Classifications

• • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
  • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
  • F25D—REFRIGERATORS; COLD ROOMS; ICE-BOXES; COOLING OR FREEZING APPARATUS NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • F25D29/00—Arrangement or mounting of control or safety devices
• • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
  • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
  • F25D—REFRIGERATORS; COLD ROOMS; ICE-BOXES; COOLING OR FREEZING APPARATUS NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • F25D11/00—Self-contained movable devices, e.g. domestic refrigerators
  • F25D11/02—Self-contained movable devices, e.g. domestic refrigerators with cooling compartments at different temperatures
• • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
  • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
  • F25B—REFRIGERATION MACHINES, PLANTS OR SYSTEMS; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS
  • F25B2700/00—Sensing or detecting of parameters; Sensors therefor
  • F25B2700/21—Temperatures
  • F25B2700/2117—Temperatures of an evaporator
• • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
  • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
  • F25D—REFRIGERATORS; COLD ROOMS; ICE-BOXES; COOLING OR FREEZING APPARATUS NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • F25D2400/00—General features of, or devices for refrigerators, cold rooms, ice-boxes, or for cooling or freezing apparatus not covered by any other subclass
  • F25D2400/08—Refrigerator tables
• • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
  • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
  • F25D—REFRIGERATORS; COLD ROOMS; ICE-BOXES; COOLING OR FREEZING APPARATUS NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • F25D2400/00—General features of, or devices for refrigerators, cold rooms, ice-boxes, or for cooling or freezing apparatus not covered by any other subclass
  • F25D2400/36—Visual displays
• • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
  • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
  • F25D—REFRIGERATORS; COLD ROOMS; ICE-BOXES; COOLING OR FREEZING APPARATUS NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
  • F25D2700/00—Means for sensing or measuring; Sensors therefor
  • F25D2700/12—Sensors measuring the inside temperature

Definitions

• the present invention relates to a refrigeration device with a heat-insulating housing, an evaporator and two rooms surrounded by the housing, one of which evaporator cools to different target temperatures.
• Known refrigeration devices of this type are e.g. Refrigerators with an internal ice compartment, the walls of which are largely formed by the evaporator. Since heat can only penetrate from the outside into this ice compartment over a small part of its surface, it reaches significantly lower storage temperatures than the main cooling chamber of such a refrigerator, which surrounds the evaporator on a large part of its surface outside.
• a temperature sensor which is arranged on the evaporator and detects its temperature. Since the evaporator must reach temperatures below 0 ° C to operate the ice compartment, a layer of frost or ice forms on the surface of the evaporator when the refrigerator is operated for a long time. This layer provides thermal insulation for the evaporator from the main cooling compartment of the refrigerator, with the result that the evaporator absorbs less and less heat as the icing increases. As a result, only short operating times of a source supplying the evaporator with liquid refrigerant, such as a compressor, are required in order to keep the temperature detected by the sensor in a predetermined desired range.
• the cooling capacity of the evaporator which decreases with increasing icing, leads to the temperatures in the cooling rooms of the refrigeration device becoming ever higher.
• the refrigerator can no longer function properly and there is a risk that food stored in it will spoil prematurely. If a user recognizes this situation and at the same time determines that the compressor hardly ever works, it can easily lead to the erroneous assumption that the refrigerator is defective.
• the object of the present invention is to provide a refrigeration device of the type specified at the outset, in which increasing icing of the evaporator cannot lead to an undesirable increase in the interior temperatures, and its
• a first temperature sensor of this refrigeration device By arranging a first temperature sensor of this refrigeration device in such a way that it detects the air temperature of the warmer of the two cooled rooms of the refrigeration device, it is excluded that excessive icing of the evaporator can lead to an undesirable rise in the temperature in this room. Instead, as a result of icing, the operating phases of the refrigerant source required to maintain the target temperature in the space monitored by the sensor are becoming longer and longer. The user can thus possibly hear that the refrigerator is working and cannot come to any false conclusions about its functionality.
• the refrigeration device preferably has a second temperature sensor for detecting a temperature of the evaporator or the colder of the two rooms.
• this second temperature sensor is not used, as is conventionally arranged on the evaporator, to keep the evaporator temperature constantly in a desired range, but it essentially serves as a precautionary measure in order to avoid faulty controls which occur when the first temperature sensor is used alone or at unusually low ambient temperatures with a very weak set cooling. If poor cooling is set or the temperature of the environment in which the refrigerator is installed is only slightly above the target temperature of the warmer interior, this leads to extremely short operating phases of the refrigerant source, which can be insufficient to control the temperature in the to keep the colder of the two rooms at a sufficiently low level.
• the control unit which controls the operation of the refrigerant source, is set up to adopt a first operating mode or normal operating mode, as long as the temperature of the evaporator or of the colder space detected by the second temperature sensor is below a predetermined threshold , and to control the operation of the source in the first operating mode such that the temperature of the warmer room detected by the first temperature sensor remains in a desired range.
• the control unit changes from the first operating mode to a second operating mode or emergency cooling mode, wherein it regulates the average power of the source in the second operating mode to a higher value than in the first.
• the control unit preferably operates the source continuously in the second operating mode.
• the control unit changes from the second operating mode back to the first.
• the control unit has a third operating mode or defrosting mode which can be set by a user and in which it does not operate the source. If the refrigeration device has a heating device for heating the evaporator, it can be provided that the control unit is set up to operate the heating device in this third operating mode in order to accelerate the defrosting.
• the control unit is preferably also set up to automatically switch from the third operating mode to the first or second operating mode when the temperature detected by the second temperature sensor exceeds a third threshold which indicates complete defrosting of the evaporator. In this embodiment, it is therefore sufficient to defrost the evaporator that the user gives the control unit a command in this regard; After defrosting has taken place, the control unit returns to normal cooling operation without further action by the user.
• FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a refrigerator, to which the present invention is applicable;
• Fig. 2 is a schematic drawing showing various functional elements of the refrigerator;
• FIG. 1 shows a perspective view of a refrigerator as an application example of the present invention, with the door 1 open.
• the heat-insulating housing 2 of the refrigerator encloses an interior which is subdivided into a normal refrigerator compartment 3 and an ice compartment 4.
• the approximately cuboidal ice compartment 4 is in an upper corner of the interior. It has on its front side facing the door 1 a closable flap 5, shown half open in the FIG.
• the four walls of the cuboid shape adjoining this front side are formed by an evaporator 6, on the outer surface of which lines 7 for a refrigerant can be seen.
• a flat shell 8 is mounted below the ice compartment 4, so that it can be pulled out towards the front. It extends over the entire base area of the ice compartment 4 and serves to collect defrost water that drips off the evaporator 6 when it is defrosted.
• FIG. 2 Various functional elements of the refrigerator are shown in the schematic drawing of FIG. 2.
• a suction line 9 for evaporated refrigerant extends from the evaporator 6 to a compressor 10.
• Pressure line 11 for compressed refrigerant passes through a condenser 12 mounted on the rear of the housing 2 before it reaches the evaporator 6.
• a control unit 13 for controlling the operation of the compressor 10 is connected to operating and display elements 15 and 16 mounted on a front panel 14 of the housing 2 and to two temperature sensors 17, 18, of which the first, 17, inside the normal cooling compartment 3 or is mounted on a wall thereof at a distance from the evaporator 6 in order to detect the air temperature prevailing in the normal cooling compartment 3.
• the second temperature sensor 18 is mounted on the evaporator 6 and detects its temperature.
• the control unit 13 has three operating modes. In a first operating mode, it switches the compressor 10 on and off as a function of the temperature T N detected by the temperature sensor 17 in order to keep this temperature T N in a predetermined tolerance range around a target value which is set by a user on one of the operating elements 15 ,
• FIG. 3A shows the course of the temperature T N of the normal cooling compartment 3 detected by the temperature sensor 17 as a function of the time t.
• the control unit 13 switches the compressor 10 on and keeps it in operation until the temperature T N reaches the lower limit of the tolerance range.
• the corresponding operating phases of the compressor 10 are shown in Fig. 3B.
• the control unit 13 only uses the temperature sensor 17 Measuring the air temperature in the normal cooling compartment has the result that if the normal cooling compartment 3 is sufficiently cooled, the ice compartment 4 becomes undesirably warm.
• the second temperature sensor 18 is provided. 2 shows the second temperature sensor 18 mounted on the evaporator 6. Strictly speaking, with this placement of the second sensor 18, the temperature detected by it can deviate from the temperature T E prevailing in the ice compartment 4.
• the second sensor 18 could also be placed at a distance from the evaporator 6 in the ice compartment 4 in order to detect its temperature T E.
• the second temperature sensor 18 reports a temperature above a critical first threshold of, for example, -5 ° C. to the control unit 13, then this changes to a second operating mode in which the compressor 10 is operated continuously regardless of the temperature T N detected by the temperature sensor 17 , The control unit does not return to the first operating mode until the evaporator temperature has fallen below a second threshold of, for example, -10 ° C. and thus sufficient cooling of the ice compartment is ensured.
• a critical first threshold for example, -5 ° C.
• these two thresholds can be predetermined by the manufacturer of the refrigeration device. There is generally no need for the user to be able to specify them himself. However, it can make sense if the control unit 13 offers the user the possibility of completely blocking the second operating mode. This can save energy when the freezer compartment is empty and as a result may reach temperatures above the first threshold without causing damage to the refrigerated goods.
• the control unit 13 can also be put into a third operating mode, a defrosting operating mode, by actuating a corresponding control element 15.
• This operating mode can simply consist of the control unit leaving the compressor switched off, but monitoring the temperature detected by the temperature sensor 18 when the compressor is switched off and, when a positive Celsius temperature is reached, the indicates complete defrosting of the evaporator 6, returns to the first or second operating mode.
• the evaporator 6 can be equipped with a heating device (not shown) which is operated by the control unit 13 as long as it is in its third operating mode.

Landscapes

• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Chemical & Material Sciences (AREA)
• Combustion & Propulsion (AREA)
• Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
• Mechanical Engineering (AREA)
• Thermal Sciences (AREA)
• General Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Devices That Are Associated With Refrigeration Equipment (AREA)
• Cold Air Circulating Systems And Constructional Details In Refrigerators (AREA)
• Defrosting Systems (AREA)
• Sorption Type Refrigeration Machines (AREA)
• Air-Conditioning For Vehicles (AREA)

Applications Claiming Priority (3)

Publications (2)

Family

ID=7712669

Family Applications (1)

Country Status (8)

Families Citing this family (1)

Family Cites Families (10)

• 2002
  • 2002-01-21 DE DE10202134A patent/DE10202134A1/de not_active Withdrawn
• 2003
  • 2003-01-10 CN CNB038025175A patent/CN100416193C/zh not_active Expired - Fee Related
  • 2003-01-10 BR BR0306819-6A patent/BR0306819A/pt not_active IP Right Cessation
  • 2003-01-10 ES ES03704372T patent/ES2326163T3/es not_active Expired - Lifetime
  • 2003-01-10 DE DE50311532T patent/DE50311532D1/de not_active Expired - Fee Related
  • 2003-01-10 AT AT03704372T patent/ATE431926T1/de not_active IP Right Cessation
  • 2003-01-10 EP EP03704372A patent/EP1470375B1/fr not_active Expired - Lifetime
  • 2003-01-10 WO PCT/EP2003/000185 patent/WO2003060402A1/fr not_active Ceased
  • 2003-01-10 PL PL369369A patent/PL201063B1/pl not_active IP Right Cessation

Non-Patent Citations (1)

Also Published As

Similar Documents

Legal Events