Communications: electrical – Systems – Timer control
Reexamination Certificate
2000-08-22
2001-12-04
Hofsass, Jeffery (Department: 2632)
Communications: electrical
Systems
Timer control
C361S695000, C307S13200T, C454S256000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06326882
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method and apparatus for controlling a ventilation device, and in particular to a method and apparatus for controlling a ventilation device in a bathroom, restroom or warehouse.
2. Reference to Prior Application
This application has been filed in the R.O.C. (Taiwan) as Patent Application No. 08921002 May 8, 2000 and Patent Application No. 089209524 on Jun. 2, 2000 respectively.
3. Description of the Related Art
In a conventional bathroom, restroom or warehouse design, in order to improve the air quality, ventilation fans will be installed to work in parallel with the rooms' lights. If the light of a room (bathroom, restroom, or warehouse room) is turned on by a user, the fan in that room is also turned on to ventilate the room. The ventilation fan can expel bad odors and humid air from the room when the room is being used and the light in the room is turned on. If the user leaves the room, the light power switch is turned off and the fan is also turned off, but the remaining bad odors and humid air cannot be expelled from that room. So, the conventional design has only limited effect in improving the air quality in those rooms.
Please refer to FIG.
1
. If the user leaves a room (bathroom, restroom, or warehouse room), without turning off the Power Switch
7
of the Ventilation Fan
72
, the Light
71
in the room will also be left turned on. If the user wants to turn off the Power Switch
7
after making sure that the bad odors are expelled, then it causes inconvenience to the user. If the user forgets the working condition of the Ventilation Fan
72
or simply lets the Power Switch
7
stay always turned on, that will cause the electricity to be wasted and the electricity bill to increase. That will also wear out the fan and the light in that room.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
From the above deficiencies, the Inventor uses his electronic experiences, through careful study and modifications, to successfully accomplish this invention.
An aspect of this invention is to provide a control apparatus that is a kind of Automatic Delay-Off and Timer-On/Off Control over ventilation fan to improve the air condition in a room (bathroom, restroom, or warehouse room). Please refer to FIG.
2
. One Automatic Control Box
73
is added in between the Fan
72
and the Light
71
to provide automatic control as described below: When the Light
71
in a room is turned on, the Ventilation Fan
72
will also be turned on. When the Power Switch
7
is turned off the Light
71
goes off, but the Automatic Control Box
73
will let the Ventilation Fan
72
work until a fixed set time (say, 5 minutes) and then turn off automatically. If later the room is not being used by the user, the Automatic Control Box
73
will automatically repeat turning on and off the Ventilation Fan
72
(only turns on for a short time say, 5 minutes) periodically according to the set interval (say, repeat every 30 minutes).
By the above automatic control over the Ventilation Fan
72
, the bad odors and humid air in the room can be removed. If the room is not used after a longer period of time (say, 12 hours), the Automatic Control Box
73
enters sleep mode, the sleep timer will shut off the automatic repeat on/off function. In sleep mode, the Ventilation Fan
72
won's be automatically turned-on/off to save energy assuming that the humid air in the room is well ventilated. No matter whether the Automatic Control Box
73
is in sleep mode or not, whenever the user re-enters the room, the Ventilation Fan
72
will be turned on with the Light
71
by Power Switch
7
, and all the above automatic control functions can be repeated to keep the room smelling good. So, the purpose of this invention, namely to ventilate the bad odors and humid air in a room, can be accomplished by the above Automatic Control Box
73
.
It is another aspect of the invention to provide an ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) that implements the control apparatus of the invention therein.
It is another aspect of the invention to provide a method for controlling a ventilation device in the bathroom, restroom or warehouse.
It is another aspect of the invention to provide a computer-readable recording medium encoded with a computer software which is performing the above method.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5189412 (1993-02-01), Mehta
patent: 5289157 (1994-02-01), Rudick
patent: 5722887 (1998-03-01), Wolfson
patent: 6084504 (2000-07-01), Rosche
Chiu Tai-Chieh
Lin Kun Feng
Hofsass Jeffery
La Anh
Senniger Powers Leavitt & Roedel
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