KR20120110495A - Operating method of a clothes treating apparatus with a heat pump - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: A driving method for a cloth processing device with a heat pump is provided to improve the reliability of a product by preventing damage caused by the operation of an auxiliary heater to a compressor to prevent the performance deterioration of the compressor. CONSTITUTION: Power is supplied to a compressor(S02). The normal operation of the compressor is determined(S03). The temperature of refrigerant discharged from the compressor is measured. After a fixed time, the temperature of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor is measured. The normal operation of the compressor is determined according to a difference between the temperatures measured. If the compressor is normally operated, an auxiliary heater is operated(S04). The discharge pressure of the compressor is measured to determine the normal operation of the compressor. [Reference numerals] (AA) Start; (BB) No; (CC) Yes; (DD) End; (S01) Dry function start; (S02) Power is supplied to a compressor; (S03) Compressor normal?; (S04) Auxiliary heater driving; (S05) Current blocking and error display

Description

Operation method of clothing processing apparatus with heat pump {OPERATING METHOD OF A CLOTHES TREATING APPARATUS WITH A HEAT PUMP}

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method of operating a clothes treating apparatus having a heat pump, and more particularly, to a clothes treating apparatus including a heat pump for reusing heat energy of exhausted air.

The clothes treating apparatus having a drying function, for example, a dryer, generally removes moisture by supplying hot air into the drum while a drying object is put into the rotating drum. The hot air supplied to the drum is generated by adding heat obtained by burning fuel such as electric resistance heat or gas to the air supplied to the drum, but a heat pump may be used to generate hot air in order to reduce energy consumption.

Specifically, the hot air exhausted from the drum is cooled and condensed by heat exchange with the evaporator, and the hot air is generated by heat-exchanging the air supplied to the drum with the condenser. When the heat pump is used, the amount of heat discarded in the exhaust or condensation process can be re-injected into the hot air generation, thereby reducing energy consumption.

However, when performing the drying function using only the condenser of the heat pump, there is a problem that the drying time is long because the amount of heat transferred from the condenser to the air is not sufficient. In order to solve this, a dryer having an auxiliary heater in addition to the condenser has been disclosed. This allows the heaters to be operated together to supply hot air having a temperature suitable for drying from the beginning of operation when the heat pump does not reach a steady state at the initial stage of the heat pump operation so that sufficient heat is not supplied from the condenser. Even in the normal state, the heater can provide more heat and shorten the drying time.

On the other hand, the dryer may be classified according to whether or not the hot air exhausted from the drum, the exhaust type dryer for exhausting the hot air to the outside of the dryer, and the circulation type dryer for re-supply to the inside of the drum without exhausting the hot air to the outside. . In the case of the circulation dryer, the water is cooled to remove the moisture of the air exhausted from the drum, the moisture is removed, and then reheated and supplied to the drum. When the heat pump is applied to the circulation dryer, the evaporator of the heat pump serves to cool and condense the hot air, and the condenser generates hot air to be supplied to the drum by heating dry air from which moisture is removed.

Since the air circulates through the evaporator and the condenser in the circulation dryer, the heat pump can operate normally only when the temperature and humidity conditions of the air passing through the evaporator and the condenser are in an appropriate range. In other words, if the temperature of the hot air flowing into the evaporator is too high and the evaporator does not sufficiently cool the hot air, air having a temperature of an appropriate range or more is introduced into the condenser to lower the heat dissipation performance of the condenser. As a result, when the refrigerant passing through the condenser is not sufficiently cooled, liquid refrigerant flows into the compressor or the discharge pressure of the compressor is excessively increased, which adversely affects the reliability of the compressor.

If the auxiliary heater is added to the circulating dryer having the heat pump as described above, the temperature of the air flowing into the evaporator becomes higher, which makes it more difficult to control the compressor so that the load is not excessively loaded at the initial stage of the heat pump operation. There is.

The present invention has been made to overcome the disadvantages of the prior art as described above, the technical problem is to provide a method of operating a clothes handling apparatus that can prevent the excessive load on the compressor even when the operation of the heat pump. .

According to an aspect of the present invention for achieving the above technical problem, the air exhausted from the drum is supplied back to the drum after passing through the evaporator and condenser of the heat pump, the auxiliary heater for heating the air supplied to the drum A method of operating a laundry treatment apparatus having a: supplying power to a compressor; Determining whether the compressor operates normally; And operating the auxiliary heater when the compressor operates normally. The method of operating the clothes treating apparatus having the heat pump is provided.

In the above aspect of the present invention, in the laundry treatment apparatus having a circulating structure having a heat pump and an auxiliary heater, the auxiliary heater is operated after confirming that the compressor operates normally. That is, when the auxiliary heater is driven in a state where the compressor does not operate normally due to an abnormality in the compressor, since the air heated by the auxiliary heater passes through the condenser of the heat pump, normal heat dissipation is not performed in the condenser. As a result, a high temperature refrigerant is introduced into the compressor, thereby worsening the state of the compressor.

Therefore, in the above aspect of the present invention, after confirming that the compressor is normally operated, the auxiliary heater is operated to prevent the high temperature refrigerant or the liquid refrigerant from flowing into the compressor.

In this case, the steps may be performed immediately after the compressor is driven, or may be performed during a drying function. That is, even after the initial operation is confirmed whether the auxiliary heater needs to be operated during the drying process, it is possible to prevent damage to the compressor by operating the auxiliary heater after checking whether the compressor is normally operated.

Here, the normal operation of the compressor can be determined by measuring the discharge pressure of the compressor. That is, if heat dissipation is not properly performed in the condenser, the discharge pressure of the compressor is increased due to the high temperature refrigerant. Therefore, the discharge pressure may be checked using a pressure sensor or the like to determine whether the compressor operates normally.

In addition, the temperature of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor may be measured to determine whether the compressor is in normal operation. That is, although the temperature of the refrigerant is not high at the beginning of the operation of the compressor, the temperature of the refrigerant increases as the compressor proceeds to reach a steady state. Therefore, the temperature of the refrigerant may be sensed to determine whether the compressor operates normally from the temperature change. To this end, the step of determining whether the compressor is in normal operation comprises the steps of measuring the temperature (T1) of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor; Measuring the temperature T2 of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor after a predetermined time elapses after the T1 measurement; And determining whether the compressor operates normally according to the difference between T2 and T1.

Here, it may be determined that the compressor operates normally when the value of T2-T1 is equal to or greater than a predetermined value. If the value of T2-T1 is less than a predetermined value, the method may further include stopping power supply to the compressor and indicating that there is an error in the dryer.

According to aspects of the present invention having the configuration as described above, it is possible to prevent damage to the compressor due to the operation of the auxiliary heater in advance it is possible to prevent the degradation of the compressor to improve the reliability of the product.

1 is a perspective view showing a dryer to which an embodiment of a driving method according to the present invention is applied.
2 is an internal structural view schematically showing the internal structure of the dryer.
3 is a plan view showing the base of the dryer.
FIG. 4 is a partial cutaway view of the base shown in FIG. 3;
5 is a block diagram schematically illustrating a control system of the dryer.
6 is a flowchart illustrating the operation of the embodiment.
7 is a flowchart illustrating a process of determining whether or not the compressor is abnormal in the embodiment.

Hereinafter, with reference to the accompanying drawings will be described an embodiment of a method of operating a laundry treatment apparatus according to the present invention.

1 is a perspective view showing a dryer to which an embodiment of the operating method according to the present invention is applied, and FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating an internal structure of the dryer. Here, the embodiment is applied to a dryer, but the present invention is not necessarily limited to a dryer, and may be applied to any clothes treating apparatus having a drying function of supplying hot air to dry laundry loaded into a drum.

1 and 2, the dryer includes a cabinet 100 having a substantially rectangular parallelepiped shape, and an upper surface of the cabinet 100 is provided with a top plate 102, and various functions of the dryer are provided on an upper surface of the cabinet 100. A control panel 104 is provided for controlling and displaying the operating status. In addition, an inlet 106 for injecting clothes to be dried is formed on the front surface of the cabinet 100, and a door 108 for opening and closing the inlet 106 is installed adjacent to the inlet 106. .

On the other hand, the inside of the cabinet 100, the drum 110, the clothes are introduced is rotatably installed. In addition, a lint filter installation part 112 through which air exhausted from the drum 110 flows is formed near the lower front of the drum 110. The lint filter installation unit 112 provides a place where a lint filter (not shown) for filtering lints included in the hot air exhausted from the drum is installed and forms a part of a flow path through which the hot air moves.

The circulation passage 116 is provided downstream of the lint filter installation unit 112, and the heat pump 120 is installed inside the circulation passage 116. Specifically, the heat pump 120 includes an evaporator 121, an expander 122, a compressor 123, and a condenser 124, but the evaporator 121 and the condenser 124 are provided in the circulation passage 116. The inflator and the compressor are disposed outside the circulation passage. Therefore, the air introduced from the lint filter installation unit 112 passes through the circulation passage 116 and passes through the evaporator 121 and the condenser 124 sequentially, thereby cooling (condensing) and reheating. do. In the cooling process, the moisture contained in the hot air condenses and forms on the surface of the evaporator or falls to the bottom of the evaporator. The condensed water thus produced is first collected in the condensate collecting unit located at the bottom of the evaporator.

A back duct 114 is installed downstream of the circulation passage 116, and the back duct 114 is connected to supply hot air introduced from the circulation passage 116 to the drum. In addition, an auxiliary heater 118 is provided inside the back duct 114 to reheat the hot air primarily heated by the condenser 124. The auxiliary heater 118 operates at an initial time point at which the heat pump does not reach a normal state, thereby preventing the temperature of the hot air from being lowered, or providing an additional amount of heat to shorten the drying time even when the heat pump is reached. Or the like.

3 is a plan view illustrating a base of the dryer, and FIG. 4 is a partial cutaway view of the base shown in FIG. 3. 3 and 4, the base 130 is installed on the bottom surface of the cabinet 100, constitutes a part of the circulation passage described above, and the installation place for stably supporting the heat pump 120 Providing. In detail, a circulation passage in which the evaporator and the condenser are installed is arranged on the left side with reference to FIG. 3, and the expander 122 and the compressor 123 are installed on the right side.

In addition, the lint filter installation unit 112 is formed at the front portion (lower end in FIG. 3) of the cabinet 100, and a circulation flow guide unit 131 communicating with the lint filter installation unit 112 is formed. The circulation flow path guide part 131 communicates with the lint filter installation part 112 to guide hot air exhausted from the drum toward the evaporator 121. To this end, a plurality of guide vanes 131a are formed in the circulation flow path guide part 131 to guide the introduced air toward the evaporator 121 side.

Hot air induced by the guide vane 131a is introduced into the circulation passage 116. The circulation passage 116 is defined by a cover plate 140 covering a bottom surface of the base 130 and an upper portion of a space formed by a partition wall (not shown) formed on the base 130. That is, the circulation passage 116 is formed by the partition wall of the cover plate 140 and the base 130, and the air passing through the circulation passage 116 thus generated passes through the evaporator and the condenser in turn and then the base. It is introduced into the back duct 118 through the back duct connection 133 formed on the rear surface of the 130.

On the other hand, the portion in which the evaporator and the condenser is disposed among the bottom surface of the base 130 functions as the condensate collector 132. That is, the condensed water generated while condensed by the evaporator 121 is first collected by the condensate collecting unit 132. The collected condensate is introduced into the condensate storage unit 134 positioned adjacent to the compressor 123. The condensate collecting unit and the condensate storage unit are partitioned by partitions not shown, and are communicated with each other by through holes formed in the partitions.

Therefore, when the level of the condensate collected in the condensate collection unit 132 is higher than a predetermined level, the condensate storage unit 134 is introduced into and stored through the through hole. The condensate stored in the condensate storage unit 134 is supplied to the control valve 160 installed on the cover plate 140 by the pump 150. The control valve 160 distributes the condensed water supplied by the pump 150 to each of the washing nozzles 170 to remove foreign substances such as lint attached to the surface of the evaporator 121.

Here, the cleaning nozzle 170 is not necessarily provided with a plurality, it may be considered to wash the entire evaporator using a single nozzle, lint by using a brush installed to move along the surface of the evaporator. An example of removal may also be considered.

Now, the operation of the dryer will be described.

5 is a block diagram schematically illustrating a control system of the dryer. Referring to FIG. 5, a controller 180 provided to control an operation of the dryer according to a signal or information input from the operation panel 104 by a user is provided to the compressor 121 and the auxiliary heater 118. Applying or breaking current will control their operation. The controller is electrically connected to a hot air temperature sensor 181 for measuring the temperature of the air exhausted from the drum and a refrigerant temperature sensor 182 for measuring the temperature of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor. In this case, the coolant temperature sensor 182 may be attached to the surface of the discharge pipe of the compressor to indirectly measure the temperature of the coolant.

6 is a flowchart illustrating a process of starting a drying function in the dryer by the controller. Referring to FIG. 6, if a user needs to start a drying function, such as when a user performs a drying function through the operation panel, the controller may dry the drum according to a predetermined procedure such as rotating the drum. The function is started (step S01).

Thereafter, in order to supply hot air into the drum, a current is applied to the compressor 121 to drive the compressor (step S02). After the current is applied to the compressor, it is determined whether the compressor is normally driven (step S03). If it is determined that the compressor is normal, the auxiliary heater is driven (step S04), and the drying function is continued. Otherwise, the current is applied to the compressor and the dryer is cut to the user through a display device provided in the operation panel. Notify that there is an error in the function (step S05).

As described above, the dryer is a circulating dryer that cools, heats, and resupplys the air exhausted from the drum. In the circulating dryer, the evaporator receives heat energy of the exhausted air, cools the air to remove moisture contained in the air, and then transfers the received heat energy to the condenser to heat the condensed air.

Meanwhile, the refrigerant transfers heat from the condenser to the air and then compresses it in the compressor through the evaporator. If the heat cannot be sufficiently transferred to the air from the condenser, the refrigerant does not absorb enough heat from the evaporator to exhaust the air. Not only does not sufficiently remove the included moisture, the high temperature refrigerant flows into the compressor, thereby increasing the load applied to the compressor. If the compressor is abnormal and the heat pump is not normally driven, heat dissipation in the condenser may not be normally performed. In this state, when the protective heater is operated, the temperature of the exhausted air is further increased, thereby increasing the temperature of the refrigerant supplied to the compressor, thereby worsening the state of the compressor.

In other words, the maximum amount of heat that can be absorbed by the evaporator is set to correspond to the amount of heat exhausted from the drum when the condenser and the auxiliary heater are operated at the same time, but the compressor fails to operate normally or immediately after the operation is started. The amount of heat that can be absorbed will not reach the maximum amount of heat. If there is no abnormality in the compressor, but the steady state is not reached, the amount of heat that can be absorbed by the evaporator increases as time passes. However, the auxiliary heater can be operated. In this case, the compressor should be shut down to prevent damage to the compressor due to overload, since the likelihood of failure to increase is very high.

Therefore, in the above embodiment, after the current is applied to the compressor, the auxiliary heater is operated after checking whether the compressor is normally operated before operating the auxiliary heater to solve the above problem.

On the other hand, the normal operation of the compressor can be confirmed in a variety of ways. For example, the pressure of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor may be sensed by a pressure sensor or the like to directly check whether there is an abnormality. In the above embodiment, it is determined whether the temperature of the refrigerant is normal. The process is illustrated in FIG. 7.

Referring to FIG. 7, after the current is applied to the compressor (step S10), the temperature T1 of the refrigerant is measured through the refrigerant temperature sensor 182 after 10 seconds have elapsed (step S11). After 60 seconds after measuring T1, the temperature T2 of the refrigerant is measured again (step S12). If the difference between the measured T2 and T1 exceeds 3 ℃ (step S13), it is determined that the compressor is operating normally to reach a normal state (step S14), otherwise it is determined that there is an abnormality (step S15) ).

On the other hand, the example shown in FIG. 6 can be applied not only to the initial operation of the compressor but also to the case where the operation is in progress for a predetermined time or more. That is, after a considerable time has elapsed since the compressor has been operated, when the auxiliary heater needs to be driven, the auxiliary heater is operated after checking whether the compressor is normally operated before starting the auxiliary heater. It is possible to protect the compressor by checking whether or not the amount of heat generated can be absorbed by the evaporator.

Claims (6)

As the air discharged from the drum passes through the evaporator and condenser of the heat pump and is re-supplied to the drum, the operation method of the clothes treating apparatus having an auxiliary heater for heating the air supplied to the drum,
Supplying power to the compressor;
Determining whether the compressor operates normally; And
Operating a subsidiary heater when the compressor is operating normally. The method of claim 1,
The normal operation of the compressor operation method of the laundry treatment apparatus having a heat pump characterized in that it is determined by measuring the discharge pressure of the compressor. The method of claim 1,
Determining whether the compressor is operating normally
Measuring a temperature T1 of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor;
Measuring the temperature T2 of the refrigerant discharged from the compressor after a predetermined time elapses after the T1 measurement; And
Determining whether the compressor is normally operated according to the difference between T2 and T1; and a method of operating a laundry treatment apparatus having a heat pump. The method of claim 3,
A method of operating a laundry treatment apparatus having a heat pump, characterized in that it is determined that the compressor operates normally when the value T2-T1 is equal to or greater than a predetermined value. The method of claim 4, wherein
If the T2-T1 value is less than a predetermined value, the step of stopping the power supply to the compressor, and indicating that there is an abnormality in the dryer, the operation method of the laundry treatment apparatus having a heat pump characterized in that it further comprises. As the air discharged from the drum passes through the evaporator and condenser of the heat pump and is re-supplied to the drum, the operation method of the clothes treating apparatus having an auxiliary heater for heating the air supplied to the drum,
Determining whether to drive the auxiliary heater;
If it is determined that the auxiliary heater is driven, determining whether the compressor is normally operated before the auxiliary heater is driven; And
And driving the auxiliary heater when the compressor is in normal operation.

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