Heat meters
AssigneeWilgood Corporation
InventorMurray F. Feller
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The disclosed apparatus measures the temperature at the inlet and at the outlet of equipment such as a solar heater, and meters the flow of fluid through the equipment. An electrical signal representing the difference between the inlet temperature and the outlet temperature is multiplied by the output signal of the fluid metering device to register the amount of heat exchanged during a given time interval. The volumetric changes of fluid density at the flow meter and the error in performance of the flow meter that may occur due to changes in fluid temperature passing through the flow meter are automatically taken into account in the computation.
Claims10
Apparatus for measuring the thermal energy change of a fluid that passes from an inlet through a heat-exchange zone to an outlet, including inlet and outlet electrical fluid-temperature-responsive devices, means responsive to said devices for deriving a temperature-difference signal representing the difference between the inlet and outlet temperatures of the fluid, fluid-metering means for providing a series of impulses whose repetition rate represents the volume rate of fluid flow, means responsive to the impulses of said fluid-metering means for producing a train of triangular waves each having a sharp front and an ensuing slope, a signal generator for providing a constant-frequency signal recurring a large number of times during each said triangular wave, registering means, means responsive to said triangular-wave producing means and said temperature-difference signal deriving means for developing successive enabling signals whose individual durations in relation to their recurrence time intervals represent the product of the temperature difference and the flow rate of the fluid, and means responsive to said enabling signals for causing entry of said constant-frequency signals into said register intermittently.
Apparatus for measuring the thermal energy change of a fluid that passes from an inlet through a heat-exchange zone to an outlet, including inlet and outlet electrical fluid-temperature-responsive devices, means responsive to said devices for deriving a temperature-difference signal representing the difference between the inlet and outlet temperatures of the fluid, fluid-metering means for providing a series of impulses whose repetition rate represents the volume rate of fluid flow, means responsive to an alternating current source for deriving rectangular timing waves having a dependence in duration and frequency on the alternating current source and recurring at a faster rate than the fluid-metering series of impulses, a voltage-to-frequency converter responsive to said temperature-difference signal, a register, and gating means acting under control of said fluid-metering means in dependence on the flow rate for allowing only selected ones of said signals from said rectangular wave deriving means to enable transmission of the output of the voltage-to-frequency converter to said register, thereby to represent the thermal energy change of the fluid between the inlet and the outlet.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.