US1762242A - Liquid-fuel heating apparatus - Google Patents

Description

H. F. RODLER LIQUID FUEL HEATING APPARATUS June 10, 1930.

sheets-sheet 1 Filed "April 23, 1925 N t ml E EL mTmL GQ H/LME/P IPO DLEP IVEN TOR.

A TTORNEY.

June 10, 1930. H. F. RODLER 1,762,242

LIQUID FUEL HEATING APPARATUS Filed April 23, 1925 4 Sheets-Sheet 2 H/LMER E POOLE? I N VEN TOR.

June 10, 1930.

H. F. RODLER LIQUID FUEL HEATING APPARATUS Filed April 23, 192 5 4 Sheets-Sheet 5 FIE 1E 15 13 FIE-5 IN VEN TOR.

ff/LME/P 7 R0 DL ER 7 Y B Y A TTORNEY.

Patented June 10, 1930 UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE HILMER I. BODLEIt, OF DAVENI PORT, IOWA, ASSIGNOR TO CALVIN J. MUMMER'I, OF

WEST NEW YORK, NEW JERSEY LIQUID-FUEL HEATING APPARATUS,

Application filed April 23, 1925. Serial No. 25,348.

My present invention relates to means for preparing liquid fuel, more especially oil, for burning and mixing the prepared fuel with the proper amount of air for combustion. Among the objects of my invention are to produce an improved liquid fuel burner; to produce a liquid fuel burner which will function automatically and without failure; to produce an improved device for converting liquid fuel into a combustible mixture; to improve upon the means for supplying fuel to the means for mechanically breaking it up; to provide improved means for timing the control valves in a mechanism of the character described; to improve upon prior valve construction; to improve upon the means for mixing air with the fuel; to provide means for preventing dirt from accumulating upon the oil nebulizing means; to produce an oil burning heater which can be adjusted for different sized furnaces by the exchange of a minimum number of parts; to provide an improved method of producing a combustible gas; to improve upon the method of igniting the fuel in a liquid fuel burner; to improve upon the mode of adjusting the amount of air admitted to the burning chamber, and such further objects, advantages and capabilities as will hereafter more fully appear and as are inherent in the mechanism disclosed.

My invention further resides in thecombination, construction and arrangement of parts illustrated in the accompanying drawings and, while I have shown therein a preferred embodiment of said invention, I desire the same to be understood as illustrative only and not as limiting my invention. In the drawings annexed hereto and forming a pal-thereof, Fig. 1 is a plan view of my improved apparatus; Fig. 2 is a transverse section between the motors, pump and controlling valves substantially along the plane indicated by the line 2-2, Fig. 1; Fig. 3 is a vertical section through a combustion chamber, showing -my improved burner in elevation; Fig. 4 is a vertical longitudinal section through the burner head and its immediate driving mechanism;

is an elevation of one of the valves; Fig. 8 1s anelevation of a valve bodyFat a ri ht angle to the elevationshown-in ig. 7 ig.

9 is an expandedview of a valve core and burner head; Fig. 6 is a fragthe parts associated therewith; Fig. 9 is a transverse section through Fig. 9 substantially along the plane indicated b the line 9 9 Fig. 10 is an elevation o the part shown at the right in Fig. 9 designed to show .how adjustment between the valves issecured; Fig. 11 is a plan view of the casting which supports the lining of the fire box; Fig. 12 is an elevation of means whereby adjustment of the draft regulator is secured; Fig. 13 is an elevation at a right angle to Fig. 12; Fig. 14 is a fragmentary sectionthrough the igniting means shown at the right in Fig. 3, with the parts in a somewhat different position; and Fig. 15 is an incomplete plan'view, Fig. 16 an edge view and Fig. 17 an inner face elevation of a fire brick used in building the fire box for a furnace in which my oil burner is used.

Referring more in detail to the annexed drawings, a base 1 is provided with legs 2 whereby it may be secured in place. This base carries an actuating motor .3, a driving motor 4, a burner assembly 5, electrical high tension mechanism 6, manual regulating valves 7 and 8, automatic cut-off valves 9 and 10 and a pump 11.

The shaft 12 of the motor 4 is connected by means of a flexible coupling 13 with the .rotor of the pump 11 and this is in turn connected by a flexible coupling 14 with the shaft 15 which has mounted thereon a bevel gear 16*(shown in Fig. 4). This bevel gear 16 meshes with a corresponding gear 17 secured to the vertical shaft'18. These gears are mounted in the gear casing 19 which has secured to its upper end a bearing casing 20. Secured in the lower part of the gear casing 19 is an adjustable thrust bearing element 21 which may be adjusted by loosening the set nut 22 and then turning the element 'ing into upper and lower chambers.

21 until the gears 16 and 17 mesh properly. The nut 22 is then tightened to place to hold element 21 in its adjusted position.

A well in the bottom of element 21 carries a ball 23 upon which rests a hardened steel pin 24 to serve as a substantially fric-, tionless thrust bearing for the shaft 18. The lower end 25 of said shaft is held from lateral play by an appropriate anti-friction bearing 26 mounted in the upper end of element 21. A similar anti-friction bearing 27 laterally supports the central portion of the shaft 18 where it passes through the bottom of the bearing casing 20. Another antifriction bearing laterally supports the upper portion of the shaft 18 and is mounted in diaphragm 29 which divides the bearing calskgland 30 is applied to the lower part of the diaphragm 29 to make a tight joint between the shaft and the diaphragm, in order to substantially prevent the escape of oil from oil chamber 31 in the upper part of the bearing housing. A similar gland 32 prevents the escape of oil around the shaft at the top of the casing 20. A nipple 33 is attached to or integral with the wall of the chamber 31 so that an oil delivery pipe may be connected thereto for the delivery of fuel to the said chamber. p

The shaft 18 has a longitudinal aperture 34 extending from its upper end downwardly to-the central part of chamber 31 and has a lateral opening. 35- connecting the longitudinal aperture with the chamber 31. The. upper end of the shaft is screw-threaded at 36 for the reception of the nebulizer head 37. The extreme upper end'of the shaft 18 is provided with a pair of channels 38 leading from the upper extremity backwardly so that oil rising through channel 34 and overflowing on the upper end of the shaft will pass downwardly through the grooves 38 into the cup 39 in the upper surface of the nebulizer head 37. A guard and air vane carrier plate 40 having an internally screw-threaded boss 41 is screwed on to the upper end of the shaft 18. This is provided with a plurality of openings 42 between its middle and. periphery for the entry of air therethrough' into the space between the plate 40 and a dished plate 43 of the nebulizer head. A plurality of air vanes 44 are carried by the underside of the plate 40 near the outer periphery thereof to throw air out wardly toward a furnace wall when the shaft 18 is rotated. The direction of the threading on the upper end of the shaft will be dependent upon the direction of rotation of the shaft, and should be such that the driving of the shaft by the gearing 16, 17 will have a tendency to tighten the head 37 and the plate 40 upon the shaft.

The periphery of the dished plate 43 is ground concave as shown at 45 to form at 1 thrown 0 the upper side of the plate a feather edge 46 from which the fuel will be thrown off in a-very finely divided state, such as results from the operation of a nebulizer. This is therefore called a nebulizer element. Air vanes 47 are preferably integrally formed with the underside ofthe plate 43 and ex tenddownwardly along the side of the hub of this element, as shown most clearly in Figs. 4 and 5. "These vanesare so designed as to give a strong blast of air outwardly and upwardly toward a furnace wall, preferably lined with fire bricks 54, thereby having atendenc to cross the course of the fuel by the nebulizer head. This results in a strong blaze being directed against the furnace wall throughout its entire periphery. The air vanes 44 are supposed to draw hot air downwardly through the openings 42 and direct it'outwardly toward the furnace wall to assist the vanes 47 in thoroughly mixing the air and fuel and causing complete combustion.- found, however, that the device works quite satisfactorily without the addition'of the plate 40 and air vanes 44, but it is believed desirable to make use of this. plate in order to prevent dirt fromgetting into the opening 34 and accumulating on top of the plate 43.

Mounted on legs 48 inside of the furnace is a skeleton frame 49 comprising an inner ring 50, outer ring 51 and spokes 52 connecting these rings. The outer ring 51 is provided with an upstanding flange 53 for retaining in position the special fire bricks 54 which cooperate in a. peculiar manner with the nebulizer head in producing complete com- It has been bustion of the fuel. These bricks have upon their inner faces alternate ribs and indenta-' tions which catch and direct upwardly the swirling gases thrown outwardly by the nebulizer head and cause the flames to be directed upwardly in close contact with the inner faces of the bricks. While these ribs 55 are not essential to the operation of this device, they nevertheless appear to considerably improve its operation. These ribs appear also to reverse the direction of whirl of the agitated gases, thus causing a more intimate mixture of the air and nebulized oil, resultingin an intense blue flame.

A sheet metal plate 56 rests upon the rings 50 and 51 and the spokes 52 and 6 by means of legs 59 and as having an overlapping joint at 60 with the inner edge of the ring 50. However, by making this joint lap in the opposite direction, the ring 58 can be supported directly by the ring 50 and the posts 59 can be omitted in small sizes of apparatus.- At its inner periphery the ring 58 is provided with an upstanding flange 61 notched at its upper edge/as shown at 62.

The lower edge of an air collar 63 rests in stallation required by substitution of a mini-- mum number of parts, it not being necessary.

to change either of the motors, the pump, the valves, any of the electrical equipment, either of the housings, or anything contained there- In order to adjust the amount of air delivered to the nebulizer head, the vertically adjustable ring 64 is slidably mounted upon the upper end of the bearing housing 20, this ring being provided with a laterally extending flange 65. \Vhen the ring. is moved upwardly toward the ring 58 the space through which air is admitted to the air ring 63 is reduced, and conversely. Integral with the ring 64 is a socket 66 to which is rigidly secured a shaft or rod 67 provided with teeth 68 which mesh with teeth 69 of an actuating mechanism'supported at the side of the casing. The rod 67 passes through a guide lug 70 onthe side of the casing 20 and also through aicorrespondingly siaped opening in the bottom flange of the casin 20. This construction serves to guide and rigidly hold the rod 67 against lateral play and to guide the ring 64 in its vertical movements so that there will be no binding between said ring and the housing 20. A shaft 71 carries the pinion which meshes with the rack on' red 67 and extends to the outside of the furnace where a crank 72 is rigidly. connected thereto. This. shaft passes througha sector 73 which is preferably slotted as shown at 74.

' Suitable means 75, such as a bolt with a milled or wing nut mounted thereon, serves to hold the crank arm 72 in properly ad justed position so that the air regulating means 64, 65 will be held in proper adjustment with relation to the air collar.

The shaft 76 of the'actuating motor 3 is connected in driving relation with the connecting member 77 which is in turn connected with the core 78 ofvalve 9. A screw 79 passes through slot 80 in the flange 81 of this connecting member and serves as means whereby the connecting member and valve may be adjusted relatively to each other and held in adjusted position. This adjustment is necessary in order to get exactly the proper time relation between the cycles in the functioning of the apparatus. A washer 82 surrounds the end 83 of the core 78 and is pressed a ainst the body of the valve 9 by a nut 84 w ich is adjusted to a point where the core will fit the body sufliciently tightly to prevent leaka e'of fuel between the core and body. The anged nut 85, which serves as a lock nut, is then screwed down againstthe nut 84 and'holds the parts in relatively adjusted position. The flange 86 of core 7 8 is provided with a-slot corresponding to slot 80 in flange 81, and a screw 79 holds thev flanges 85 and 86 in relatively adjusted position so that the two valves will operate in properly timed sequence.

Connected with the pump 11 is inlet pipe 90 by means of which the fuel is led to the.

pump. From the pump the fuel passes through a filter 91 and connection 92 to the manual valve 7, by means of which the flow of fuel to the automatic valve 9 can be controlled. The purpose of the manual valve 8 is to control the flow of gas to the automatic valve 10 as the flow of liquid fuel to the valve 9 is controlled by the valve 7. A bypass pipe 99 carries the excess oil drawn by the pump and returns it to the source of supply.

It will be obvious from Figs. 7 and 8 that theentra-nce and exit ports of the automatic valves are spaced ninety degrees from each other 'and that the openings into the interior of the cores 78 and 78 are likewise spaced a distance of ninety degrees, on the surface of the core. These openings communicate through the interior of the core so designed to turn the connector 77 through an arc of' one hundred eighty degrees and then discontinue operation. When the current isagain supplied to this motor it will turn the connector another one hundred eighty degrees and then stop. The purpose of this is in order to turn the valve cores into position to permit the-flow of fluid therethrough andv to then turn them into position to stop the flow of the fluid. The complete cycle of operation willbe described hereinafter.

Through the bottom of the fire box extends an opening 93, arranged substantially in the direction of a plane tangential to a circle drawn about the axis of the shaft 18. This arrangement is chosen in order that the air driven toward the outer wall of the fire box shall not be .driven outwardly and downwardly through the opening 93. Extending upwardly to this opening is a gas pipe 94 having a nozzle 95 in proximity to which is a terminal 96 of a high tension circuit one lead of which is shown at 97. This terminal leads from the hi h tension mechanism 6 upon the base 1. he other terminal from this high tension apparatus is grounded on the gas pipe. It Wlll therefore appear that when the circuit to the hi h tension aparatus is closed a' spark Will be produced etweenthe terminal 96 and the nozzle 95.

Operation tor then starts running and closes thecircuit to the high tension mechanism. Shortly thereafter the shaft of the actuating motor will have caused the opening of the valve 10 which controls the admission of gas to the nozzle 95. This gas is ignited by the sparks passing between the nozzle 95 and the terminal 96. Shortly thereafter, the core of valve 9 will have been turned sulficiently so that oil is admitted through this valve to the chamber 31, passing from thence through the openings 35 and 34 to the dished plate 43. In the meantime, the feed circuit to the high tension apparatus has been opened and that to the driving motor 4 closed,

with the result that the nebulizer head starts at an increasing rate fed to the rotating nebu-- lizer head. The valve 10 remains open for a short interval of time after the driving motor 4 begins to operate and while the valve 9 is opening. This gives an opportunity for the nebulizer head to produce a combustible mixture in the vicinity of the gas flame issuing from nozzle 95. This combustible mixture is thus ignited and the flame continues even though the gas flame has been extinguished by the closureof valve 10 caused by the further rotation of the actuating motor 3. When this motor has completed its 'cycle of. one hundred eighty degrees rotation, it automatically stops and the partsare reset, automatically, for the next part of the complete operation, with the valve 9 in completely open position. This takes place when the room temperature rises flow of oil can take place. This operation also includes the breaking of the circuit to.

the driving motor 4 which results in stopping the motor, pump and nebulizer head.

It will of course be understood that the specific description. of structures and methods set forth above may departed from without departing from the spirit of my invention.

Having now described my invention, I claim:

1. In liquid fuel burning apparatus, a burner head, a vertical, rotary shaft supportin said head and causin rotation thereof, in combination with air driving vanes extending inwardly along the under side of the head from near the periphery.,

thereof and then downwardly along the shaft, and means to regulate the amount of air supplied to the. air vanes.

2. In an apparatus of the character described, a slightly dished plate having vanes upon the bottom thereof and projecting downwardly therefrom, a flat cover plate supported adjacent the dished plate but spaced therefrom, said flat plate carrying substantially radial vanes near its outer periphery and between said two plates,said flat plate having perforations therein located inwardly with respect to the last mentioned vanes, and means for supporting and rotating said plates in unison.

3. In an apparatus of the character dc scribed, a substantially vertical rotary shaft, a dished plate secured thereto adjacent to the upper end thereof, in combination with a cover late removably secured to the upper end'of t e shaft and covering the upper surface of the dished plate, said cover plate having a perforation therein and having air vanes external thereto near the outer periphery of the cover plate, between the dished plate and the cover plate, to cause a secondary circulation of air between the plates, said air vanes. having their lower edges'spaced slightly from'the dished plate,-

the primary supply of air being furnished from the lower side of the dished plate and the secondary air from between the plates,

the circulation of the secondary air preventing the plates from burning out and assisting in the mixing of, the air and nebulized oil.

scribed, a substantially vertical rotary shaft, a centrally depressed plate'secured directly thereto adjacent the upper end thereof and receiving oil therefrom, said plate fitting the shaft closely so that no airis permitted to pass between the shaft. and plate, in combination with a cover plate removably' secured directly to the upper end of the shaft and covering the upper surface of the dished plate,said plates being substantially parallel, said cover plate having air vanes near its outer periphery between the two plates,

4. In an apparatus of the character dedepending from the upper plate and out of I contact with the lower plate.

5.. In a liquid fuel burning apparatus, a

housing, a fire box located above said housing and having an aperture in the bottom thereof'overt the housing, a plate arranged adjacent the lower end of-the aperture and adapted to be moved toward and away from same, a rod rigidly secured to the plate and extending longitudinally of the housing, an

v adjusting shaft adjacent the housing, operative connection'between the shaft and rod; means for rotating the shaft, comprising a lever, and means for holding the rotating means'in adjusted position, comprising an adjustable clamp.

my name to this In witness whereof, I hereunto subscribe specification. HILMER F. RODLER.

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