Soot blower construction

Abstract

A soot blower of the long retracting type includes a box beam within which a lance tube is longitudinally movable by means of a carriage suspended on rollers to travel along an integrated rack/track assembly secured to the inner walls of the box beam. Such rack/track assemblies have longitudinal rails on their tops for the rollers and longitudinal racks secured to the bottoms of the rails. The racks are engaged by underlying walking pinions journaled in the carriage and positioned directly beneath the rollers. In a modification, the combined rack/track assemblies include bottom rail surfaces in addition to top rail portions, and bottom rollers are employed in addition to the pinions and top rollers. In another modification, the carriage is supported by an I-beam the bottom flanges of which constitute the tracks, a single rack being secured to the underside of such bottom flange. The carriage has a set of accessible spur gears journaled at its rear wall beneath a cover, including a driving gear keyed slidably on a shaft driven by a stationary motor at the rear of the beam, the gear set being connected by a shaft which projects into the carriage to internal gears in the carriage which drive the walking pinions, one of the accessible rear gears being drivingly connected to the lance tube to rotate the latter as the lance tube is moved longitudinally by the carriage.