Wind tunnel freezer
AssigneeW. R. Grace & Co.
InventorsJohn J. Sullivan, Eugene D. Prine
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A batch freezing apparatus has a fan or blower to continuously circulate air through the freezing chamber and back again through a recycle conduit. A cold gas such as from a liquid nitrogen supply tank is added to the recirculating air to lower the temperature in the system in a controlled manner to provide rapid freezing. The freezing chamber is capable of rotation so the material being frozen in cylinderical containers can be rotated against and freeze upon the inner surface of the container during the freezing process. The apparatus is especially suitable for freezing bull semen.
Claims14
An apparatus for cryogenic batch freezing of a large volume of material comprising
- a freezing chamber with entry means to permit insertion of the material to be frozen in the chamber;
- a gas inlet means on one side of the chamber;
- a gas outlet means on the opposite side of the chamber;
- gas recycle conduit means positioned outside the freezing chamber connecting the gas outlet means of the chamber with the gas inlet means of the chamber to thereby form a gas conduit system;
- fan means positioned in the gas recycle conduit means outside the freezing chamber to circulate gas throughout the apparatus;
- container means within said chamber adapted to hold said material to be frozen and being removable from said chamber to withdraw the frozen product, said container means having openings in the sides adjacent the gas inlet and gas outlet means to permit the circulating cold gas to pass through the container means so the gas is in direct contact with said material being frozen;
- and
- control means to add a variable amount of the cooling gas into the gas conduit system at any desired cooling rate whereby the fan means circulates the resulting cold gas mixture rapidly through the freezing chamber to control the temperature.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.