Hob comprising heating zone illumination means

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10772164-B2
Application number	US-201615573616-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 31, 2016
Priority date	Jun 10, 2015
Publication date	Sep 8, 2020
Grant date	Sep 8, 2020

Abstract

The invention relates to a hob comprising a transparent or semi-transparent hob plate (2) and multiple heating elements (3) arranged below said hob plate (2), the hob further comprising illumination means arranged below said hob plate (2) for providing light markings (4) at the upper side (2.1) of the hob plate (2), said light markings (4) indicating heating zones (5) associated with the heating elements (3), wherein the illumination means comprise a light box (10) with at least a bottom wall portion (11) and a pair of side wall portions (12), said light box (10) including one or more lighting elements (13) for illuminating an interior space (14) of the light box (10), wherein the light box (10) further comprises an upper portion (15) being adapted to emit light towards the hob plate (2) in order to provide said light marking (4) at the upper side of the hob plate (2).

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A hob comprising:
a transparent or semi-transparent hob plate;
multiple heating elements arranged below said hob plate;
illumination means arranged below said hob plate for providing light markings at an upper side of the hob plate, said light markings varying to indicate selected or activated heating zones associated with the heating elements, wherein the illumination means comprise a light box with at least a bottom wall portion and a pair of side wall portions, said light box including one or more lighting elements for illuminating an interior space of the light box, wherein the light box further comprises an upper portion being adapted to emit light towards the hob plate in order to provide said light marking at the upper side of the hob plate.

2. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein the bottom wall portion and the side wall portions are integrally formed at the light box.

3. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein at least one side wall portion of the light box comprises one or more apertures through which light is emitted into an interior space of the light box.

4. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein the bottom wall portion is formed by a circuit board comprising said lighting elements.

5. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein the wall portions of the light box comprise a light blocking material or a light-blocking finishing or coating at the outer side.

6. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein the interior surface of the light box is adapted to diffuse and/or reflect light.

7. The hob according to claim 6 , wherein at least the side wall portions of the light box are made of white, non-transparent material or comprise a light-dispersive and/or light-reflecting coating.

8. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein the light box comprises at its top side a light diffusing portion which faces a bottom side of the hob plate.

9. The hob according to claim 8 , wherein the light diffusing portion is made by a rigid diffusor plate or a diffusor foil.

10. The hob according to claim 1 , comprising a lid which partially covers an opening of the light box in order to provide a narrowed light emitting aperture.

11. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein the light box is made of heat resistant polybutylene terephthalate (PBT).

12. The hob according to claim 1 , comprising multiple said light boxes being arranged at different positions below said hob plate, the lighting elements included in the respective light boxes being driven such that a heating zone formed by one or more of said heating elements is highlighted at the upper side of the hob plate.

13. The hob according to claim 12 , wherein said multiple light boxes are adapted to highlight heating zones by completely bordering said heating zones by a solid illumination line or by partially bordering the heating zones by broken lines.

14. The hob according to claim 1 , comprising a control unit being adapted to control illumination properties provided by the light box based on a cooking level, by changing at least one of light intensity, colour, line width and number of lines of the light markings.

15. The hob according to claim 1 , comprising control means for selecting the size of a heating zone wherein the light marking provided by said light box is adapted based on the selected size of the heating zone, or comprising a pot detection mechanism for choosing an appropriate size of the heating zone wherein the light marking indicating the size of the heating zone is adapted based on information provided by the pot detection mechanism.

16. A hob comprising:
a transparent or semi-transparent hob plate, a plurality of heating elements arranged below said hob plate and configured to provide a plurality of variable heating zones having different shapes and sizes based on either a user selection or a pot-detection system detecting an arrangement of cookware on an upper side of the hob plate, a plurality of light boxes also arranged below said hob plate in an array that encompasses said plurality of variable heating zones, and a controller;
each said light box having non-transparent and light-reflective or -diffusive interior walls that define an interior space of the light box, an LED for generating light that permeates said interior space, said interior space being in light communication with a bottom side of said hob plate through an opening of said light box so that light from said interior space is visible from said upper side of said hob plate, a diffuser disposed adjacent said opening to diffuse light exiting said interior space toward said bottom side of said hob plate, said LED being positioned so that it is not in direct line-of-sight with said opening;
said bottom side of said hob comprising a printed or coated layer that defines one or more light transmission slots in the hob layer to confine light emitted from the array of light boxes to defined apertures;
said controller being operatively connected to and configured to selectively operate said array of light boxes in order to generate variable light markings visible from said upper side of said hob that indicate the size and shape of active heating zones;
said upper side of said hob plate being devoid of fixed markings to indicate heating zones.

17. The hob according to claim 16 , said controller further configured to regulate at least one of light intensity, color or thickness of said light markings based on an operative cooking level for an associated heating zone.

18. The hob according to claim 1 , wherein at least one of the lighting elements is arranged outside the interior space of the light box and at least one side wall portion of the light box comprises one or more apertures through which light from the at least one of the lighting elements is emitted into an interior space of the light box.

Assignees

• Electrolux Appliances AB

Inventors

• Puchinger Bianca
• Holzinger Jochen
• Weinmann Anne
• Martini Filippo
• Burkhardt Jennifer
• Herzog Michael

Classifications

• H05B2213/05

  Heating plates with pan detection means · CPC title

• H05B2213/03

  Heating plates made out of a matrix of heating elements that can define heating areas adapted to cookware randomly placed on the heating plate · CPC title

• H05B3/746 Primary

  Protection, e.g. overheat cutoff, hot plate indicator · CPC title

• H05B6/1218 Primary

  with arrangements using lights for heating zone state indication · CPC title

• H05B6/062

  for cooking plates or the like · CPC title