ICE Maker and Refrigerator

This application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 18/528,063, filed on Dec. 4, 2023, which is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 16/685,410, filed on Nov. 15, 2019, now U.S. Pat. No. 11,874,048, which claims the benefit of priority to Korean Application No. 10-2018-0142116, filed on Nov. 16, 2018, Korean Application No. 10-2019-0033198, filed on Mar. 22, 2019, and Korean Application No. 10-2019-0088299, filed on Jul. 22, 2019. The disclosures of the prior applications are incorporated by reference in their entirety.

The present disclosure relates to an ice maker and a refrigerator.

In general, refrigerators are home appliances for storing foods at a low temperature in a storage space that is covered by a door.

The refrigerator may cool the inside of the storage space by using cold air to store the stored food in a refrigerated or frozen state.

Generally, an ice maker for making ice is provided in the refrigerator.

The ice maker is constructed so that water supplied from a water supply source or a water tank is accommodated in a tray to make ice.

Also, the ice maker is constructed to transfer the made ice from the ice tray in a heating manner or twisting manner.

As described above, the ice maker through which water is automatically supplied, and the ice automatically transferred may be opened upward so that the mode ice is pumped up.

As described above, the ice made in the ice maker may have at least one flat surface such as crescent or cubic shape.

When the ice has a spherical shape, it is more convenient to ice the ice, and also, it is possible to provide different feeling of use to a user. Also, even when the made ice is stored, a contact area between the ice cubes may be minimized to minimize a mat of the ice cubes.

Prior art document 1, Korean Patent No. 10-1850918 provides an ice maker.

The ice maker of the prior art document 1 comprises an upper tray having a plurality of hemispherical upper cells arranged thereon and including a pair of link guide portions extending upward from both sides, a lower tray having a plurality of hemispherical lower cells arranged thereon and rotatably connected to the upper tray, and an ice separation heater for heating the upper tray.

In the prior document 1, since the ice separation heater is formed in a U-type shape and is placed on a top surface of the upper tray, heat may not be uniformly provided to the upper cells which the upper tray forms.

Since the ice separation heater contacts the upper tray at a higher position than the upper cells, the time required to transfer the heat of the ice separation heater to a surface of the upper cell may be increased. Therefore, there are disadvantage that it takes a long time to operate the ice separation heater, and accordingly, power consumption is increased.

In addition, since the ice separation heater contacts the upper tray at a higher position than the upper cell, there is a small amount of heat transmitted to a boundary between the upper tray and the lower tray. Therefore, since the boundary between the upper tray and the lower tray is not separated well, the lower tray may not be smoothly rotated for ice separation.

In addition, since the ice separation heater exists to be exposed outwards in a state that the ice separation heater is placed on the top surface of the upper tray, the heat of the ice separation heater is not concentrated on the upper tray and is emitted outside of the upper tray, thereby lowering heating efficiency.

In addition, in the prior art document 1, since the ice is frozen from each of the upper cell and the lower cell, bubbles are present in the completed ice, thereby creating opaque ice.

Prior art document 2, Japanese Laid-open Patent publication No. Hei 9-269172 discloses an ice making device.

The ice making device of the prior art document 2 includes an ice making dish, and a heater for heating a bottom of water supplied to the ice making dish.

The ice making dish includes a plurality of ice blocks, and the heater contacts one side and a bottom surface of the ice making block.

In the ice making process, the heat of the heater is transferred to one aspect and the bottom surface of the ice making block. A surface of water proceeds to coagulate, and convection in the water occurs, thereby creating transparent ice.

However, in the prior art document 2, since the ice making dish has a structure of being surrounded by an insulation component in a state that the ice making dish contacts the heater, it is difficult to apply a scheme using the heater of the prior art document 2 to the prior art document 1 having a type of rotating the upper tray.

Even if the heater of the prior art document 2 contacts the upper tray of the prior art document 1, the upper heater may be exposed outwards, and also, the heater is apprehended to interfere with a lower ejecting pin in a rotation process of the lower tray.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker capable of rapidly providing heat of an upper heater to an upper chamber, and also transferring the heat to a boundary of an upper tray and a lower tray.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker capable of uniformly providing the heat of the upper heater for ice separation to upper chambers.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker of allowing bubbles caused by freezing ice from an upper side to be locally gathered at a lowermost side, thereby making ice transparent as a whole.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker of preventing lower heater for making transparent ice from interfering with a lower ejector in an ice separation process.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker capable of uniformly providing the heat of the upper heater to the lower chambers.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker of enabling the upper heater to be stably maintained in a fixed state.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker capable of reducing a tension of a wire by extending a length of the wire connected to the heater and preventing a disconnection.

The present embodiment provides an ice maker capable of preventing the disconnection of the wire by rotation of a lower assembly although the length of the wire is extended by adding a hook for guiding the wire.

The present embodiment provides a refrigerator comprising the above-described ice maker.

An ice maker according to one aspect may comprise: an upper tray and a lower tray defining an upper chamber; and an upper heater for providing heat to the upper tray, and a lower heater for providing heat to the lower tray.

In the present invention, on the basis of a height of the ice chamber, a distance from a horizontal central line of the ice chamber to the upper heater may be shorter than a distance from the horizontal central line of the ice chamber to the lower heater.

The horizontal central line means a line passing through a contact surface of the upper tray and the lower tray.

The upper tray may define an upper chamber that is a portion of the ice chamber, and the lower tray may define a lower chamber that is another portion of the ice chamber. The lower chamber may be disposed under the upper chamber.

The upper tray may further comprise an upper opening communicating with the upper chamber and disposed in an upper side of the upper chamber.

The upper heater is disposed closer to the horizontal central line of the ice chamber than the upper opening so that the heat of the upper heater is smoothly transferred to a boundary of the upper tray and the lower tray. As an example, the horizontal central line is a line passing through a contact surface of the upper tray and the lower tray.

The upper heater is disposed in the same height as the height of a bisector of bisecting a distance between the upper opening and the horizontal central line or is higher than the bisector.

The upper heater may comprise an upper round portion surrounding the upper chamber, and a lower round portion surrounding the lower chamber.

A radius of curvature of the upper round portion of the upper heater may be greater than a radius of curvature of the lower round portion of the lower heater.

In this embodiment, the upper tray may include a plurality of upper chambers disposed in a line, and the lower tray may include a plurality of lower chambers disposed in a line.

For uniformly heating the plurality of upper chambers, the upper heater may be disposed to surround each of the plurality of upper chambers.

The lower round portion of the lower heater may be disposed to surround a vertical central line at a position of being spaced apart from the vertical central line of the ice chamber to prevent an interference of the lower ejector and the lower heater.

The vertical central line means a line vertical to the horizontal central line.

For uniformly heating the plurality of lower chambers, the lower heater may be disposed to surround each of the plurality of lower chambers.

The upper heater and the lower heater may be wire-type heaters.

The ice maker may further comprise an upper case contacted by the upper tray, and including a heater coupling part coupled to the upper heater.

The heater coupling part may be accommodated in an accommodation part in a state that the upper heater is coupled to the heater coupling part.

The heater coupling part may comprise a heater accommodation groove into which the upper heater is accommodated.