A cooking apparatus
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing cooking appliances like air fryers suffer from undesired smoke and smell emissions, as well as difficulty in cleaning, despite efforts to reduce these issues often involving compromises on user experience.
Innovation Solution
A cooking apparatus with infrared lighting, shielding elements, and dual air guiding units to manage air flow and heat distribution, enhancing cleanability and reducing smoke and smell emissions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If conventional air frying methods are used to cook food, then cooking efficiency and food quality are improved, but smoke and smell emissions increase causing unwanted disturbance
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an infrared light source as an intermediary energy source that directly heats the food item, replacing conventional convection-only heating. This intermediary infrared radiation enables rapid cooking with minimal oil while significantly reducing smoke and smell emissions, as the food is heated more efficiently and evenly without requiring high-temperature oil heating that generates harmful emissions
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the heating parameter from conventional thermal convection to infrared radiation. By using infrared light sources operating at specific wavelengths, the cooking process achieves higher energy efficiency and faster cooking times while maintaining lower oil temperatures, thereby reducing smoke and smell generation during the cooking process
2Reliability
If less cooking oil is used in air frying to improve health benefits, then healthiness is improved, but smoke and smell emissions as well as cleaning difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The infrared light source acts as an intermediary that transfers energy directly to the food, enabling cooking with minimal oil. This direct energy transfer to the food item rather than heating oil reduces the formation of smoke and smell, allowing healthy low-oil cooking without the harmful emissions typically associated with reduced-oil frying methods
3Productivity
If infrared light sources are positioned close to the cooking chamber to maximize infrared radiation effect, then cooking efficiency is improved, but smoke and smell emissions directly from the infrared sources increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts and separates the harmful emission source from the useful infrared heating function. By positioning the infrared light sources outside the cooking chamber and using transparent or infrared-transmissive windows, the design removes the infrared sources from the enclosed cooking space, eliminating their contribution to smoke and smell emissions while preserving their cooking efficiency benefits
Solution Approach 2:
The transparent window or door acts as an intermediary element that transmits infrared radiation from the external light sources into the cooking chamber. This intermediary structure allows the infrared energy to penetrate and heat the food effectively while preventing direct contact between the infrared sources and the cooking environment, thereby avoiding additional smoke and smell generation
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The apparatus effectively minimizes smoke and smell while improving cleanliness and cooking efficiency, ensuring high-quality cooking with reduced emissions and easy maintenance.
Implementation Method 1
an infrared lighting unit comprising one or more infrared light sources configured to provide infrared radiation to the food item received in the cooking chamber
Implementation Method 2
a first air guiding unit configured to conduce air flow through the shielding unit
Implementation Method 3
a second air guiding unit configured to circulate hot air inside the cooking apparatus to heat the food item received inside the cooking chamber
Implementation Method 4
a heating unit comprising one or more heating elements configured to heat air flow inside the cooking apparatus to create hot air circulation
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2A
Figure 2B
AI summary
There is provided a cooking apparatus (100) comprising: a cooking chamber (110) configured to receive a food item; an infrared lighting unit (120) comprising one or more infrared light sources configured to provide infrared radiation to the food item received in the cooking chamber, the infrared lighting unit being positioned such that the food item is exposed to infrared radiation from the one or more infrared light sources; a shielding unit (130) comprising one or more shielding elements respectively positioned between each of the one or more infrared light sources of the infrared lighting unit and the cooking chamber; a first air guiding unit (140) configured to conduce air flow through the shielding unit; and a second air guiding unit (150) configured to circulate hot air inside the cooking apparatus to heat the food item received inside the cooking chamber.