Cold water tank
AssigneeCoway Co., Ltd.
InventorJae Man Kim
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The present invention provides a cold water tank. In the cold water tank, an accommodation space for accommodating a fluid is partitioned by means of partition walls alternately disposed in the transverse direction such that the fluid flows straight along the partition walls, and an evaporator having m evaporation pipes forming an offset and m−1 connection pipes connecting the m evaporation pipes is disposed in the accommodation space opposite to the partition walls so as to be heat-exchanged with the fluid. Therefore, the cold water tank has increased contact surface area heat-exchanged with the fluid and prevents excessive ice formation, and thus provides an enhanced cold water dispensing performance.
Claims11
A cold water tank, comprising:
- a body part having an accommodation space for accommodating a fluid;
- a partition wall part composed of n partition walls that laterally divide the accommodation space of the body part into n+1 zones, wherein n is an integer equal to or greater than 1;
- an evaporator disposed in the accommodation space of the body part to cool a fluid moving through the n+1 zones,
- wherein the evaporator comprises:
- m evaporation pipes, wherein m is an integer of 2 or more, that are arranged to face the partition walls, wherein at least some of the evaporation pipes are arranged in a first direction;
- and
- m−1 connection pipes connecting a kth evaporation pipe and a [k+1]th evaporation pipe so that the [k+1]th evaporation pipe forms a first offset with the kth evaporation pipe in a second direction perpendicular to the first direction and forms a second offset with the kth evaporation pipe in the longitudinal direction, and connecting the [k+1]th evaporation pipe and a [k+2]th evaporation pipe so that the [k+2]th evaporation pipe forms a first offset with the [k+1]th evaporation pipe in a third direction, which is the reverse direction of the second direction, and forms a second offset with the [k+1]th evaporation pipe in the longitudinal direction wherein k is an odd number equal to or greater than 1 and less than m−1,
- wherein the partition wall comprises an opening through which the connection pipe passes,
- wherein the m−1 connection pipes comprise:
- a plurality of first connection pipes connecting the kth evaporation pipe and the [k+1]th evaporation pipe;
- and
- a plurality of second connection pipes connecting the [k+1]th evaporation pipe and the [k+2]th evaporation pipe,
- wherein the n partition walls comprise a first partition wall part through which any one of the plurality of first connection pipes passes and a second partition wall part through which any one of the plurality of second connection pipes passes, and the first partition wall part and the second partition wall part are alternately arranged in the transverse direction in the accommodation space.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.