Patent GB-248394-A (GB)
Title: An improved apparatus for and method of annealing metals, ceramic and other materials
IPC: C21D9/00
Filed: 1926-02-27
Abstract: 248,394. Besta, A. Feb. 28, 1925, [Convention date]. Annealing - furnaces; charging and discharging; cooling discharged materials. -In an,apparatus for annealing metals &c. in spaces filled with a neutral gas, the materials &c. are placed in superposed containers which are forced upwards vertically or at an angle, are heated while so being moved, are moved laterally when they have reached the highest positions and then are moved downwards, being cooled during the latter movement. The annealing-boxes 2 are introduced one at a time into a space 4, from which, after the door 3 is closed, the air is exhausted, and is replaced by inert gas. The slide 5 is now opened and the box 2 forced up into the furnace by a charging device 6, the perforated box being provided with lugs 31, Fig. 3, which, when the box is pushed upward, force aside shafts 32 movably mounted in the sides of the furnace until the lugs 31 have passed the shafts 32, when the lugs 31 then rest on the shafts thus holding the box in position. When another box 2 is charged into the furnace, in a similar manner the box 2 already in the furnace is pushed up by the lower box and then held in position as before. When in the position 2b, the box is pushed by means 7 into the position 2<c>, and then the boxes are caused to move downward to the position 2<d> by spring-pressed arms 36 carried by a plunger 35, the upward movement of the latter causing the arms 36 to bear against, and force aside, the shafts 32 when the box is lifted by the rollers 34 carried by the plunger 35. The arms 36 slide into recesses 38 and lock the shafts 32 in position so that on the return movement of the plunger 35 the box is moved downwards into the next position, the shafts 32 running over the lugs 31 on the box and engaging the lugs 31 of the next descending box and hold it in position. When the box is in the position 2d, the slide 8 is opened and the box lowered by a discharging device 9 into the space 10, the box 2<c> being automatically held in position during the discharge of the box 2<d>. The bottom of the furnace is now closed bv the slide 8, the door 11 opened, and the box 2<d> removed. The door 11 is now closed and the space 10 evacuated and then filled with inert gas before the box 2<c> is discharged from the furnace in a similar manner to the box 2d. The furnace is heated by hot gases which enter at the part 15 and which pass around the annealing- boxes through flues 17 and between the bridgepieces 16. In the flue 18 part of the gases passes downwards into lower flues 17, the other part passing upwards and being drawn and forced upwards by a blast producer 21 into a heater 22 heated by a burner 24 and an electrical heater 23 before passing into the furnace again at 15. The rest of the gases pass downwards through flues 17 &c. and becoming cooled are conveyed by a blower 20 into the blast producer 21 and so to the heaters 22, 23. Some of these gases are directed through flues 26, 27 by a blower 25 into a cooling device 28, the cooled gases passing into a box 2f and thence into boxes 2<g>, 2h containing cold material, giving off heat to the same, and finally into the box 2i filled with hot material cooling the latter and then to the blower 25. The heating space 12 is located in the upper part of the furnace, the inner part of which is separated from the outer sheathing 13 by an insulating layer 14.