JPS6366203B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a rice cooker equipped with a rice cooker switch with a lock mechanism that can use an external time switch.

When using an external time switch with a conventional rice cooker, make sure to lock the rice cooking switch in the ON state, and once you finish cooking, when you use the external time switch again to cook rice, There was a problem that the switch had to be released and then locked back to the ON state, making the operation complicated.

This invention was made to improve this problem, and by detecting the temperature of the inner pot, when cooking rice using an external time switch, once the rice cooking switch is locked in the ON state, The present invention proposes a rice cooker in which an external time switch can be used continuously in the same state next time.

An embodiment of the present invention will be described below. FIG. 1 is an overall configuration diagram of an embodiment of a rice cooker according to the present invention. As is clear from Figure 1, the inner pot 1
A rice cooking heater 2 for heating rice, a rice cooking switch 3 having a locking mechanism, and a temperature sensing element 4 for detecting the temperature of the inner pot 1 are provided, and the locked state of the rice cooking switch 3 is determined by the rice cooking switch lock determination means 5, and the Inner pot initial state determining means 6 determines the temperature of the inner pot 1
The rice cooking determination means 7 determines whether or not rice should be cooked based on the determination results, and when the determination means 7 determines that rice should be cooked, the rice cooking heater 2 is controlled by the rice cooking control means 8. configured to control.

FIG. 2 is an electrical circuit diagram of the embodiment shown in FIG. In the figure, 9 is an A/D converter 10, a memory 11,
A microcomputer incorporating a CPU 12, an input circuit 13, and an output circuit 14 is shown. 15 is resistance 1
The rice cooking heating control means 8 is composed of the microcomputer 9, a resistor 17, a transistor 18, a resistor 19, a bidirectional thyristor 20, and a rice cooking heater 2. 2
1 is an input terminal of an A/D converter 10 built in the microcomputer 9, and inputs the analog potential from the voltage dividing resistor circuit 15 to the A/D converter 10 in order to convert it into a digital value. Similarly, 22 is an output terminal of the output circuit 14, and 23 is a commercial frequency power supply.

Next, the operation of the above embodiment will be explained with reference to FIG.

FIG. 3 shows the memory 1 of the microcomputer 9.
1 is a flowchart showing a program of the present embodiment stored in FIG. First, in step 24, when the power is turned on by an external time switch (not shown), etc., it is determined in step 25 whether or not the rice cooking switch 3 is locked, and if it is determined that it is locked, the process proceeds to step 26. If it is determined that the lock is not locked, proceed to step 28 and stop the rice cooking.
In step 26, the temperature of inner pot 1 is set to a certain temperature.
Determine whether T is higher than _A. This set temperature
T _A is stored in advance in the memory 11 of the microcomputer 9, and is set within the range of 35 to 65°C, higher than the ambient temperature at the start of rice cooking and lower than the warming temperature. The temperature of the inner pot 1 is detected by measuring the potential of the input terminal 21 of the A/D converter 10 of the voltage dividing resistor circuit 15 composed of the temperature sensing element 4 and the resistor 16. Therefore, when this detection level is determined to be higher than the temperature _TA , it is determined that rice cooking is not possible, and the process proceeds to step 28, where the rice cooking is stopped. When it is determined that the detection level is lower than the temperature T _A , the process proceeds to step 27, where rice cooking is started and the rice cooking process begins. In this process, the output terminal 22 of the microcomputer 9 is turned on, the transistor 18 is turned on via the resistor 17,
The gate current of the bidirectional thyristor 20 flows through the resistor 19, the bidirectional thyristor 20 is turned on, and the rice cooking heater 2 is energized.

According to the above embodiment, each time the power is turned on, the temperature of the inner pot 1 is detected, and if the temperature is higher than a certain set temperature T _A , it is assumed that the rice is being kept warm, and the cooking is stopped. , rice cooking starts only when the temperature of the inner pot 1 is below the set temperature T _A.

Therefore, when using an external time switch to pre-cook rice, once you lock the rice-cooking switch to the ON state, you can continue pre-cooking the rice in the same state the next time, without having to turn on the rice-cooking switch like before. There is no need to release the switch once and lock it back on again.

In addition, when the rice cooking switch 3 is locked, for example, when the power is turned off and then turned on again after moving the rice cooker while it is being kept warm, or when there is a power outage and the power is turned on again. This also eliminates problems such as switching from keeping warm to cooking rice.

As described above, according to the present invention, there is provided a rice cooking heater for heating an inner pot, a rice cooking switch having a locking mechanism, a temperature detecting means for detecting the temperature of the inner pot, and a rice cooking switch lock for determining the locked state of the rice cooking switch. a determining means, an inner pot initial state determining means for determining whether the temperature of the inner pot detected by the temperature detecting means is below a set temperature, and whether rice is cooked based on the determination results of each of the determining means. Since it is equipped with a rice-cooking determining means for determining whether or not to cook rice, and a rice-cooking control means for controlling the rice-cooking heater when the rice-cooking determination means determines that rice should be cooked, reservation cooking can be performed using an external time switch. In this case, continuous reservation cooking becomes possible, and there is no need to release the rice cooking switch and lock it back to the ON state each time, so the operation can be easily performed. Furthermore, it is possible to eliminate problems such as moving the main unit during warming or accidentally cooking rice even if the power is turned on again during a power outage.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an overall configuration diagram of an embodiment of a rice cooker according to the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a circuit diagram showing its electrical connections.
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the operation of this embodiment. In the figure, 1 is an inner pot, 2 is a rice cooking heater, 3 is a rice cooking switch, 4 is a temperature sensing element (temperature detection means), 5 is a rice cooking switch lock determining means, 6 is an inner pot initial state determining means, and 7 is a rice cooking determining means. , 8 is a rice cooking control means.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. A rice cooking heater that heats the inner pot, a rice cooking switch having a locking mechanism, a temperature detection means for detecting the temperature of the inner pot, and a rice cooking switch lock determining means for determining the locked state of the rice cooking switch. and an inner pot initial state determining means for determining whether or not the temperature of the inner pot detected by the temperature detecting means is equal to or lower than a set temperature, and a determination result by the rice cooking switch lock determining means and the inner pot initial state determining means. A rice cooker comprising a rice cooking determining means for determining whether or not to cook rice based on the rice cooking method, and a rice cooking control means for controlling the rice cooking heater when the rice determining means determines that rice should be cooked. 2. The rice cooker according to claim 1, wherein the rice cooking switch lock determining means, the inner pot initial state determining means, and the rice cooking determining means are implemented by a microcomputer.