세탁기용 자동신통저감장치($Auto-Leg^{TM}$)의 최적 설계

Optimal Design of an Auto-Leg System for Washing Machines

Automatic washing machines have been improved and popularized steadily since the first electric washing machine was produced in the early 1900's. Appliance industry has tried to obtain the performance of washing machine with large capacity, high energy efficiency, low vibration and low noise levels. As the installation peace of a washer becomes closer to the living space, vibration and noise problems become more important challenges. In general, a washing machine has four legs to support its body. Four legs of the washing machine should be attached on a floor. If not so, it may cause severe vibration or walking in the spin-drying process. Unfortunately, the floor of an ordinary house is bumpy in general, and the consumers will not accept bolting washing machines to a foundation; moreover, sometimes they move the location of their washing machines to utility rooms or bath rooms or kitchens and don't care for leveling the legs exactly. In this study, we devise an auto-leg system that prevents the occurrence of abnormal vibration and walking of washing machines. It is simply composed of a spring and a friction damper. Some experiments are implemented to show the dynamic characteristics of the three-dimensional auto-legged washing machine model that is located on the even or uneven ground. A spring parameter is optimized to adjust the length of the auto-leg system automatically up to 10 mm irregularity, and the friction damper is designed to decrease a resonance induced by the spring of the auto-leg system. Some numerical results show that placing the proposed auto-leg system in a washing machine makes good performance with low vibration, as well as low noise, regardless of the unevenness of the floor.