Vacuum filter belt apparatus

• US 5,599,363 A
• Filed: 08/01/1994
• Issued: 02/04/1997
• Est. Priority Date: 08/01/1994
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Donald W. Percy
• Original Assignee: Donald W. Percy
• Inventors: Percy, Donald W.
• Primary Examiner(s): WEBER, THOMAS
• Application Number:
  US08/283,567
• Time in Patent Office: 918 Days
• Field of Search: 55/351, 55/352, 55/354
• US Class Current: 55/352
• CPC Class Codes: B01D 46/20 the belts combined with drums

Abstract

In a gas cleaning apparatus a filter belt is arranged to move in a flight path across and transverse to a gas flow stream so that successive incremental portions of the filter belt enter the gas flow stream at an entrance point, pass thereacross, and then leave it at an exit point, with and means for moving the successive incremental portions of the filter belt in seriatim into and out of the gas flow stream.

Claims

1. In a filter device in fluid communication with the vacuum means of an engine serviced thereby and including:

a housing having an upstream fluid inlet and a downstream fluid outlet defining a flow passage therebetween,

a charge of filter medium sequentially movable along a vertical flight path from one side of to the other side of the housing,

support means for supporting a portion of the filter medium across and transversely of the flow passage,

a supply canister and a takeup canister at opposite sides of the flow passage,

a supply spool rotatably mounted within the supply canister for loading the charge of the filter medium thereinto and the payout of the filter medium therefrom,

a takeup spool rotatably mounted within the takeup canister for the takeup of the filter medium thereon,

a motor for driving the takeup spool,

a primary grill having inboard and outboard faces and being extendable transversely of and through the flow passage forwardly of the filter medium for retaining the filter medium in confronting position against the inboard face of the grill,

plural adjacent layers of reticulated polyurethane foam of varying pore densities positioned as a supplemental filter medium intersecting the flow passage outboard of the outboard face of the grill with the foam layer nearest the primary grill having a porosity of 40 pores per inch and the layer farthest from the primary grill having a porosity of 80 pores per inch,

a secondary grill having inboard and outboard faces and being extendable transversely of and through the flow passage with its inboard face being outboard of the foam layers for holding the foam layers against each other and relative to the primary grill,

the engine vacuum means communicating with the fluid outlet for drawing the fluid stream through the filter medium and supplemental filter medium,

sensing means including a presettable control means cooperant with the engine vacuum means for monitoring the concentration of contaminants collected on the filter medium as a function of the vacuum drawing on the filter medium and responsively generating and ceasing-to-generate signals respectively as the sensing of the contaminant concentration reaches maximum and minimum levels respectively for energizing and deenergizing the motor respectively and driving and stopping the takeup spool respectively in effecting the incremental movement of the filter medium with respect to the flow passage for replacing a spent portion of the filter medium with a fresh unspent portion across the flow passage.