Fabrication of hollow fiber materials having sealed chambers
AssigneeThe Boeing Company
InventorWeidong Song
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Systems and methods are provided for fabricating and utilizing segmented hollow fibers. One embodiment is a method for fabricating a hollow fiber. The method includes disposing injection needles at orifices of a die, loading the die with a pool of molten material, driving the molten material through the orifices of the die, and iteratively injecting a gas into the molten material at the orifices via the injection needles and pausing injecting the gas as the molten material is driven through the orifices of the die, resulting in discrete hollow chambers within molten material exiting the die. The method also includes cooling the molten material into a hollow fiber that includes the discrete hollow chambers.
Claims21
A method for fabricating a segmented hollow fiber, the method comprising:
- disposing injection needles at orifices of a die;
- loading the die with a pool of molten material;
- driving the molten material through the orifices of the die;
- iteratively injecting a gas into the molten material at the orifices via the injection needles and pausing injecting the gas as the molten material is driven through the orifices of the die, resulting in discrete hollow chambers within molten material exiting the die;
- and
- cooling the molten material into a segmented hollow fiber that includes the discrete hollow chambers.
A method for fabricating a segmented hollow fiber, the method comprising:
- acquiring a hollow fiber made from a material;
- heating the hollow fiber to a tacking temperature of the material;
- compressing portions of the hollow fiber at lengthwise intervals, causing walls of the hollow fiber to tack together and form airtight chambers, thereby forming a segmented hollow fiber;
- and
- cooling the segmented hollow fiber below the tacking temperature.
A segmented hollow fiber comprising:
- exterior walls of material;
- and
- a series of airtight chambers within the fiber that are separated by lengthwise intervals.
-26. (canceled)
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.