the washing apparatus according to the rotation of the drum.

An object of the present invention as described above is provided in the inside of the cabinet tub for receiving the wash water, the drum is provided to be rotatable inside the tub and provided to enable relative movement to the drum vibration generated during the rotation of the drum It can be achieved by a laundry machine characterized by having a balancer to reduce.

In addition, the object of the present invention as described above is provided in the inside of the cabinet tub to accommodate the wash water, the drum is provided rotatably inside the tub and provided in the drum to reduce the vibration generated during the rotation of the drum The rotating shaft can be achieved by a washing apparatus, characterized in that it comprises a balancer that is selectively different from the rotating shaft of the drum.

In the washing apparatus according to the embodiment of the present invention, it becomes possible to reduce vibration and noise of the washing apparatus in a relatively simple and light balancer as compared with the conventional art.

1 is a cross-sectional view of a laundry machine having a balancer according to one embodiment;
Figure 2 is a schematic diagram showing a state in which the balancer of Figure 1 is not stabilized,
3 is a schematic view showing a state in which the balancer of FIG. 1 is stabilized;
4 is a graph showing the rotational speed of the drum in the dehydration stroke,
5 is a front view showing a balancer and a drum according to an embodiment when the drum does not rotate,
6 is a front view illustrating a balancer and a drum according to an embodiment when the drum rotates at a predetermined speed or more;
7 is a cross-sectional view illustrating a balancer according to an embodiment.

Hereinafter, an embodiment of a washing apparatus will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1 is a side cross-sectional view showing a laundry machine according to an embodiment.

Referring to FIG. 1, the washing apparatus 100 is rotatably provided in a cabinet 10 to form an exterior, a tub 20 provided inside the cabinet 10 to accommodate washing water, and a tub 20. It may include a drum (30).

The cabinet 10 forms an exterior of the washing apparatus 100, and various components described later may be mounted on the cabinet 10. First, the door 12 may be provided in front of the cabinet 10. The user may open the door 12 to inject the laundry object into the cabinet 10.

A tub 20 for accommodating the wash water may be provided in the cabinet 10, and a drum 30 for accommodating the laundry object inside the tub 20 may be rotatably provided. In addition, the inside of the drum 30 may be provided with a plurality of lifters 32 for lifting the laundry object to drop back to the lower side when the drum 30 is rotated. The lifter 32 raises the laundry object when the drum 30 rotates, and then drops the laundry object back to improve the washing performance. Lifter 32 may be provided with a plurality, for example, in the washing apparatus 100 according to the present embodiment is shown as being provided with three inside the drum 30, but is not limited thereto.

Meanwhile, the tub 30 may be elastically supported by the upper spring 50 and the lower damper 60. When the drum 30 rotates, the vibration of the drum 30 is absorbed by the spring 50 and the damper 60 so that the vibration is not transmitted to the cabinet 10. In addition, the back of the tub 20 may be mounted with a drive unit 40 for rotating the drum (30). The driving unit 40 may be made of a motor, etc. to rotate the drum 30. Since the driving unit 40 is well known to those skilled in the art, a detailed description thereof will be omitted.

However, as shown in FIG. 1, if the laundry object 1 is accommodated in the drum 30 when the drum 30 rotates, the noise and vibration may occur greatly according to the position of the laundry object 1. There is this. That is, when the laundry objects are not evenly distributed in the drum 30 and are gathered in some areas, the drum 30 rotates (hereinafter, referred to as 'eccentric rotation') when the laundry objects are rotated by an uneven distribution of the laundry objects. Vibration and noise may be greatly generated in the drum 30. Therefore, in order to prevent vibration and noise caused by the eccentric rotation of the drum 30 in this way, the balancer 70 may be provided.

The balancer 70 is provided on the rotating drum 30, and may be provided on at least one of the front and rear sides of the drum 30. Although the drawings are shown as being provided in front of the drum 30 for convenience, the present invention is not limited thereto.

On the other hand, the balancer 70 is provided in the rotating drum 30 to play a role of preventing noise and vibration, the center of gravity may be configured to move variably. That is, the balancer 70 may include a mass 80 having a predetermined weight therein, and the mass balancer 70 may include a path movable in the circumferential direction. Therefore, when the load by the laundry object is unbalanced on one side of the drum 30, the noise due to the eccentric rotation of the drum 30 is distributed while the mass body inside the balancer 70 moves to the opposite side of the place where the load is unbalanced. And vibration.

Here, the balancer 70 may be formed of a liquid balancer including a liquid having a predetermined weight therein, or a ball balancer including a ball having a predetermined weight. In the washing apparatus according to the present embodiment, a balancer including a filling fluid together with a ball is adopted in the balancer 70, but is not limited thereto.

2 and 3 show the movement of the ball 80 inside the balancer 70 while the drum is rotating.

As shown in FIG. 2, when the drum 30 rotates, in particular, when the drum 30 rotates at a high speed in the dehydration stroke, the ball 80 inside the balancer 70 may have the laundry object 1 inside the drum 30. You can start moving slowly on the other side of. As the balls 80 start to move in this manner, as shown in FIG. 3, most of the balls 80 are located at opposite sides of the laundry object. That is, the amount of eccentricity generated by collecting the laundry objects in some areas can be corrected and reduced by adjusting the ball 80 of the balancer 70 on the opposite side of the laundry object. In other words, when the drum 30 rotates at a high speed, when the balls 80 are collected on the opposite side of the region where the laundry object is biased, the eccentric rotation can be prevented when the drum 30 rotates. Noise and vibration due to rotation can be prevented. Noise and vibration of the washing machine may occur when the drum 30 rotates, in particular in a dehydration stroke in which the drum 30 rotates at high speed. Hereinafter, the driving of the drum 30 in the dehydrating stroke will be described.

4 is a graph showing a change in RPM of the drum over time in the dehydration stroke of the laundry machine according to an embodiment. In the graph of FIG. 4, the horizontal axis represents time, and the vertical axis represents the rotational speed, that is, the RPM change of the drum 30.

Referring to FIG. 4, the dehydration stroke may largely include a podispersion step S100 and a dehydration step S200.

In the dispersing step (S100), the drum can be rotated at a relatively low speed, and the inner fabric can be evenly distributed. In the dehydration step (S200), the drum can be rotated at a relatively high speed to remove moisture from the laundry. However, the podispersion step and the dehydration step are named mainly for their main functions, and the functions in each step are not limited according to the name. For example, in the foaming step, water may be removed from the fabric by the rotation of the drum as well as the foaming. Hereinafter, each step will be described in detail.

When the rinsing stroke is finished, the fabric inside the drum 30 is wet by moisture. When the control unit starts the dehydration stroke, the control unit may first detect a quantity of the inside of the drum 30, that is, the amount of the wet foam (S110).

The reason for detecting the amount of wet bubble is that the weight of the water-containing cloth is different from the weight of the dry cloth even if the amount of non-wet amount, that is, the amount of dry matter, is detected at the beginning of the washing administration. The detected amount of foam determines the allowable conditions for accelerating the drum 30 in the transient region passing step S210 to be described later, or decelerates the drum 30 by the eccentric condition in the transient region passing step S210. It will act as a factor that decides to perform the dispersion step again.

Specifically, the amount of wetting in the drum 30 may be measured when the drum 30 is accelerated to a first rotational speed (first RPM), for example, about 100 to 110 RPM, and then driven at a constant speed and decelerated for a predetermined time. Can be. Power generation braking can be used when the drum 30 is decelerated. The amount of wet can be sensed using the amount of rotation of the acceleration section during acceleration of the driving motor 40 for rotating the drum 30, the amount of rotation of the deceleration section during deceleration, and the applied motor DC power.

On the other hand, after detecting the amount of weeping, the control unit may perform the inflating step for the dispersion of the fabric in the drum (30) (S130).

The inflating step is to prevent the foams from being concentrated in a specific area inside the drum 30 to increase the eccentricity of the drum 30 by uniformly distributing the foams in the drum 30. This is because when the eccentricity increases, noise and vibration increase when the RPM of the drum 30 is increased. Specifically, the inflating step may be performed until the drum 30 is accelerated in one direction by a predetermined inclination until the rotation speed of the eccentric sensing step described later is reached.

Subsequently, the controller may detect an eccentricity of the drum (S150).

If the fabric inside the drum 30 is not evenly distributed and concentrated in a predetermined area inside the drum 30, the amount of eccentricity is increased. When the RPM of the drum 30 is increased later, the cause of noise and vibration is caused by the eccentric rotation. Can be. Therefore, the controller may determine whether the drum is accelerated by sensing the eccentric amount of the drum.

Eccentricity detection may use the difference in acceleration when the drum 30 rotates. That is, when the drum rotates according to the degree of eccentricity, there is a difference in acceleration when the drum rotates downward along the gravity and when the drum rotates upward in the opposite direction to the gravity. The controller may measure the acceleration difference by using a speed sensor such as a hall sensor provided in the driving motor 40, and may detect an eccentric amount by the detected acceleration difference. Therefore, in the case of detecting the eccentricity, even if the drum rotates, the inside of the drum does not fall and the state of being attached to the drum must be maintained, and the drum rotates at a rotational speed of approximately 100 to 110 RPM. do.

When the sensed eccentricity of the drum at a predetermined wet amount is equal to or greater than the reference eccentricity, the drum is accelerated at high speed, and the vibration and noise of the drum are significantly increased, making it difficult to accelerate the drum. Therefore, the controller may store the predetermined data in a table form in which the reference eccentricity allowing acceleration according to the amount of the wet bubble is predetermined. Therefore, it is possible to determine whether to accelerate by applying the detected amount of eccentricity and the amount of eccentricity to the table. That is, when the amount of eccentricity according to the detected amount of wet bubble is equal to or greater than the reference amount of eccentricity, the eccentric amount is too large to accelerate the drum, and thus the above-described wet bubble detection step, inflated step, and eccentric detection step may be repeated.

Meanwhile, as described above, the repeating process of the wet bubble detection step, the inflating step, and the eccentric detection step may be repeated until the detected eccentricity satisfies the reference eccentricity or less. However, when an abnormality occurs in the washing machine or when the fabrics in the drum are extremely agglomerated, the detected eccentricity does not satisfy the reference eccentricity or less, and the wet bubble detection step, the inflating step, and the eccentric detection step may be repeated. . Therefore, the control unit stops the rotation of the drum when the wet detection step, the inflating step, and the eccentric detection step are repeated until a predetermined time exceeds, for example, approximately 20 to 30 minutes after the start of the dehydration stroke. It informs the dehydration administration that it did not end normally.

When the amount of eccentricity according to the detected wet amount is equal to or less than the reference amount of eccentricity, the acceleration tolerance condition is satisfied, so that the subsequent transient region passing step (S210) may be performed.

Here, the transient region may be defined as a predetermined RPM band including one or more resonance frequencies in which resonance occurs according to a system of a washing apparatus. The transient area is an inherent vibration characteristic that occurs when the system of the washing machine is determined. The transition zone varies depending on the system of the laundry machine and may, for example, range from approximately 200 to 350 RPM.

That is, when the rotational speed of the drum 30 passes through the transient region, resonance occurs in the washing apparatus, and the noise and vibration of the washing apparatus may be significantly increased. In the washing apparatus, noise and vibration cause discomfort to the user, and further, disturb the acceleration of the drum. In the case of passing through the transient region, the acceleration slope may be properly adjusted to reduce the noise and vibration when accelerating the drum 30.

On the other hand, as the drum 30 is accelerated while passing through the transient region, or due to an unexpected shock applied from the outside, the amount of eccentricity of the drum 30 may increase. If the eccentricity of the drum 30 becomes larger than a predetermined value, noise will become remarkably large, and it will become difficult to continue to accelerate a drum. Therefore, when passing through the transient region, the control unit may continuously detect the eccentricity of the drum 30.

In addition, the control unit may be provided with a vibration sensor on the drum of the laundry machine and detect the vibration of the drum when passing through the transient region. If the sensed vibration and / or the eccentricity of the drum 30 become larger than a predetermined value in the transient region passing step, the controller decelerates the drum 30 and repeats the above-described wet bubble detection step, inflated step and eccentric detection step. Done.

Following the transient region passing step, the control unit may perform a water draining step (S230).

The control unit maintains the rotational speed of the drum 30 at the second RPM to remove water from the laundry object (S200).

Specifically, in the water draining step, the drum is accelerated and maintained at a relatively high speed until the desired RPM to drain the water. In this case, the balls of the balancer can be moved to the opposite position of the laundry object (hereinafter referred to as the 'eccentric counterpart') to reduce the amount of eccentricity of the drum 30 to reduce the vibration and noise caused by the rotation of the drum.

By the way, in the laundry machine having the above-described configuration, the amount of eccentricity that can be corrected by the total weight of the ball 80 of the balancer 70 may be determined. That is, since the balls 80 are moved to the eccentric counterpart in the balancer 70 to reduce the amount of eccentricity to reduce vibration, the sum of the total weights of the movable balls 80 is proportional to the amount of eccentricity that can be corrected. . Therefore, as the total weight of the ball 80 increases, the amount of eccentricity that can be corrected increases.

However, in recent years, users often want to process a large amount of laundry objects at a time, and accordingly, the capacity of the laundry apparatus, that is, the amount of laundry objects that can be put into the laundry apparatus to the maximum is increasing. As the amount of laundry objects to be added increases, the amount of eccentricity may increase when the laundry objects are aggregated, and accordingly, the total weight of the ball of the balancer needs to be increased.

In order to increase the weight of the ball, there is a method of increasing the weight of each ball by having one ball larger, or increasing the total number of balls while maintaining the size of the ball. However, when the weight of each ball is increased, the ball may not move smoothly according to the rotation of the drum, and it may be difficult for the balls to move properly to the eccentric counterpart. In addition, if the number of balls is increased, the balls may be concentrated at other parts other than the eccentric counterpart when passing through the above-described transient region. As such, when the balls are concentrated in a portion other than the eccentric counterpart, the weight itself may act as an eccentric amount, and thus noise and vibration may be increased as the drum rotates.

Therefore, the following describes a balancer 170 according to another embodiment to solve the above problems.

5 shows a state in which the drum 30 with the balancer 170 according to another embodiment is stopped, and FIG. 6 shows that the drum 30 with the balancer 170 according to another embodiment is in a dewatering stroke. It is a schematic diagram which shows the state to rotate to a target RPM.

The balancer according to the present embodiment may not be firmly fixed to the drum 30, but may be provided to allow relative movement with respect to the drum 30 when the drum 30 rotates at a predetermined RPM or higher. For example, when the drum 30 rotates more than a predetermined RPM, the balancer 170 may be provided to move in the radial direction of the drum 30. As a result, when the drum rotates, the rotating shaft of the drum 30 and the rotating shaft of the balancer 170 can be kept different from each other.

In this way, when the balancer is provided to be capable of relative movement with respect to the drum, it is possible to correct the amount of eccentricity by the total weight of the balancer when the drum rotates. That is, in the conventional balancer, the housing of the balancer is firmly fixed to the drum, and only the balls are moved inside the housing to correct the amount of eccentricity. On the contrary, the balancer according to the present embodiment is provided with a housing in which not only the ball but also the balls are movable so that the weight of the housing is also corrected in addition to the weight of the ball. Therefore, if the capacity of the washing machine is the same as the conventional (or the maximum amount of eccentricity), it is possible to reduce the weight or number of the ball of the balancer, and furthermore, if the balancer with the same weight and number as the conventional balancer, ie the amount of eccentricity that can be corrected Maximum eccentricity can be increased. Hereinafter, a balancer according to the present embodiment will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

 Referring to FIG. 5, in the balancer 170 according to the present embodiment, the center of rotation of the balancer 170 and the center of rotation of the drum 30 coincide with each other in the state where the drum 30 is stopped. That is, in the state in which the drum 30 does not rotate, the balancer 170 does not move relative to the drum 30, and the rotation shafts of the drum 30 and the balancer 170 coincide with each other.

Subsequently, when the drum 30 is rotated in the dehydrating stroke or the like, and the drum 30 reaches approximately the predetermined RPM, the balancer 170 may perform relative movement with respect to the drum 30 as shown in FIG. 6. have. When the drum 30 rotates at a predetermined RPM, not only the balls 80 of the balancer 170 move to opposite positions of the laundry object, but also the housing 172 of the balancer 170 may move to the opposite side of the laundry object. .

Meanwhile, when the balancer 170 is provided to be capable of relative movement with respect to the drum 30 as in the present embodiment, the relative motion of the balancer 170 may be determined according to the rotational speed RPM of the drum 30. For example, the balancer 170 may be provided to move when the drum 30 rotates more than a predetermined RPM. In this case, when the predetermined RPM is set below the aforementioned resonance region, the balancer 170 may start relative movement in the resonance region. In this case, as described above, the weight itself of the balancer acts eccentrically on the drum 30, so that the vibration and noise of the washing apparatus may be greater. Therefore, in the present embodiment, the balancer 170 may set a predetermined RPM above the resonance region to start the relative movement.

When the balancer 170 sets a predetermined RPM at which the relative motion starts to be greater than the resonance region, and furthermore, the capacity of the washing apparatus is the same to reduce the weight or the number of the balls of the balancer as compared to the prior art, it is possible to reduce the noise and vibration in the resonance region. It becomes possible. Since the number of balls decreases as compared to the prior art, even if the weight itself acts as an eccentricity by the movement of the balls in the resonance region, the sum of the weights is not large. Because it does not work.

Hereinafter, look at an embodiment of the configuration that the balancer 170 is provided to be relative to the drum (30).

FIG. 7 is a side sectional view showing an embodiment of the balancer 170 provided to allow relative movement of the drum 30.

Referring to FIG. 7, the balancer 170 according to the present exemplary embodiment may include a housing 172 provided to be capable of relative movement with respect to the drum 30. The housing 172 may have a predetermined space 174 therein. The balls 80 may be provided to be movable along the space 174 inside the housing 172.

Here, the housing 172 may be provided to be movable in the radial direction with respect to the drum (30). In addition, the housing 172 may be provided so that the rotation axis of the drum 30 and the rotation axis of the housing 172 when the drum 30 rotates.

For example, the elastic member 120 may be provided to provide an elastic force between the housing 172 of the balancer 170 and the drum 30. The elastic member 120 may apply an elastic force toward the radially inner side of the drum 30. Therefore, when the drum 30 rotates at the first speed or less, the housing 172 rotates in a concentric manner with the drum 30 without relative movement with respect to the drum 30 by the elastic force of the elastic member 120. can do. Furthermore, when the drum 30 rotates at a first speed or higher, the housing 172 may move over the elastic force of the elastic member 120. As such, when the housing 172 itself of the balancer 170 is moved, only the conventional balls are moved and the housing is fixed to the drum while reducing the number and / or size of the balls compared to the so-called 'fixed balancer'. It is possible to correct the same amount of eccentricity. This is because, as described above, since the housing 172 itself is movable, the weight of the housing 172 also serves to correct eccentricity.

Meanwhile, the first speed at which the housing 172 is movable may be variously set. For example, the first speed may be set above the resonance region of the laundry machine. If the first speed is set below the resonance zone of the washing machine, the housing may move in the resonance zone. When the housing moves in the resonant region, moving to a position other than the eccentric counterpart position increases the amount of eccentricity, thereby increasing vibration and noise. Therefore, the first speed at which the housing 172 is movable may be set above the resonance region.

On the other hand, the elastic modulus of the elastic member 120 is the total weight of the balancer (when the weight of the balancer housing 172, the weight of the filling oil filled in the balancer and the weight of the ball) and the first speed is determined Can be determined by one speed. That is, the relationship between the frequency f and the elastic modulus k of the rotating mass m is expressed by Equation 1 below.

For example, when the first rotational speed (rpm) set above the resonance region is converted into the frequency (f), and the total weight (m) of the balancer is known, the elastic modulus (k) of the elastic member 120 can be obtained. have.

As a result, when the drum 30 is stopped by the elastic member having the elastic modulus calculated by the above formula or rotates below the first speed, the housing 172 of the balancer does not move, and the drum 30 does not move. When rotating above this first speed, the balancer housing 172 may be provided to be movable.

On the other hand, the balancer 170 may include a guide unit 180 to guide the movement when the housing 172 moves. The guide portion 180 may be made of a member such as a bolt. As shown in FIG. 7, the bolt 180 has a thread 184 only at an end portion of the body 182 that is fastened to the drum 30, and a thread is provided at a portion of the body 182 penetrating the housing 172. It may not be provided. As a result, the bolt 180 is fastened to the drum 30, and the housing 172 may be provided to be movable along the body 182 having no thread. Therefore, the housing 172 may be provided to be movable in the radial direction of the drum 30 along the guide portion 180.

On the other hand, the balancer according to the embodiments as described above, that is, the balancer relative to the drum may be provided in at least one of the front and rear of the drum (30). In addition, when a balancer capable of moving relative to the drum is provided only at one of the front and rear of the drum 30, the other place may be provided with a so-called 'fixed balancer' fixed to the drum.

Claims (20)

A tub provided inside the cabinet to accommodate washing water;
A drum rotatably provided inside the tub; And
And a balancer provided to be capable of relative movement to the drum to reduce vibrations generated when the drum is rotated. The method of claim 1,
The balancer
A housing provided to be capable of relative movement with respect to the drum and having a predetermined space therein; And
And a mass body movably provided in the inner space of the housing. The method of claim 2,
Washing apparatus characterized in that the mass comprises a plurality of balls. The method of claim 2,
The housing is characterized in that the washing apparatus is provided to be movable a predetermined distance in the radial direction of the drum. The method of claim 2,
The balancer further comprises an elastic member provided between the drum and the housing to provide an elastic force. The method of claim 5,
The balancer device is provided with a plurality along the outer periphery of the drum washing device, characterized in that it comprises a guide for guiding the housing to move. The method of claim 6,
The guide unit washing apparatus, characterized in that for guiding the housing to be movable in the radial direction with respect to the drum. The method of claim 5,
And the elastic member provides an elastic force so that the housing does not move when the drum is less than or equal to the first speed. The method of claim 8,
And said first speed is set above a resonance region of said laundry machine. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 9,
The balancer is a laundry machine, characterized in that provided in at least one of the front and rear of the drum. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 9,
When the balancer is provided on either of the front and rear of the drum, the other side is provided with a balancer fixed to the drum. A tub provided inside the cabinet to accommodate washing water;
A drum rotatably provided inside the tub; And
And a balancer provided in the drum to reduce vibration generated when the drum rotates, the balance shaft being selectively changed from the rotation shaft of the drum. The method of claim 12,
The balancer
A housing provided on an outer circumference of the drum to move a predetermined distance in a radial direction of the drum and having a predetermined space therein; And
And a mass body movably provided along a space inside the housing. The method of claim 13,
The balancer further comprises an elastic member provided between the drum and the housing to provide an elastic force. The method of claim 13,
The balancer device further comprises a plurality of guides provided along the outer circumference of the drum to guide the housing to be movable. 16. The method of claim 15,
The guide unit washing apparatus, characterized in that for guiding the housing to be movable in the radial direction with respect to the drum. The method of claim 14,
And the elastic member provides an elastic force so that the housing does not move when the drum is less than or equal to the first speed. The method of claim 17,
And said first speed is set above a resonance region of said laundry machine. The method according to any one of claims 12 to 18,
The balancer is a laundry machine, characterized in that provided in at least one of the front and rear of the drum. The method according to any one of claims 12 to 18,
And a balancer fixed to the drum when the balancer is provided at either one of the front and the rear of the drum.

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