DESCRIPTION

Technical field

The present invention relates to a hood and an assembly composed of a hood and a cooker for cooking food as defined in the preambles of claims 1 and 5 respectively.

Particularly, the present invention relates to a downdraft fume-exhaust hood and assembly composed of this hood and a cooker.

Background of the invention

Hood and cooker assemblies are known in the art, in which the hood is a fume- exhaust extractor hood of downdraft type.

One example of such assembly is disclosed in EP 2105674. Here, a cooker for cooking food has a parallelepiped-shaped cabinet structure with a bottom base, a front vertical wall, a rear vertical wall and lateral vertical walls, as well as a downdraft fume- exhaust hood, which is adapted to be pulled out of a compartment associated with said cabinet structure, parallel to the rear vertical wall of the cabinet structure. The downdraft hood can be displaced from a position in which it is entirely within its compartment to an operating position in which it is located outside the compartment above the cooktop and vice versa, means being provided for carrying out said displacement of the hood and extracting and exhausting said fumes Furthermore, the means for extracting and exhausting the fumes from the hood, when the latter is in its pulled-out operating position, out of the cabinet structure of the kitchen, generally consist of a centrifugal extractor, which is housed in a sealed chamber directly communicating with the inlet of the extractor and also communicating with the interior of the compartment associated with the wall of the cabinet structure in which the pull-out hood is designed to slide.

According to the prior art, the cabinet structure also comprises a cooktop, which is horizontally disposed on such cabinet structure.

Still according to the prior art, the extractor assembly is entirely accommodated within its chamber in communication with the extraction, with a substantial space requirement, as measured perpendicular to the bottom wall of the cabinet structure, of about 265 mm.

In these types of assemblies, the cabinet structure may be designed to comprise at least one drawer to store dishware or else. The drawer is below the cooktop and is designed to be pulled out from said front vertical wall.

US 5,231,972 discloses a hood and cooker assembly in which the compartment in which the extractor is situated is not adjacent to the bottom wall of the cabinet, but at mid height thereof.

Since this space requirement in the cabinet structure is particularly found in the area in which a pull-out drawer is conventionally mounted, or a compartment with doors is provided for housing large pots, a construction drawback arises in view of the constant user demand for increasingly large spaces for storage of dishware, pans, pots or other items in the cooker structure below the cook top.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The object of the present invention is to obviate the aforementioned drawback by providing a technical solution to reduce the space requirements of the chamber for containing the extractor unit of the downdraft hood, as used in a cooker as discussed above.

These and other objects, as better explained hereafter are fulfilled by a technical solution that is characterized as defined in the accompanying claim 1.

LIST OF FIGURES

Further features and advantages of the present invention will result more clearly from the illustrative, non-limiting description of a preferred, non-exclusive embodiment of an assembly of a hood and a wall-mounted cabinet as shown in the annexed drawings, in which:

- Figure 1 shows an exploded perspective view of a cooker with a pull-out hood, according to the invention;

- Figure 2 shows a cross sectional view of the cooker according to the invention;

- Figure 3 shows a perspective view as taken from the back of the cooker of the invention, with the rear vertical wall of the cabinet structure omitted.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Even when this is not expressly stated, the individual features as described with reference to the particular embodiments shall be intended as auxiliary to and/or interchangeable with other features described with reference to other exemplary embodiments.

Referring to the accompanying figures and particularly Figures 1 and 2, it may be appreciated that the assembly 1 of the invention comprises a cooker 1 and a downdraft hood 8 for extracting fumes generated by cooking food.

The cooker 1A comprises a cabinet structure, generally referenced IB which is composed of a base 2, a front vertical wall 3, a rear vertical wall 4 and lateral walls 5 and 6.

A cooktop 7, e.g. an induction cooktop, having at least one cooking zone, is horizontally disposed over the cabinet structure IB.

The assembly 1 comprises a downdraft fume-extraction hood 8, which is designed to be pulled out of a compartment 9 associated with the cabinet structure IB parallel to the rear vertical wall 4.

Namely, the compartment 9 is adjacent to the rear wall 4. More in detail, the compartment 9 is delimited at its back by the rear wall 4 of the cabinet structure IB. On the other hand, the compartment 9 is delimited at is front by an intermediate wall.

In one embodiment, the compartment 9 is formed in the cabinet structure IB with linear dimensions between the front wall 3 and the rear wall 4, ranging from 96 to 102 mm.

The hood 8, whose extraction inlet is referenced 10 and is in fluid communication with the compartment 9, is adapted to vertically slide within the compartment 9 between a position, not shown, in which it is entirely accommodated within such compartment, and an operating position, as shown in the figures, in which it is located outside the compartment 9 and above the cook top 7.

The movements of the hood 8 are obtained using conventional lifting and lowering mechanisms, which comprise, for example, a hydraulic jack 11 with an associated pump 12, both housed within the compartment 9.

The motor means for extracting and exhausting the fumes generated at the cooktop 7 and conveyed through the opening 10 of the hood 8 in the compartment 9, comprise a centrifugal extractor 13 having a respective electric motor 14.

The outlet 15 of the centrifugal extractor 13 is typically connected to an exhaust duct below the base 2 of the cabinet structure IB, with a conduit also placed therein, and generally referenced 17 in Figure 1, for the passage of electric cables for supplying power to the various motors and devices of the cooker.

It shall be noted that the outlet 15 can be also oriented in other directions, e.g. if the extraction chamber lies directly on the ground.

The base 2 is supported by height-adjustable support feet, referenced 18, 19 and 20 and is conventionally concealed by peripheral boards, generally referenced 21 in the figures.

In one aspect, also referring to Figure 2, the hood 8 comprises a containing chamber 22 which has a predetermined volume and is associated with the compartment 9. Namely, in a preferred embodiment, the containing chamber 22 has the shape of a parallelepiped.

The containing chamber 22 is spaced from the rear wall 4 of the cabinet structure IB, and in greater detail the compartment 9 is disposed at least partially between the containing chamber 22 and the rear wall 4. The containing chamber 22 also projects out of the intermediate wall toward the front wall 3 of the cabinet structure IB.

The containing chamber 22 and the compartment 9 are preferably sealingly associated to each other, so that the fumes extracted by the extractor 13 through the inlet 10 will be conveyed to the outlet 15 and hence to the duct 16, and no fumes will be recirculated in the cabinet structure IB.

Namely, in order to reduce the space requirements of the chamber 22 for containing the extractor unit of the downdraft hood 8, the means 13, 14 for extracting and exhausting said fumes are mainly situated in said containing chamber 22 and partially within the compartment 9.

In other words, the unit composed of the centrifugal extractor 13 and its actuating motor 15 is mainly placed in the containing chamber 22 and partially within the lower portion 9a of the compartment 9 which is located at the opening 23 that provides communication between the chamber 22 and the compartment 9 which is in turn in communication with the extraction opening 10 of the hood 8.

Therefore, the means 13, 14 for extracting and exhausting the fumes at least partially project out of the chamber 22 toward the rear wall 4 in the compartment 9, through the opening 23.

It will be appreciated that the opening 23 that provides communication between the chamber 22 and the compartment 9 is formed in the intermediate wall. For this purpose, the containing chamber 22 has at least one portion of a lateral wall, preferably the entire lateral wall omitted, such that the unit composed of the centrifugal extractor 13 and its actuating motor 14 will be in fluid communication with the interior of the compartment 9.

Namely, according to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the outlet 15 of the centrifugal extractor 13 is placed on the bottom wall 24 of the chamber 22, whereas a portion of the conveyor (or screw), referenced 13 a, of the extractor, extends in the area 9a of the compartment 9.

Therefore, according to the invention, a substantial portion, ranging from 78 mm to 88 mm of the cabinet structure IB of the cooker 1 A, corresponding to the linear dimensions of the helical body portion 13a of the extractor 13, projecting into the area 9a of the compartment 9, becomes available in the interior space 25 of the cabinet structure 1, thereby affording the benefit of increasing the depth of a pull-out drawer, such as the one that is generally referenced 26 in Figure 1.

Thus, the cabinet structure IB comprises one or more pull-out drawers 26 disposed between the front wall 3 and the containing chamber 22 ad/or one or more pull-out drawers 26 disposed between the front wall 3 and the intermediate wall.

Namely, also referring to Figure 2, due to the characteristic of having the means 13, 14 for extracting and exhausting said fumes mainly within the containing chamber 22 and partially within the compartment 9, a distance S of 265 mm is obtained between the front wall 3 and a partition wall 27 (positioned as a protection for the containing chamber 22).

Those skilled in the art will obviously appreciate that a number of changes and variants may be made to the arrangements as described hereinbefore to meet incidental and specific needs. All of these variants and changes fall within scope of the invention, as defined in the following claims.