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US 6,947,467 B2Granted
Cooling system for heat treating furnace
AssigneePV/T, Inc.
InventorLennie L. Ashburn
Life of this patent
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AssigneePV/T, Inc.
InventorLennie L. Ashburn
Estimating the term…
An electric resistance high temperature vacuum furnace having radiant heating units evenly spaced around the sides and ends of the furnace hot zone. Pairs of units are automatically regulated both radially and longitudinally according to the temperature required by the workload in the hot zone. The units each comprise parallel aligned elements electrically connected in series at their one ends. Each element has lengthwise surfaces angularly disposed from each other to form a beam structure of high section modulus for stiffness and resistance to sagging. Also, the angles of the element surfaces facing a heat-reflective assembly substantially enable all of the energy radiated toward the assembly to be reflected into the hot zone in addition to the direct radiation from the surfaces facing the hot zone. The furnace includes a re-circulating cooling system for rapid cooling of the furnace and workload. An inert cooling fluid bypasses the hot zone, passing instead around the outside of the heat assembly and through a heat exchanger until the circulated fluid temperature drops below the maximum tolerated by all component parts in the cooling system, after which the fluid passes directly through the hot zone.
A method for cooling an electric heat treating furnace to a desired end temperature following a heat treating phase, the furnace including radiant heat-reflecting assemblies offset from the interior surface forming a hot zone within the assemblies and an annular channel in the space between the assemblies and the interior surface, fluid inlet and outlet ports communicating with the hot zone and annular channel, and a heat exchanger operatively connected between said inlet and outlet ports, comprising the sequential steps of:
Apparatus for cooling an electric heat treating furnace to a desired end temperature following a heat treating phase, the furnace including a radiant heat-reflecting assembly offset from an interior surface of the furnace forming a hot zone within the assembly and an annular channel in a space between the radiant heat-reflecting assembly and the interior surface of the furnace, fluid inlet and outlet ports communicating with the hot zone and annular channel, and a beat exchanger operatively connected between the inlet and outlet ports, comprising:
A system for uniformly cooling a workload in a heat treating furnace, comprising:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.