Patent ID: 7390162

Claim:
A rotary ram compressor comprising: a stationary casing having at least one inlet passage for admission of gases, and at least one exit passage for discharge of pressurized gases; a drive shaft supported for rotation in the casing by an arrangement of bearings and extending to a drive receiving end located outside the casing; and a rotor assembly housed inside the casing and including a plurality of axially spaced disks surrounding the drive shaft and lying in planes transverse to the rotational axis of the drive shaft, at least one disk being secured for rotation about the drive shaft, at least two disks defining an annular space in-between with a plurality of vanes arranged circumferentially within the annular space between the two disks, each vane attached to at least one of the two disks defining the annular space, each vane having a leading edge, a trailing edge, a concave surface and a convex surface, the opposing parts of the surfaces of each two adjacent vanes along with the opposing parts of the two disks' surfaces confined between the opposing parts of the surfaces of the two adjacent vanes defining a channel between each two adjacent vanes, each channel having an inlet communicating with the space relatively radially outward of the vanes and an outlet communicating with the space relatively radially inward of the vanes, each channel formed of two successive freely communicating portions: a first diverging inlet portion; and a second constant cross-sectional area outlet portion, with the cross-sectional area of the first diverging inlet portion of each channel increasing from the inlet of the channel to the second constant cross-sectional area outlet portion of the channel.