W.c. Heraeus Gmbh

Hubert Koukol

Dieter Wendt

Werner Ptaschek

Walter Keller

To permit flexibility in chemical testing steps, a plurality of automatic chemical apparatus units are arranged in modular form, each unit including a main sample receptacle transport conveyor to move the receptacle holding a sample to be tested in a main transport path, a plurality of test and treatment containers being associated with each unit, and a sampling transfer station is located to extract a sample of test substance from the sample receptacle and introduce it into one of the test and treatment containers, which test and treatment container is then moved in a separate test and treatment conveyor path along a plurality of testing and treatment stations until the entire analysis of the removed sample is completed, at which time a new sample receptacle is moved along the main path to the sampling transfer station for introducing a new sample into a subsequent test and treatment receptacle. Movement, in steps, of the sample receptacle and of the test and treatment containers is synchronized so that, at any one time, only one sample container is present at the sampling transfer station. If a plurality of such modular units are assembled together, the stepping of movement of the sample receptacle past the respective transfer stations of the respective modular units is controlled by the longest time period taken to carry out the analysis steps of any one modular unit, sample receptacles for subsequent tests being held at a sample feeder which supports the receptacles in a sinuous, meandering path for introduction, one at a time, to the analysis units in accordance with the slowest test procedures being carried out, so that errors in identification and coordination of test results with samples are reliably avoided.

Automatic chemical analysis apparatus

A valve ahead of a continuously running exhaust pump allows air to be sucked through the piping of a burette from the intake capillary and, after the capillary is lowered into the input sample vessel, a quantity of the sample liquid flushes out any remaining traces of a previous sample. After the necessary small quantity of the sample liquid has been thus pulled into and out of the burette, the valve is closed and a piston with a conical head fitting right into the burette draws in a measured quantity of the sample from the input container and then discharges it into the output container. The vertex of the piston is flattened so that the channel through the burette head will not be closed off when the piston is driven all the way into the burette head.

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Bad Nauheim, Germany

Hubert Koukol