Refrigeration – Display type – With air controlling or directing means
Reexamination Certificate
1999-06-04
2001-01-09
Tapolcal, William E. (Department: 3744)
Refrigeration
Display type
With air controlling or directing means
C062S258000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06170280
ABSTRACT:
The present invention relates to a device for maintaining a layer of air (or more generally gas) at a cool, and preferably substantially constant temperature the air lying over a work surface or equivalent to be used for various preparations necessitating a particular temperature and preferably filtering of the ambient air.
Preparations, such as culinary preparations, usually take place on inert working surfaces. Temperature controls and filtering of the air are therefore needed for the whole of the area covering the working surface, which necessitates fixed technical means having demanding energy requirements. Moreover the temperatures required for some products, in order not to break the cold chain in certain fields of activity, such as the farm produce industry, is incompatible with work legislation, for example meat which is worked while stationary for prolonged periods of time, and the interior of which must be maintained at a temperature of +3° C., whilst the area itself is at an ambient temperature of 10 to 12° C.
The device according to the invention permits these disadvantages to be remedied by maintaining the various preparations or foods present on the “working surface” at a temperature determined by regulations.
In the prior art there are however, such devices for the working, presentation or laying out of edible food comprising:
a zone for the work, presentation or laying out of the said food, having an upper surface and a lower surface, such area often being upwardly open, on its upper face, where it is in contact with a cool layer of gas, such as air,
and cooling means, to cool this layer of gaseous fluid to a temperature lower than the local ambient temperature.
Problems nevertheless remain, linked notably to the relative complexity of these devices, their cost and the manner in which the cooling or the maintenance of a cool temperature is assured. In this regard, the efficacy of the existing devices is open to doubt at least when it is not a question of large store-rooms which are more similar to refrigerators open at the front rather than to devices for presentation or working of foodstuffs, in the manner of stands or tables, as in the invention.
Also, to resolve the above-described problems of cost, high consumption of energy for cooling, and the efficacy with which the required temperatures is maintained in the immediate proximity of the zone where the foods are laid out, it is proposed in the invention that the said area, called “the work, presentation or laying out area” of these foods should be further (directly) in contact on its lower surface with a layer of the said gaseous fluid, substantially at the said cool temperature. The work, presentation and/or the laying out of the foods will therefore be carried out in ambient air different from that of the local area.
The production of the necessary cooling is thus essentially limited to the volume of air lying over the working surface of the device. The gas (usually air) can be diffused by heat loss forced ventilation or recycled cold air. The air thus diffused can be filtered.
Refrigerating equipment and, preferably, horizontal cooling diffusers allow the food to be maintained in the interior of a mass of cooled air, being thermally separated from the ambient conditions of the area. For greater convenience, the user of the device will be positioned facing the working surface.
Still, in order to maintain the food at a cool temperature effectively, the device of the invention will advantageously comprise, to create the said layers of cool gaseous fluid (air):
flow generator means,
a flow-channelling circuit comprising a flow delivery opening above the said zone of work, presentation, or laying out of the foods, an opening for recovery of the flow diffused onto this zone, and a flow circulation conduit linking the distribution and recovery openings, this conduit passing at least under the main part and in contact with the lower surface of the said zone of work, presentation or laying out of the foods,
and (preferably) a site reserved in the flow-channelling circuit of the flow, to receive uniquely a part of the said flow generator means.
Always with a view to the good conservation of the foods and to the performance of the installation in relation to its cost, a complementary characteristic of the invention envisages that advantageously the above-mentioned flow circulation conduit has a (substantially) horizontal section defined on the upper part by the lower surface of the said area of work, presentation or laying out of the food and attached laterally to two elbows each approximately at 180 degrees, for reorientation of the flow, these two elbows terminating, one at the distribution opening, the other at the recovery opening, the two openings each being situated approximately at the same height above two opposite ends of the said area.
Concerning this zone, two possible embodiments have more particularly been envisaged:
the first envisages that the said zone has a working surface bordered on at least one side by a removable strip for carrying accessories limited frontally and above by a substantially vertical panel (for example a glass pane), the strip communicating on its lower face with the cool environment flow circulation conduit.
the second envisages that this zone can be essentially in the form of a succession of trays placed one beside the other and in contact, above and below, with the said cooled gas flow, this succession of trays being itself bordered by the above-mentioned strip with the front panel and having the same direct communication, on its lower face, with the cooled fluid circulation conduit.
It is to be noted that the preceding characteristics are well able to meet the hygiene conditions imposed or anticipated.
In this regard, a complementary characteristic of the invention anticipates that the said zone of work, presentation or laying out of the foods will be bordered by a support frame supported by the above-mentioned elbows or the limiting lateral walls of the conduit and on which can rest peripherally the working surface or the trays.
As far as hygiene is concerned, it is proposed that the bottom of the flow circulation conduit includes a waste outlet opening into a removable recovery tray. Moreover, in order to improve the performance of the installation, the circulation or the renewing of the air in this environment of the zone of work, presentation or laying out of the foods, once again, just like the hygiene of the entirety of the device, a complementary characteristic of the invention anticipates that advantageously:
the inlets for distribution and recovery inlets of air (gas) will have substantially horizontal strips to channel the flow, in order to ensure a preferably substantially laminar flow between them, in contact with the above-mentioned elbows which will then be advantageously rounded, and above all:
the recovery opening will have a filter for the said flow, carried by a removable frame on the corresponding elbow, as well as indirect heat exchange means between the recovered gas flow and a cool fluid,
and the circulation conduit will have a fan situated preferably in proximity to the elbow where the recovery opening is situated.
Correspondingly, the flow generator means will comprise, as well as the above-mentioned fan, a drive motor for this fan, with, as a distinctive feature, the fact that the fan will be placed in the conduit, in proximity to the elbow where the recovery opening is situated, whilst the motor will for preference be isolated from the flow channelling circuit.
In a comparable manner, it is moreover recommended that the cold generation unit associated with the above-mentioned heat exchange means should be installed away from the flow channelling circuit and that it should be isolated from it by a separation wall only traversed by pipes. It will be advantageously the same with the fan drive motor mentioned hereinabove, only the linking cables between them then traversing the said separation wall.
According to another characteristic of the invent
Didier Ortion
Rothwell Figg Ernst & Manbeck p.c.
Tapolcal William E.
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