Particle exhaust apparatus for optical fiber draw furnace

A method of producing an optical fiber, comprising the steps of:

• flowing a first gas into an optical fiber draw furnace;
• passing the first gas through a heated section of the optical fiber draw furnace;
• passing the first gas into a reclaim cylinder coupled to the optical fiber draw furnace, the reclaim cylinder comprising:
• a single housing (60) defining a reclaim chamber 64,
• a plurality of gas reclaim ports (68) spaced equidistant from each other and tangentially coupled to the housing,
• a gas sampling port (52) tangentially or perpendicularly coupled to the housing, and
• a particle sampling port (54) tangentially or perpendicularly coupled to the housing;
• removing a portion of the first gas through the plurality of gas reclaim ports fluidly coupled to the reclaim cylinder such that a vortex of the first gas is generated in the reclaim cylinder, wherein the plurality of gas reclaim ports are spaced equidistant from each other and are tangentially coupled to the housing;
• and
• flowing a second gas from a gas inlet at a rate configured to substantially recover a pressure drop associated with removing the portion of the first gas.