Beverage brewer with dispense pump
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Solution Overview
Problem
Commercial drip-type hot beverage brewers face challenges with complex design, high operational costs, difficulty in varying brew time, numerous components, and limited control over flow rates and spray patterns, leading to inconsistent beverage quality.
Innovation Solution
An electrical beverage brewer with a variable speed pump and a spray distribution dome that allows for independent control of flow rates and spray patterns, using a controller to adjust the electrical power supply and create different spray patterns based on flow rates, enabling precise control over brewing parameters.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a variable speed pump is used to control flow rate, then brewing quality and consistency are improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces traditional mechanical flow control devices (orifice plates, flow control valves) with an electronically controlled variable speed pump. This substitution allows precise flow rate control through electronic means rather than mechanical adjustments, improving brewing consistency while enabling programmable control sequences that simplify operation despite the added electronic components.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the control parameter from fixed mechanical flow restrictions to variable pump speed control. By adjusting the pump motor speed through electronic control, the system can dynamically modify flow rates during different phases of the brewing cycle, achieving consistent brewing quality through programmable parameters rather than fixed mechanical settings.
2Manufacturing precision
If multiple solenoid valves and flow control devices are used, then flow rate control is improved, but device complexity and operational cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts and eliminates multiple flow control components (orifice plates, flow control valves, spray cutters) by consolidating their functions into a single variable speed pump. This extraction reduces the number of parts that need to be precisely manufactured and assembled, simplifying the overall device while maintaining flow control precision through electronic regulation.
Solution Approach 2:
The variable speed pump serves multiple functions that previously required separate components: it controls overall flow rate, regulates water distribution timing, and replaces the need for orifice plates and flow control valves. This multi-functionality reduces device complexity while maintaining manufacturing precision through a single controllable component.
3Device complexity
If fixed dispense time is used, then device complexity is reduced, but adaptability to different beverage types is limited
Solution Approach 1:
The patent transforms the static, fixed dispense time into a dynamic, programmable control sequence. The variable speed pump can adjust its operation during different phases of brewing (wetting phase, extraction phase, rinse phase), allowing the system to adapt to different beverage types and brewing methods without adding complex mechanical adjustment mechanisms.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements periodic action through programmable brewing cycles with distinct phases (wetting, extraction, rinsing) separated by timed intervals. This allows the system to provide different flow rates and timing patterns for different beverage types while maintaining relatively simple control logic based on sequential timing events rather than continuous complex regulation.
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
This solution provides consistent and high-quality brewing by allowing for fine control over flow rates and spray patterns, accommodating various types and varieties of ingredients, and reducing the complexity and cost of the brewing process.
Implementation Method 1
a water dispense system including a variable speed pump for pumping hot water out of the hot water tank
Implementation Method 2
a spray distribution dome with an upper surface for receiving hot water from the pump, said dome having upwardly facing, open, surface channels to direct the hot water from the pump into individual streams of hot water deposited into the brew basket
Implementation Method 3
a variable electrical power supply connected to the pump, and a controller for controlling the variable electrical power supply to selectively change the application of electrical power to the variable speed pump
Data Source
AI summary
An electric hot beverage brewer (20) with a duty cycle modulated DC voltage dispense pump (44) with an inlet (46) connected to a de-aerator (24) and beneath a lower limit and an outlet (48) located above an upper limit the surface a hot water tank (22) is finely controlled by a high frequency pulse-width, modulated, square power input voltage (FIG. 2) with a duty cycle controlled in accordance with predetermined profiles stored within a controller (28) to selectively change the flow rate out of the pump onto a distribution dome (50) during a dispense period of a brew cycle to achieve optimum brewing of different types of beverage ingredients and varieties of the different types and to selectively change the spray pattern of hot water onto the ingredient (53) within the basket assembly (52) between vertical and acute angles including acute angles that pass hot water into a bypass gap (56).