JPH0441003B2 - - Google Patents

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] <Technical Field> The present invention relates to a rice cooker with a quick-cooking function.

<Background and Prior Art> There are various rice cookers on the market at present, and recently there have been many rice cookers equipped with microcomputers that can cook delicious rice and are easy to use. It's starting to feel like this. Most of these rice cookers incorporating microcomputers were designed to cook delicious rice by controlling the time required for each process, from the water absorption process to the shading process, to the time considered to be optimal.

Also, recently, when the water absorption process is omitted and the rice cooking operation is performed, the rice is not as delicious as when the above rice cooking operation is performed, but in reality, the rice is cooked to a level that does not make much of a difference. Based on the results, we have developed a rice cooker that allows you to select between a normal rice cooking operation that performs a water absorption process and a rice cooking operation that omits the water absorption process (hereinafter referred to as "fast cooking"). It is now available. For example, a microcomputer is built into a rice cooker, and it determines whether the rice cooking switch is operated only once or twice, and if the switch is operated only once, it performs the normal rice cooking operation. If you operate it twice, it will start cooking quickly.

Therefore, it has the advantage that the rice cooking operation can be selected according to the user's request, but there is a high possibility that the rice cooking switch will be operated twice due to inadvertence. In some cases, there is a problem in that even if the rice is intended to be cooked normally, it is actually cooked quickly.

To be more specific, in the rice cooking operation, delicious rice can be cooked by first performing a water absorption process, followed by a patching process, a shading process, etc. Therefore, quick cooking that omits the water absorption process is recommended. You should not do this too often, but in case of an emergency where you are short on time and need to cook the rice in a hurry, or when cooking rice using rice that has been washed and soaked in water to absorb water. Quick cooking should only be done in However, with the above conventional technology, there is a problem in that even if there is plenty of time, there is a high possibility of inadvertently cooking the food too quickly, and further improvements are desired. It was rare.

Therefore, as another conventional example, for example,
As disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. 122415, a device equipped with a dedicated switch for switching between normal rice cooking and quick rice cooking has been proposed. but,
Providing a dedicated changeover switch in this way increases the number of parts in the rice cooker, requires a space for the dedicated changeover switch, and complicates the mechanical structure and shape of the rice cooker. There was a problem.

<Purpose> The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned problems, and enables quick cooking without the need for a dedicated switch, omitting the water absorption process when necessary, and To provide a rice cooker in which the possibility of premature cooking is reduced with caution.

<Structure> In order to achieve the above object, the rice cooker with a quick-cooking function of the present invention has a power switch and a rice cooking switch, and is a rice cooker that controls the rice cooking state using a microcomputer. If the rice cooking switch is turned on immediately after the microcomputer starts normal operation after the microcomputer is turned on, the rice cooking operation will be performed, omitting the water absorption process, and after the power switch is turned on, the rice cooking switch will be turned on. It is characterized by performing a normal rice cooking operation including a water absorption process in response to the water absorption process.

<Examples> Hereinafter, examples will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings showing examples.

In FIG. 1 showing a partially cutaway side view of a rice cooker that implements the quick-cooking method, 1 is the rice cooker main body;
2 is an inner pot, 3 is an inner pot storage container for storing the inner pot 2, 4 is a rice cooking heater, and 5 is an inner pot 2
6 is a control unit mainly composed of a microcomputer, and 7 is a rice cooking switch. Further, as shown in FIG. 2, a power switch 8 is provided close to the rice cooking switch 7, and display sections 9 and 10 made of LEDs and the like are provided above both switches 7 and 8.

FIG. 3 is a circuit diagram showing the electrical configuration of the rice cooker.

Reference numeral 11 denotes a microcomputer having a CPU, RAM, ROM, etc., which inputs the output pulse of the clock oscillator 12 as a clock pulse, connects the rice cooker switch 7 to a terminal for detecting the ON state, and further connects a triac drive circuit to the output terminal. 13, a relay drive circuit 14, and a sounding body 15 are connected. A voltage between the terminals of a heat-sensitive element 5, which is composed of a thermistor or the like and whose electrical resistance value changes depending on the temperature, is applied to the input terminal through an AD converter 16. In addition, the microcomputer 11
The positive voltage and negative voltage applied to are obtained as follows. That is, the commercial AC power supply 17 is connected to the rectifier circuit 1.
8, smoothed by a smoothing circuit 19 composed of a capacitor and a diode, and made constant by a constant voltage circuit 20, which is then applied to the power supply terminal of the microcomputer 11. The smoothed output voltage Va of the smoothing circuit 19 is divided by resistors to provide a base-emitter bias for the transistor 21, and the collector terminal of the transistor 21 is connected to the input terminal K4 of the microcomputer 11. Further, a series charging circuit 2 consisting of a resistor and a capacitor is connected to the constant voltage output terminal of the constant voltage circuit 20.
2 is connected, the base-emitter bias of the transistor 23 is applied by the voltage at the connection point between the resistor and the capacitor, and the collector terminal of the transistor 23 is connected to the reset terminal (RESET) of the microcomputer 11.

Note that the power switch 8 is connected to one terminal of the commercial AC power supply 17, and when the power switch 8 is turned on,
At this time, a commercial AC voltage can be applied to the rectifier circuit 18 and the rice cooking/warming circuit 24.

FIG. 4 shows the output potential of the smoothing circuit 19, the reset terminal (RESET) potential of the microcomputer 11, and the input terminal K4 potential of the microcomputer 11.
When turned ON (see A in the same figure), the output potential of the smoothing circuit 19 increases and decreases in small increments due to the influence of ripples, as shown in B in the same figure, and gradually increases as a whole. As shown in Figure C, the (RESET) potential also increases gradually as a whole while repeating increases and decreases in small steps, and after reaching a predetermined potential at which the microcomputer 11 can operate, it reaches the OV level at time t1. As shown in Figure D, the input terminal K4 potential gradually increases as a whole while repeating small increments like the reset terminal (RESET) potential, and suddenly increases from time t1 to time t2. It becomes a pulse-like signal that increases and decreases (hereinafter, this pulse-like part is referred to as a quick-cooking signal), and becomes the OV level after time t2.

If the rice cooker has the above configuration, as shown in FIG.
Determine whether or not is ON. If the rice cooking switch 7 is ON, the presence or absence of a quick-cooking signal is determined in step, and if there is a quick-cooking signal, a quick-cooking flag is set in step. and,
Is rice cooker switch 7 OFF, or is there no fast-cooking signal?
Alternatively, after setting the quick-cooking flag, it is determined again in step whether the rice cooking switch 7 is ON or not, and if the rice cooking switch 7 is OFF, the warming operation is performed thereafter. On the other hand, if the rice cooking switch 7 is ON, it is determined in step whether or not the quick cooking flag is set, and if the quick cooking flag is not set, the normal rice cooking operation to perform the water absorption process is performed, and the quick cooking is started. If the flag is set, quick cooking is performed, omitting the water absorption process.

That is, if you turn on the power switch 8 and then turn on the rice cooking switch 7, you can perform the normal rice cooking operation that performs the water absorption process.On the other hand, if you turn on the power switch 8, At the same time or before, turn on rice cooker switch 7.
By turning on a special switch, you can quickly cook rice by omitting the water absorption process, reducing the cooking time by about 10 minutes compared to normal rice cooking. Also, don't turn on rice cooker switch 7 at all.
If the rice cooker switch 7 is not turned on, the heat-keeping operation is performed, and if the rice cooking switch 7 is turned on during the heat-keeping operation, the normal rice cooking operation that performs the water absorption process can be performed.

Therefore, by performing a special switch operation to turn on the rice cooker switch 7 before the quick-cooking signal is generated, it is possible to perform quick-cooking, which reduces the required time by about 10 minutes, and there is not much time left. The rice cooking operation can be performed even in the case of

In the above embodiment, the power switch 8 and the rice cooking switch 7 are configured to be able to be turned on and off independently of each other. If both switches 7 and 8 are configured so that the rice cooking switch 7 can be kept in the ON state only when the switch 8 is turned ON (see Fig. 6), the rice cooking switch 7 can be turned ON at the same time as the power switch 8 is turned ON.
Quick cooking is possible only when you operate a special switch to
After turning on the rice cooker switch 7, if you perform the normal switch operation of turning on the rice cooker switch 7, you can perform the normal rice cooking operation that completes the water absorption process. This has the advantage that even if the switch 7 is operated, the rice cooking switch 7 is not kept in the ON state, and the misconception that the rice cooking operation is performed only by operating the rice cooking switch 7 can be eliminated.

<Effects> As described above, the present invention is based on the fact that a pulse-like quick-cooking signal is generated at the input terminal immediately after the microcomputer becomes ready for operation, and that the rice-cooking switch is turned on when this quick-cooking signal is generated. Only when it detects that the rice is cooked, the rice can be cooked without the water absorption process, making it possible to cook rice in a shorter time compared to conventional methods, especially when you need to cook rice in a hurry. It has the unique effect of being able to.

Moreover, according to the rice cooker according to the present invention, it is possible to reduce the possibility of inadvertently prematurely cooking rice. Furthermore, since this rice cooker does not require a dedicated switch for switching between normal rice cooking and quick-cooking rice, the structure of the rice cooker does not become complicated.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figure 1 is a partially cutaway side view of the rice cooker, Figure 2 is an enlarged front view showing the switch mounting part, Figure 3 is the electric circuit diagram of the rice cooker, and Figure 4 is the power switch 8 and rice cooker switch 7. FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the operation of the rice cooker, and FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing the relationship between the rice cooker switch and the power switch.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a rice cooker that has a power switch and a rice cooking switch and uses a microcomputer to control the rice cooking state, the rice cooking switch is turned on immediately after the power switch is turned on and the microcomputer starts normal operation. If there is, a quick rice cooking operation is performed that omits the water absorption process, and after the power switch is turned on, in response to the rice cooking switch being turned on, a normal rice cooking operation including the water absorption process is performed. , a rice cooker with quick-cooking function.