US 7,556,171 B2Granted

Tank

AssigneeToyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

InventorHirokazu Ishimaru

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Abstract

In a high-pressure tank, an adjacent part of a liner and a protruded part of a cap are provided adjacently to each other, and in respective annular grooves in the protruded part, an O-ring for sealing adjacent portions of the adjacent part and the protruded part is loaded. A backup ring provided in the inside of the adjacent part of the liner has a hardness higher than that of the liner. Therefore, deformation of the adjacent part that would be caused by the respective O-rings is suppressed, and the respective O-rings can be sufficiently compressed, whereby reliable sealing between the liner and the cap can be provided. In addition, when the pressure inside of the high-pressure tank is increased to a high pressure, even if the cap is pushed out toward the outside resulting in the protruded part of the cap being shrinkage-deformed toward the inside in the radial direction due to the stresses, the respective O-rings can maintain the state of sealing between the protruded part and the adjacent part.

Claims15

Dependent claims

A tank, comprising:

a valve, and a tank main body having a container-like shape into which said valve is inserted, said tank main body having:
a circumferential wall which is configured by integrating an outer circumferential wall on the outside and a liner on the inside except for the area around a through-hole that is formed in the circumferential wall;
and
a cap made of a metal that is fitted into said through-hole in said circumferential wall, wherein,
at said liner, an adjacent part is formed as an integral part thereof, said adjacent part constituting an inner end portion of said through-hole;
in the inside of the adjacent part, a high-hardness part having a higher hardness than the liner is provided;
an inner end portion of said cap forms a protruded part that protrudes inwardly towards an inner side of the tank, and in an axial direction of the tank, and contacts the adjacent part of said liner;
and
a seal member being provided at an outer circumferential surface of said protruded part of said cap and an inner circumferential surface of the adjacent part of said liner.

6 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.