Cooktop Heating Zone Surface Cues for Tactile Vessel Positioning
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional cooktops lack effective methods to provide clear demarcation and kinesthetic feedback for heating zones, making it difficult for users to accurately position cooking vessels over the correct heating elements, especially for visually impaired individuals and those relying on tactile cues.
Innovation Solution
A cooktop assembly with a support surface featuring surface discontinuities or kinesthetic features, such as recessed areas and texture elements, that provide haptic, audible, and visual feedback to demarcate heating zones from surrounding surfaces, allowing users to correctly position cooking vessels over the heating elements.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If conventional smooth support surfaces are used on cooktops, then the surface is easy to clean and has simple manufacturing, but users cannot easily identify heating zones or position cooking vessels accurately
Solution Approach 1:
The support surface incorporates localized texture elements and surface discontinuities at specific heating zone locations while maintaining smooth surfaces in other areas. This allows the surface to provide tactile feedback where needed without requiring complete surface complexity throughout, thus improving positioning accuracy while limiting overall structural complexity
Solution Approach 2:
Texture elements and surface discontinuities serve as intermediary features between the heating elements and the user's tactile sensing system. These intermediaries translate the invisible heating zone boundaries into detectable tactile cues, enabling users to locate and position vessels accurately without direct visual observation
2Ease of operation
If the support surface is made completely smooth and continuous, then manufacturing is simpler and cleaning is easier, but visually impaired users and those relying on tactile cues cannot identify heating zones
Solution Approach 1:
Rather than making the entire support surface complex, the invention applies texture elements and surface discontinuities only in localized areas corresponding to heating zones. This provides necessary tactile information for usability while maintaining simpler manufacturing requirements for the overall surface structure
Solution Approach 2:
The support surface structure itself provides the tactile feedback function without requiring additional separate identification systems. The texture elements and discontinuities are integrated into the support surface, allowing it to serve both its primary structural function and the secondary function of providing tactile heating zone identification
3Loss of information
If surface discontinuities are added to demarcate heating zones, then tactile feedback is improved, but the surface structure becomes more complex and may be harder to clean
Solution Approach 1:
Surface discontinuities and texture elements are applied only in localized areas where heating zones require demarcation, rather than throughout the entire support surface. This provides necessary tactile feedback quality while limiting the overall complexity of the surface structure and minimizing impact on cleaning ease
Data Source
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AI summary
A cooktop assembly (10) includes a cooking panel (12). A heating element (14, 14a-14d, 40, 40a-40d, 100, 100a-100d) is operably coupled to the cooking panel (12). The heating element (14, 14a-14d, 40, 40a-40d, 100a-100d) forms a heating zone (18, 18a-18d) for said cooktop assembly (10). A support surface (20, 20a-20d, 20e) extends over the heating element (14, 14a-14d, 40, 40a-40d, 100, 100a-100d) for supporting a cooking vessel (22, 62, 64) thereon. The support surface (20, 20a-20d, 20e) includes a heating zone surface (20a-20d) in the heating zone (18, 18a-18d), a surrounding surface (20e) outside the heating zone (18, 18a-18d), and a surface discontinuity (23) defining a kinesthetic feature (24) providing feedback for demarcating the heating zone (18, 18a-18d) relative to the surrounding surface (20e) and positioning the cooking vessel (22, 62, 64) relative to the heating zone (18, 18a-18d) and, consequently, the heating element (14, 14a-14d, 40, 40a-40d, 100, 100a-100d).