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AssigneeThe Water Heater Industry Joint Research and Development Consortium
InventorsGordon W. Stretch, Bruce A. Hotton, John H. Scanlon, Gary A. Elder, James T. Campbell, Larry D. Kidd, Eric M. Lannes, James M. Martin, James W. Mears, Thomas E. Archibald
Estimating the term…
A gas-fired water heater has a combustion chamber with a bottom wall defined by a perforated flame arrestor plate forming a portion of a flow path through which combustion air may be supplied to a burner structure within the combustion chamber. During firing of the water heater a combustion air shutoff system having a heat-frangible temperature sensing structure disposed within the combustion chamber senses an undesirable temperature increase in the combustion chamber, caused by for example a partial blockage of the flow path, and responsively terminates further air flow into the combustion chamber, thereby shutting down the burner, prior to the creation in the combustion chamber of a predetermined elevated concentration of carbon monoxide.
A method of operating a fuel-fired heating apparatus having a combustion chamber, a burner structure operative to create hot combustion products in said combustion chamber, and a flow path external to said combustion chamber and operative to deliver combustion air into said combustion chamber, said method comprising the steps of:
A method of operating a fuel-fired heating apparatus having a combustion chamber, a burner structure operative to create hot combustion products in said combustion chamber, and a flow path external to said combustion chamber and operative to deliver combustion air into said combustion chamber, said method comprising the steps of sensing in said combustion chamber an elevated combustion temperature correlated to and indicative of a predetermined, undesirably high concentration of carbon monoxide in said combustion chamber, created by a reduction in air flow through said flow path into said combustion chamber, and responsively preventing combustion air flow through said flow path, said sensing step being performed using a temperature sensing structure including a frangible element disposed within said combustion chamber and being heat shatterable at said elevated combustion temperature.
A method of operating a fuel-fired heating apparatus having a combustion chamber, a burner structure operative to create hot combustion products in said combustion chamber, and a flow path external to said combustion chamber and operative to deliver combustion air into said combustion chamber, progressive clogging of said flow path creating the generation of progressively greater concentrations of carbon monoxide within said combustion chamber during firing of said heating apparatus, said method comprising the steps of:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.