Dual-Tray Ice Maker for Transparent Ice Without Slower Freezing
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing ice makers produce opaque ice due to incomplete discharge of bubbles during the ice-making process, and struggle to achieve high transparency while maintaining an efficient solidification rate.
Innovation Solution
The ice maker employs a dual-tray system with a transparent ice heater and a controlled heating mechanism to manage the ice-making process, ensuring bubbles are removed and heat is applied selectively to enhance transparency without compromising the solidification rate.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If water is cooled in a traditional ice maker with hemispherical cells, then spherical ice is produced, but bubbles remain dispersed in the water making opaque ice
Solution Approach 1:
The ice maker is divided into an upper tray and lower tray that can be rotated independently, allowing separate control of water supply and ice making processes. This segmentation enables water to be supplied in a controlled manner to facilitate bubble discharge while maintaining efficient solidification.
Solution Approach 2:
Water is supplied to the upper tray before the ice making process begins, allowing bubbles to be discharged during the water supply phase. This preliminary action of supplying water first ensures that bubbles are removed before solidification starts, resulting in transparent ice without compromising making efficiency.
2Manufacturing precision
If a heater is used to heat water during solidification to achieve convection and transparency, then transparent ice is made, but the solidification rate decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The heater is positioned to heat only the lower portion of water in the ice making cell, creating localized convection currents. This local heating approach generates sufficient convection for transparency while minimizing the overall heat input that would slow down the solidification process.
Solution Approach 2:
The heater operates periodically or in a controlled manner during the ice making process, providing intermittent heating to maintain convection without continuously slowing down solidification. This periodic action allows the system to achieve transparency while maintaining efficient ice making speed.
3Productivity
If the solidification rate is increased to improve productivity, then ice is made faster, but convection is insufficient resulting in opaque ice
Solution Approach 1:
The heater acts as an intermediary element that facilitates convection in the water during ice making. By introducing this thermal mediator, sufficient convection is generated even at higher solidification rates, enabling both fast ice making and transparent ice production simultaneously.
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 results in the production of transparent ice with improved clarity and efficient ice-making performance, addressing the issues of bubble retention and solidification rate in traditional ice makers.
Implementation Method 1
water on one surface and a bottom surface of an ice making block is heated by the heater in an ice making process. Thus, when solidification proceeds on the surface of the water, and also, convection occurs in the water to make transparent ice.
Implementation Method 2
an ice making cell in which water is phase-changed into ice by the cold air
Data Source
Figure 1
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Figure 4
AI summary
Provided is a refrigerator. The refrigerator includes: a storage chamber configured to store food; a cooler configured to supply cold into the storage chamber; a first tray assembly configured to define a portion of an ice making cell that is a space in which water is phase-changed into ice by the cold; a second tray assembly configured to define another portion of the ice making cell, the second tray assembly being connected to a driver to contact the first tray assembly in an ice making process and to be spaced apart from the first tray assembly in an ice separation process; a heater disposed adjacent to at least one of the first tray assembly or the second tray assembly; and a controller configured to control the heater and the driver. The controller controls the heater to be turned on in at least partial section while the cooler supplies the cold so that bubbles dissolved in the water within the ice making cell moves from a portion, at which the ice is made, toward the water that is in a liquid state to make transparent ice.