Patent ID: 6202428
Filing Date: 2001-03-20
Classification: F04C,F24F,F25B

Abstract:
An air conditioner having a refrigerant circuit comprising:a compressor;a four-way switching valve;an outdoor-side heat exchanger and an indoor-side heat exchanger which are selectively switched and connected to the high-pressure refrigerant discharge side and the low-pressure refrigerant suction side of said compressor via said four-way switching valve; andan expansion valve connected between said outdoor-side heat exchanger and said indoor-side heat exchanger, characterized in thatsaid compressor has an enclosed vessel, said enclosed vessel contains a refrigerant compressing section having a suction port and a discharge port and an electric motor for driving said refrigerant compressing section, and the interior of said enclosed vessel is divided airtightly into two chambers, an electric motor chamber containing said electric motor and a refrigerant discharge chamber on the side of the discharge port of said refrigerant compressing section, by said refrigerant compressing section serving as partitioning means;the suction port of said refrigerant compressing section is connected with a low-pressure refrigerant suction pipe and said refrigerant discharge chamber is connected with a high-pressure refrigerant discharge pipe, and said electric motor chamber is connected with a first refrigerant flow path pipe and a second refrigerant flow path pipe at different positions of said electric motor chamber;of four switching ports of said four-way switching valve, a first switching port is connected with the low-pressure refrigerant suction pipe of said suction port, a second switching port is connected with the high-pressure refrigerant discharge pipe of said refrigerant discharge chamber, a third switching port is connected with the first refrigerant flow path pipe of said electric motor chamber, and a fourth switching port is connected with said indoor-side heat exchanger, and also the second refrigerant flow path pipe of said electric motor chamber is connected to the side of said outdoor-side heat exchanger;at the time of cooling operation, said four-way switching valve is switched so that said first switching port and said fourth switching port communicate with each other and at the same time said second switching port and said third switching port communicate with each other, whereby said compressor is operated as an internal high pressure type; andat the time of heating operation, said four-way switching valve is switched so that said first switching port and said third switching port communicate with each other and at the same time said second switching port and said fourth switching port communicate with each other, whereby said compressor is operated as an internal low pressure type.