Filter Mounting Mechanism for Uniform Seal Loading and Low Pressure Drop
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current filter systems face challenges in reducing maintenance time, ensuring consistent seal loading, and optimizing filter element spacing and design, which can lead to increased pressure drop and fluid leaks due to uneven sealing forces and tight packing of filter elements.
Innovation Solution
The introduction of a filter element with a tube sheet seal and compression member featuring an angular catch mechanism, which secures the filter element to a mounting yoke with a threaded shank, ensuring a desired load is applied uniformly and preventing overloading or underloading, while also allowing for improved airflow by reducing flow separation and turbulence.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Quantity of substance
If filter elements are packed tightly and closely together to increase system capacity, then the quantity of filter elements increases, but flow restriction and turbulence increase leading to higher pressure drop
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs curved surfaces and rounded transitions in the filter element design, particularly at the interfaces between filter elements and in the flow paths. This curvature reduces flow separation and turbulence when filter elements are closely packed, allowing tighter packing without proportionally increasing pressure drop. The curved geometry guides fluid flow more smoothly around and between filter elements.
2Ease of operation
If a traditional attachment member is used to secure the filter element, then the filter element can be mounted, but the load applied to the seal is difficult to control and may be uneven
Solution Approach 1:
The attachment member incorporates a seal loading indicator that provides visual feedback on the amount of load being applied to the seal during mounting. This feedback mechanism allows the operator to see when the appropriate seal loading is achieved, ensuring consistent and correct installation without requiring complex measurement tools or expertise.
Solution Approach 2:
The attachment member is designed to automatically apply the correct amount of load to the seal through its internal mechanism, reducing dependence on operator skill. The self-loading feature ensures that the seal receives the proper compressive force simply by completing the mounting action, making the process more reliable and consistent.
3Ease of manufacture
If the seal is positioned in a cantilevered orientation with the tube sheet in vertical orientation, then the filter element can be mounted, but gravity generates uneven forces on the sealing elements
Solution Approach 1:
The attachment member incorporates a counterbalancing mechanism that compensates for the uneven gravitational forces acting on the seal in the cantilevered vertical orientation. This counterweight or spring mechanism applies an opposing force to balance the gravitational load, ensuring uniform seal compression despite the vertical cantilevered positioning.
4Adaptability or versatility
If multiple filter element sections are stacked axially with seal members therebetween, then a larger filter element can be formed, but visual inspection of seal compression becomes impossible
Solution Approach 1:
The seal members incorporate color-changing or color-coded indicators that change appearance based on the degree of compression. When the seal is properly compressed, it displays a specific color or pattern that can be visually inspected from the outside, allowing quality verification without disassembling the stacked filter element sections.
Data Source
AI summary
Filter elements, filter mounting systems, filter systems, methods of servicing filter systems, and methods of mounting filter elements are provided herein. The mounting system may include a quick attach attachment member that can be both axially slid along a mounting shank as well as threadedly engaged therewith. Torque limiting features may be provided to limit the amount of loading that may be provided by an attachment member to a filter element. Identifiers of appropriate tightening of attachment members may be provided. Clocking features and mechanisms for better balancing loading on seal members may be provided.