Water Tank Guide Assembly for Precise Cooking Appliance Alignment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing cooking appliances face challenges in accurately and easily aligning the water tank with the opening hole, leading to misalignment and compromised appearance quality due to manual alignment difficulties and exposure of fastening elements.
Innovation Solution
A cooking appliance design featuring a guide member with a first guide coupled to the water supply device and a second guide coupled to a protrusion on the front panel, along with a fixer that aligns and fixes the guide member to the cavity, ensuring precise alignment and easy operation without exposed fasteners.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If manual alignment method is used to align water tank with opening hole, then alignment can be performed, but alignment accuracy is low and time-consuming
Solution Approach 1:
The guide member is pre-installed on the front panel with the guide hole positioned at the correct location. This preliminary positioning action eliminates the need for manual alignment during water tank installation, as the guide member automatically directs the water tank to the correct position through its guide hole, thereby improving alignment accuracy and reducing alignment time.
2Stability of the object's composition
If fastening elements are exposed to secure water supply device, then structural stability is improved, but appearance quality deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The fastening elements are extracted from the visible front area and relocated to the rear side of the front panel. The guide member is secured to the rear surface of the front panel using fastening elements, which are thus hidden from external view. This maintains structural stability while preserving appearance quality by removing the visual distraction of exposed fasteners.
3Ease of operation
If water tank is made movable for easy withdrawal, then ease of operation is improved, but alignment maintenance becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The guide member with its precisely positioned guide hole is installed beforehand on the front panel. This preliminary action creates a reusable alignment reference that automatically guides the water tank to the correct position every time it is inserted or withdrawn. The guide hole serves as a consistent reference point that maintains alignment accuracy across multiple operations without requiring re-alignment.
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 solution enables accurate and effortless alignment of the water tank with the opening hole, maintaining high appearance quality by eliminating the need for manual alignment and fastening, ensuring smooth withdrawal and insertion of the water tank.
Implementation Method 1
a heater that generates steam by heating water in the water storage
Implementation Method 2
the water introduced into the water storage may be heated by the heater to generate the steam
Data Source
Figure 1~2
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AI summary
Provided is a cooking appliance. The present disclosure includes: a guide member that regulates an installation position of a water supply device between a front panel and the water supply device, and the guide member includes a first guide that is coupled to the water supply device to align a relative position of a front surface of a water tank with respect to the guide member, a second guide that is coupled to a guide protrusion to align a relative position of the guide member with respect to an opening; and a fixer that fixes the guide member to the cavity.