Whirlpool Corporation

Nicholas C Fugal

Bradley D Morrow

Christine L Strain

Robert C Williams

Brian P Janke

Erol D Sumer

Stephen L Keres

Eric Kenneth Farrington

Steven Fricke

Philip R Thompson

Prabhath Kv

Jason S Sabel

Meredith A Wagner

Ran Zhao

Joseph C O'Connor

Brenner Martin Sharp

Dale E Mueller

Benjamin E Alexander

Christopher A Jones

Brent M Burgess

Michael K Cluskey

Michele A Paustian

Prakash S Amte

Derek R Andreen

A suspension mount assembly for a laundry appliance with a wash unit tub disposed inside an appliance housing and a drum that is rotatably supported within the wash unit tub. A laundry compartment is provided inside the drum and the drum is rotatable about a substantially vertical axis. The wash unit tub is hung from and supported by a plurality of suspension rods. A plurality of upper suspension mount assemblies pivotally couple the suspension rods to an upper frame of the laundry appliance and a plurality of lower suspension mount assemblies couple the suspension rods to the wash unit tub. Each of the upper and lower suspension mount assemblies includes a resilient bushing that permits relative movement between the suspension rods, the upper frame, and the wash unit tub while reducing/dampening the vibrations the suspension rods transmit from the wash unit tub to the upper frame.

Suspension mount for a top load washing machine

A laundry appliance includes a rotating drum that receives laundry to be treated. A motor rotates a drive shaft about a vertical axis and engages the rotating drum at a base. A coupler is disposed within an upper portion of the base and that rests upon the drive shaft to transfer rotational forces from the drive shaft to the drum. A lower portion of the base engages an outer surface of the shaft to resist moment forces that are exerted against the drive shaft in an off-axis direction relative to the vertical axis.

Structural block for supporting a rotating drum within a laundry appliance

A laundry treating appliance having a tub defining an interior, a basket located within the interior and rotatably mounted within the tub and having an upper and lower basket base portion, a balance ring mounted to the upper edge of the basket peripheral wall, a clothes mover rotatably mounted within the basket, a drive system comprising a motor operably coupled to the basket and the clothes mover and configured to selectively oscillate or rotate the basket or the clothes mover and a first and second drive shaft, and a drive attachment mechanism configured to couple the basket to the second drive shaft, with the drive attachment mechanism comprising a bushing assembly.

Laundry treating appliance with drive attachment mechanism

A vertical axis laundry treating appliance including a chassis defining a chassis interior, a tub disposed within the chassis interior and defining a tub interior, and a perforated wash basket disposed for rotation within the tub interior, wherein the tub includes a lower tub portion, an upper tub portion, and a flexible intermediate portion.

Laundry treating appliance with tub having a flexible portion

Methods of reducing a likelihood of contact between a rotating laundry-container, such as a basket or drum, located within a tub of a laundry treating appliance where the method includes accelerating a rotational speed of the rotating laundry-container during an extraction cycle speed ramp, monitoring the friction associated with the rotating laundry-container during the speed ramp and comparing to a threshold and altering the accelerating of the rotational speed of the rotating laundry-container when the comparing indicates the threshold is satisfied.

Laundry treating appliance and methods of reducing tub contact therein

A method of detecting high friction events in a laundry treating appliance includes rotating the drum, determining, during the rotation, a torque of the motor, an acceleration of the drum, a speed of the drum, and/or an angular position of the drum at each of multiple speeds, and repeatedly estimating with a parameter estimator, during the rotation, viscous friction, coulomb friction, and total friction based on the torque, acceleration, speed, and/or angular position of the drum. A high friction even is determined based on the estimated viscous friction, coulomb friction and/or total friction.

Laundry treating appliance and methods of operation

A method of estimating a water extraction profile in a laundry treating appliance includes accelerating rotation of the drum during a water extraction cycle, determining, during the accelerating rotation, a torque of the motor, an acceleration of the drum, a speed of the drum, and/or an angular position of the drum, and estimating with a parameter estimator, at multiple times during the accelerating rotation, inertia of a laundry load, based on the torque, acceleration, speed, and/or angular position of the drum to establish multiple inertia values. A water extraction profile is then estimated based on the inertia values.

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Benton Harbor, MI, United States of America

Nicholas C Fugal