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US 9,212,442 B2Granted
Laundry treating appliance with controlled reciprocating movement
AssigneeWhirlpool Corporation
InventorsFarhad Ashrafzadeh, Luiz V. Dokonal, Robert J. Pinkowski
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A reciprocating laundry treating appliance includes a motor to rotate a drum about the horizontal axis of rotation and an axial drive mechanism to reciprocate the drum relative to the horizontal axis of rotation. The dram can be reciprocated to distribute laundry within the drum. The rotation and reciprocation of the drum can occur independently or simultaneously.
Claims12
A method of treating laundry in a laundry treating appliance having a drum defining a treating chamber for receiving laundry, the method comprising:
- with a first motor directly coupled to the drum via a drive shaft, rotating the drum about a horizontal axis of rotation;
- and
- with an axial drive mechanism directly coupled to the drum via the drive shaft, reciprocating the drum axially along the horizontal axis of rotation.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.