Valeo Climatisation

Valeo Thermique Habitacle

Christophe Chevallier

The invention concerns a fluid box-manifold assembly for a heat exchanger comprising at least a single-piece housing produced by swaging a sheet metal and including; a cap comprising a base linked to a peripheral wall defining an open surface, and a cover including a base provided with holes for receiving the tube ends of a tube bundle and linked to a peripheral edge matching in shape the cap peripheral wall, the cap and the cover being linked by a material strip forming a bend line, such that the cap and the cover can be mutually brought together up to an interlocking position to define an internal volume of the fluid box. The invention is applicable to motor vehicle heat exchanger.

Fluid box-manifold assembly for heat exchanger, in particular for motor vehicle

A plate type heat exchanger, which may for example be an evaporator for a motor vehicle air conditioning installation, comprises a stack of hollow plates with a pipe connector interposed in the stack. The flow circuit in which the heat exchanger is inserted includes a fluid flow tube coupled to the pipe connection of the heat exchanger by means of a coupling device which includes a clamping ring. This coupling device includes an intermediate sleeve having a cylindrical portion fitted intimately around a cylindrical end portion of the pipe connection, together with another cylindrical portion which serves in effect as an extension of the cylindrical end portion. The clamping ring is engaged around the outer cylindrical portion of the sleeve, so as to clamp the latter around the end of the fluid flow tube, the latter having previously been introduced into the sleeve and the end portion of the pipe connection.

Coupling device for a plate-type heat exchanger, especially for motor

A heat exchanger for use as an evaporator in a motor vehicle air conditioning system comprises a multiplicity of plates stacked in pairs and defining within each pair a flow chamber for a first fluid. Between each pair of plates and the next is a flow passage for a second fluid. Each plate has a bent-back edge portion or plate foot which extends at right angles to the main part of the plate. Each plate foot abuts against a similar plate foot of an adjacent plate, while leaving an area free to define at least one drain passage through the bottom of the heat exchanger which is formed by the overlapping plate feet. Water condensing from the air passed through the evaporator is drained through these drain passages.

Heat exchanger of the stacked plate type, in particular an evaporator

A motor vehicle air conditioning installation includes a pair of parallel tubes with annular beads at their free ends, for assembly to a component of the fluid circuit of the installation, and a clamping plate or strut connecting the two tubes together. The strut is an elongated plate having two through apertures. One of these is a notch open at one end of the plate. Each aperture has a substantially semicircular region matching the circumference of the associated tubular element fitting within it. The second aperture is surrounded by the material of the plate over its whole periphery, and includes a widened region through which the associated bead of the corresponding tubular element can pass, this widened region being joined directly to the substantially semicircular region. The strut cannot be separated from the tubes without resilient deformation of the latter, which avoids the danger of its becoming lost during disassembly.

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Le Mans, France

Christophe Chevallier