Back to results
US 2006/0048527 A1Published application
Hot gas bypass through four-way reversing valve
AssigneeCarrier Corporation
InventorsAlexander Lifson, Michael Taras
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A heat pump four-way valve selectively routes refrigerant to either indoor or outdoor heat exchanger. The position of the plunger inside the valve can also be adjusted to selectively provide a hot gas by-pass function by routing a portion of refrigerant from discharge to suction line. The four-way valve preferably is positioned such that it can either operate in a conventional heat pump mode, or can be positioned to perform an unloaded hot gas by-pass function.
Claims6
A heat pump comprising:
- a compressor for delivering a compressed refrigerant to a discharge line;
- a valve for selectively routing refrigerant from said discharge line to either an outdoor heat exchanger when in a cooling mode, and to an indoor heat exchanger when in a heating mode, said valve further being selectively operable to by-pass a portion of refrigerant if desired from said discharge line to said suction line.
A method of operating a heat pump comprising the steps of:
- (1) providing a compressor, said compressor being provided with a discharge line, said discharge line communicating with a valve for selectively routing refrigerant from said discharge line to either an indoor heat exchanger in a heating mode, or to an outdoor heat exchanger in a cooling mode, said valve further being operable to by-pass a portion of refrigerant from said discharge line to said suction line;
- (2) operating said valve to selectively route refrigerant from said discharge line to one of said indoor and outdoor heat exchangers, and to route refrigerant from the other of said indoor and outdoor exchangers back to said compressor;
- (3) determining that a bypass function is desirable;
- and
- (4) positioning said valve to selectively communicate at least a portion of refrigerant from said discharge line directly back to said compressor suction line when it is determined that a bypass function is desirable.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.