US 11,866,868 B2
Laundry washing machine color composition analysis with article alerts
Phillip C. Hombroek, Prospect, KY (US); Abubakar Abukar, Louisville, KY (US); and Christopher G. Hoppe, Louisville, KY (US)
Assigned to MIDEA GROUP CO., LTD., Guangdong (CN)
Filed by Midea Group Co., Ltd., Foshan (CN)
Filed on Dec. 18, 2020, as Appl. No. 17/126,095.
Prior Publication US 2022/0195653 A1, Jun. 23, 2022
Int. Cl. D06F 34/18 (2020.01); G06T 7/90 (2017.01); D06F 105/60 (2020.01); D06F 103/02 (2020.01)
CPC D06F 34/18 (2020.02) [G06T 7/90 (2017.01); D06F 2103/02 (2020.02); D06F 2105/60 (2020.02)] 20 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A laundry washing machine, comprising:
a wash tub disposed within a housing;
a color detection sensor positioned to capture color composition data of a load of articles over time as the load of articles is added to the wash tub; and
a controller coupled to the color detection sensor and configured to initiate the capture of the color composition data with the color detection sensor as the load of articles is added to the wash tub, the controller further configured to initiate a color decision algorithm to characterize the captured color composition data by assigning each of a plurality of pixel values in the captured color composition data to one of a plurality of color categories;
wherein the controller is further configured to generate an alert in response to detection of one or more outlier articles from the load of articles added to the wash tub in the categorized color composition data to notify the user of the presence of the one or more outlier articles in the load.