Patent Grant
9538886
The present invention relates to a hand dryer which provides for a high comfort when drying, without the need of specific heating resistors, a hand dryer which minimizes the projection of drops to the ground and a hand dryer provided with silencing means.
Known are in the art hand dryers comprising:
It is known to apply in many hand dryers with these components, heating resistors for heating the air. These are resistors that are placed at the exit of the air flow of the motor and that raise the temperature of the air in order to decrease the drying time and increase the comfort when drying in case the atmosphere of the room where the dryer is located is very cold.
The cold atmosphere, coupled with the increased evaporation of water in the hands due to the high air flow causes a considerable feeling of cold in the hands.
There are many applications including these heating elements. See for example the U.S. Pat. No. 266,229 for a “Hand Dryer apparatus” or the U.S. Pat. No. 254,101 for a “Multi-function dryer”.
The patent US20100296799 A1 “Air flow directing structure for hand dryer”, proposes an assembly consisting of a motor and a resistor, this latter placed within the circular flow of air out of the motor, which passes through the resistor and hence is directed to the element to be dried. This patent claims its compactness and low cost. However, it entails significant drawbacks:
Also known are hand dryers of the type comprising a cavity for receiving the hands, the cavity being opened upwardly and laterally, such that a top opening, a first lateral opening and a second lateral opening are defined, the cavity for receiving the hands being bounded by a first surface and a second surface provided with air injection holes for drying the hands.
A hand dryer of this type is shown in
A major drawback of this type of hand dryers is that part of the water removed from the hands by the air jets that emerge from the air injection orifices are projected as droplets G by said side openings, as illustrated in
If these devices are used continuously, for example in public services places, projected drops cause the soil to become dirty and unpleasant. This is another issue addressed by this application.
A major drawback of this type of hand dryers is that they are very noisy.
One proposed solution is to provide a labyrinth in the air inlet of the hand dryer, that is, upstream of the motor. Examples of such solutions are described in the documents WO2012017570, JP2010279436 and JP2003180554.
Now, the inventors have found that even so, the decibel level remains high.
Also known in the art are hand dryers provided with sterilization/purification means arranged in the air circulation circuit, for example from WO2012139117, JP3028621, KR20080029143 and US2008052952.
Also are known hand dryers provided with information screens, as described for example in US2006171660 or KR200452289.
To overcome the shortcomings of the prior art, the present invention proposes a hand dryer comprising:
In this manner, at the start of the normal operating regime, the motor has stored heat for ensuring that the air exits already heated, such that it is possible to dispense with additional heating circuits, such as a resistor.
Preferably, the hand dryer does not comprise a separate heating circuit apart from the motor circuits.
To achieve preheating, the excitation of the motor windings can be carried out with direct current or alternating current.
Different variants for motor control, for both types of excitation, are detailed in the description of preferred embodiments.
Furthermore, to overcome the drawback associated with the lateral escape of water drops, the present invention proposes a hand dryer of the type comprising a cavity opened upwardly and laterally for receiving the hands, such that a top opening, a first lateral opening and a second lateral opening are defined, the cavity for receiving the hands being bounded by a first surface and a second surface provided with air injection holes for drying the hands, which is characterised in that the air injection holes closest to the lateral openings of the first surface or of the second surface are arranged closer to the lateral openings than the air injection holes closest to the lateral openings of the second surface or of the first surface respectively, such that said hole or said holes arranged closer to the lateral openings of the first and/or of the second surface do not have air injection holes arranged in front of them, thus allowing the air injected by said holes arranged closer to the lateral openings to form air curtains which minimize or prevent the projection of drops of water towards the outside by said lateral openings.
Preferably, the air injection holes closest to the lateral openings that do not have injection holes in front of are arranged in the same surface, that is, in the first surface or in the second surface.
Advantageously, the air injection holes closest to the lateral openings that do not have injection holes in front them of are arranged in vertical rows.
More preferably, the air injection holes closest to the lateral openings that do not have injection holes in front of them have an oblong section with the longest axis oriented in the vertical direction.
According to another aspect of the invention, to reduce noise emissions from these devices, the present invention proposes a hand dryer of the type comprising a cavity for receiving the hands opened upwardly and laterally, such that a top opening, a first lateral opening and a second lateral opening are defined, the cavity for receiving the hands being bounded by a first surface and a second surface provided with air injection holes for drying the hands, which is characterised in that the injection holes are distributed in at least three groups:
The inventors have noted that the provision of holes of different sections contributes strongly to reduce the level of noise emitted by the hand dryer.
Preferably:
The first surface may be defined as the closest to the user and the second surface as the closest surface to the mounting surface of the hand dryer.
Advantageously:
Still more preferably, the holes of the first, second and third group are oblong and are arranged with the longest axis oriented along a substantially horizontal direction.
Advantageously, the holes are hexagonal and/or oblong.
According to a specially preferred embodiment, the hand dryer comprises a fourth group of holes, said holes being arranged at the sides of the first surface or of the second surface, such that they form air curtains.
Advantageously, the holes of the fourth group have a section which is in the range between 9 and 10 mm2, and still more advantageously, have a section of 10.5 mm2. These holes may be oblong and be vertically arranged.
Preferably, the holes of the first, second and third group each have an associated channel which extends as a protrusion in an air distribution chamber arranged behind each one of the first and second surfaces. These protrusions are channels tilted with respect to the first and second surfaces.
According to a specially preferred feature of the invention, which could be considered as an independent invention, the hand dryer comprises a driving motor-fan group M and air silencing elements arranged upstream of said driving motor-fan group M, said air silencing elements comprising, in the sense of the air circulation, the following components:
The internal air circulation circuit comprises a ion generation unit, preferably an ozone generation unit, to provide the air with sterilizing characteristics.
According to another particularly advantageous feature, that could also be considered as an invention by itself, the hand dryer comprises a visualization screen in the upper part of the second surface.
As usual in this type of hand dryers, the receiving cavity of the hands can comprise a water drain hole in the bottom.
Finally, the first surface is tilted 15° and the second surface tilted between 8° and 10° with respect to the vertical direction, inclinations that make specially comfortable the introduction of the hands in the drying volume of the hand dryer.
For a better understanding of all that has been outlined, some drawings are attached, in which, schematically and solely by way of non-limiting example, practical cases of embodiment are shown.
As it can be seen in
Specifically, as it can be seen in the figures, the control means 9 are configured for operate at least in two operating regimes:
Below, the different options of motor control to achieve the purposes of the invention will be described. All these variants include a voltage regulating unit REG arranged in series between the fourth portion of stator and the neutral point.
It is to be understood that the operation control means 9 include both the motor control, i.e. it includes the REG unit, and the motor and ambient temperature sensors such as thermocouples, ptc, or the like.
I. Embodiments of Hand Dryers Provided with an Alternating Current Universal Motor
In these embodiments the motor is an alternating current motor, wherein the stator can be divided in many sub-stators or winding portions, L1, L2, L3 and L4.
As will be seen below, the preheat function can be done with direct current or alternating current. We will also see that we can preheat either the stator+rotor assembly or the stator only.
As it can be seen in
According to a first variant, illustrated in
In this case, the control of the relays RL1 and RL2 allows choosing the supply type, AC or DC, that has to be sent to the motor. When working with DC, for starting the heating function, the relays RL3 and RL4 must be commuted to ground for preventing the current to pass through the rotor.
The power supplies E may be the same, then they would work in parallel, or may be different, in which case they would work in series.
On the other hand, each lateral part can be preheated at once or may be preheated independently.
According to a second variant based in preheating with direct current, illustrated in
In this case, the control of the relays RL1 and RL2 allows choosing the type of supply, AC or DC, to be applied to the motor. When working in DC, for starting the preheating function, the relay RL3 commutes the rotor, for preventing the current from passing therethrough. With this scheme we can only work in series and the current going from right to left depending on how the power supply and the ground are arranged.
According to a third variant based in preheating with a direct current excitation, illustrated in
In this case, the control of the relays RL1 and RL2 allows choosing the type of supply (AC or DC) to be applied to the motor. When working in DC, the preheating is started. Here the relays RL3 and RL4 physically isolate the rotor from the stator when this function is started. The power supplies E could be the same, such that they would operate in parallel. Or they could be different and then would work in series. On the other hand, either each lateral part can be preheated at once, or they can be independently preheated.
According to a fourth variant based in preheating with excitation with direct current, illustrated in
In this case, the control of the relays RL1 and RL2 allows choosing the type of supply (AC or DC) to be applied to the motor. When working in DC, the preheating function starts. The current can flow from right to left or left to right, depending on the placement of the power supply E and the ground.
As it can be seen in
As it can be seen, according to a first variant based in an alternating current motor illustrated in
In this case, with the voltage regulator REG, the minimum voltage necessary for the preheating is set when the relay RL1 is activated, thus bypassing the rotor.
As it can be seen in
In this case, with the alternating voltage regulator REG the minimum voltage required is set for preheating, but in this case, the relays RL1 and RL2 act for physically isolating the rotor when the preheating function is activated.
As it can be seen in
In this variant, with the alternating voltage regulator REG the minimum voltage required is set for preheating, but in this case, the relays RL1 and RL2 act for physically isolating the rotor when the preheating function is activated. In this case the preheating function can be independent on each side, by operating RL1 or RL2, or it can be done independently, operating RL1 and RL2 in parallel.
Finally, as it can be seen, according to a third variant based in preheating with alternating current illustrated in
II. Variants of Hand Dryer Provided with Brushless Motor
In This case, the preheating is achieved by maintaining multiple stators active for some time without creating a rotation frequency. Activating only some stators can make the stator act as a resistor.
Therefore, the general principle of the invention consists in automatically preheating the motor while the hand dryer is connected to the power.
Taking advantage of the great mass of the motor (rotor and stator) and that the air is passing therethrough, the invention is based in preheating the motor so that when used in the first drying cycle it is already hot and provides warm air from the start.
When the motor has already conducted several cycles of drying thanks to the normal operation, the motor has already warmed and the temperature of the air that reaches the hands is the right one.
The problem is in the first cycle. The motor is cold and the air exits at the room temperature, affected by the high air flow which causes a sensation of cold due to the evaporation of the water in the hands, making it very unpleasant and with a poor drying performance.
On the other hand, as it can be seen in
Specifically, according to the invention, and as it can be seen in
Preferably, these holes 8′ are a plurality of holes. However, a solution may be obviously a to single elongated hole which stretches vertically enough to constitute an air curtain.
As it can be seen in the embodiment illustrated in
According to another embodiment, the end holes can be placed to achieve the effect shown in
In the embodiments shown, the air injection holes 9′ closest to the lateral openings 3′, 4′ that do not have injection holes in front of are arranged in vertical rows. Even then, they could be arranged in zigzag, or any other vertical arrangement that would create an air curtain.
As shown for example in
According to another aspect of the present invention, the injection holes are distributed in at least three groups:
The three ranges being different.
According to a specially preferred embodiment,
The first surface 5 is the closest to the user and the second surface 6′ is the closest to the fixing surface of the hand dryer and:
As it can be seen for example in
Also a fourth group of oblong holes 8′ is provided, vertically arranged and with a section of 10.5 mm2, said holes being arranged at the sides of the first surface or of the second surface, such that they form air curtains 10′, as it can be seen in
As it can be seen in
As it can be seen in
The internal circulation of air circulation comprises an ion generation unit 25, preferably of ozone, to provide the air with sterilizing characteristics.
As it can be seen in
As shown in
Although reference has been made to specific embodiments of the invention, it will be apparent to one skilled in the art that the hand dryer described is susceptible of numerous variations and modifications, and that all the details mentioned can be replaced with other technically equivalent, without departing from the scope of protection defined by the appended claims.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 201330188 | Feb 2013 | ES | national |
| 201330216 U | Feb 2013 | ES | national |
| Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| PCT/ES2014/070098 | 2/12/2014 | WO | 00 |
| Publishing Document | Publishing Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| WO2014/125146 | 8/21/2014 | WO | A |
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5459944 | Tatsutani | Oct 1995 | A |
| 6038786 | Aisenberg | Mar 2000 | A |
| 6050000 | Curzon | Apr 2000 | A |
| 7437833 | Sato | Oct 2008 | B2 |
| 7596883 | Kameishi | Oct 2009 | B2 |
| 7614160 | Kameishi | Nov 2009 | B2 |
| 7657162 | Itoigawa | Feb 2010 | B2 |
| 7946055 | Churchill | May 2011 | B2 |
| 7971368 | Fukaya | Jul 2011 | B2 |
| 8341853 | French | Jan 2013 | B2 |
| 8347521 | Churchill | Jan 2013 | B2 |
| 8347522 | Dyson | Jan 2013 | B2 |
| 8490291 | Churchill | Jul 2013 | B2 |
| 8850713 | Nakamura | Oct 2014 | B2 |
| 9060657 | Ryan | Jun 2015 | B2 |
| 9125533 | Babikian | Sep 2015 | B2 |
| 9282856 | Fukano | Mar 2016 | B2 |
| 20070079524 | Sato et al. | Apr 2007 | A1 |
| 20080273866 | Itoigawa | Nov 2008 | A1 |
| 20160007813 | Ros Mar n | Jan 2016 | A1 |
| Number | Date | Country |
|---|---|---|
| 2904318 | Sep 2014 | CA |
| EP 0884062 | Dec 1998 | DE |
| 2399497 | Dec 2011 | EP |
| H 11113794 | Apr 1999 | JP |
| 2003180554 | Jul 2003 | JP |
| 2003250720 | Sep 2003 | JP |
| 2010220918 | Oct 2010 | JP |
| 2012023294 | Feb 2012 | JP |
| WO 2012023294 | Feb 2012 | JP |
| 2014188091 | Oct 2014 | JP |
| WO 9953250 | Oct 1999 | WO |
| WO 2006042896 | Apr 2006 | WO |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20160007813 A1 | Jan 2016 | US |
