The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 03, 1992
Filed:
Jun. 04, 1991
Dennis N Harvey, Victoria, MN (US);
Rosemarie Reilly, Bloomfield Hills, MI (US);
General Dynamics Land Systems, Inc., Warren, MI (US);
Abstract
An optical input apparatus (10) for use with a weld evaluation monitor (14) to determine the concentration of hydrogen in a weld arc atmosphere (62) including weld arc plasma and shield gas is disclosed as including an optical fiber bundle (16) having a single optical input (18) and a plurality of optical outputs (22). The optical fiber bundle is disposed to receive, at its optical input, electromagnetic radiation emitted from the weld arc atmosphere and, because the optical fiber bundle has an individual optical fiber path distribution that is completely randomized, to communicate proportional amount of the radiation to each of its optical outputs independent of the angular disposition of the fiber bundle. Radiation having only specific wavelengths of hydrogen, shield gas and background emissions are allowed to pass through respective optical line filters (56) to associated optical transducers (58), which generate electrical output signals having amplitudes representative of the intensities of the hydrogen, shield gas and background emissions. Also disclosed is a signal processing module (12) for receiving the electrical output signals and determining therefrom the hydrogen concentration in the weld arc atmosphere. A method for using the apparatus to determine the hydrogen concentration is also disclosed.