Rebalancing Method for a Front-loading Washing Machine Using a Robot Balancer System

This paper presents a novel method for both the reduction of unbalance and rebalancing of a front-loading drum-type washing machine using a robot balancer. It precisely detects the amount of unbalanced mass (UB) and phase in the forward and backward directions due to laundry and water dropping that occur during washing. The robot balancer moves the forward and backward layers in the opposite directions of the detected unbalance. The results show that all the vibration modes of the washing machine were reduced significantly, and the time to reach the steady-state vibration of the tub was effectively reduced.