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US 2016/0109175 A1Published application
Beverage machine with thermoelectric cooler, heat pipe and heat sink arrangement
AssigneeKeurig Green Mountain, Inc.
InventorsSteven Mackey, Pranav Chopra, Scott Grubb, Thomas Fedorka, Qian Gao, Jeremy B. Gordon
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A beverage making machine having a tank may be arranged to carbonate and/or chill liquid in the tank. A thermoelectric device may be thermally coupled to the tank to cool precursor liquid in the tank, and a heat pipe may transfer heat from the thermoelectric device to a heat sink. The heat sink may be located remotely from the thermoelectric device, e.g., in an air duct that helps prevent contact of moisture, dirt, etc. in the duct with the thermoelectric device.
Claims20
A beverage making machine, comprising:
- a precursor liquid supply to provide precursor liquid used to form a beverage;
- a tank having an inlet coupled to the precursor liquid supply to receive precursor liquid into the tank, and an outlet to deliver precursor liquid from the tank to a dispensing station;
- a thermoelectric device thermally coupled to the tank to cool precursor liquid in the tank;
- a heat pipe having an evaporator section and a condenser section, the evaporator section thermally coupled to the thermoelectric device to receive heat from the thermoelectric device;
- and
- a heat sink thermally coupled to the condenser section of the heat pipe to receive heat from the heat pipe.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.