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US 6,553,911 B1Granted
Exothermic reactions and methods
AssigneeERICO International Corporation
InventorsRichard E. Walker, Dean Moore
Life of this patent
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AssigneeERICO International Corporation
InventorsRichard E. Walker, Dean Moore
Estimating the term…
Exothermic reaction mixtures are electrically ignited with a low cost foil strip of two conductive strips separated by a layer of insulation. One or more holes are formed in the ignitor to create shaped spark plasma on one side and a venting plasma on the opposite side of the hole. The spark with low energy requirements is sufficient to ignite exothermic reactions for welding, casting and other uses. The ignitor may be part of reusable crucibles and molds, or expendable packages, containers, and molds, or smaller squibs for igniting larger charges. The ignitor may be immersed in or substantially adjacent the charge of exothermic material. The spark forming hole or holes is made and shaped by a punch in a simple and low cost manner. The ignitor eliminates the need for starting powders or materials and flint gun ignitors.
A method of igniting exothermic weld metal material comprising the steps of forming a charge of such weld metal material, placing a shaped spark plasma creating metal foil ignitor in ignition relationship with said charge, and impressing a voltage on said ignitor sufficient to create said spark plasma in turn to ignite said charge to convert such exothermic weld metal material to weld metal.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.