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:
May. 01, 2001
Filed:
May. 10, 2000
Seung-Ho Kim, Fort Smith, AR (US);
Robert I. Kepesky, Greenwood, AR (US);
Walter S. Painter, Fort Smith, AR (US);
Rheem Manufacturing Company, New York, NY (US);
Abstract
A gas-fired forced draft air heating furnace is provided with a specially designed self-cooling draft inducer fan that overlies an inshot-type burner section of the furnace and is operatively supported on a heat exchanger plenum portion of the furnace housing. The fan motor is supported on an outboard housing side of the fan, and an umbrella cooling fan is coaxially secured to an outboard end of the fan drive shaft. During operation of the draft inducer fan, the umbrella fan is rotationally driven to direct a flow of ambient cooling air toward the outboard side of the draft inducer fan housing in a manner causing the air flow to sequentially contact and cool the outer shaft end bearing area, the motor windings and the inner shaft end bearing area at the outer side of the draft inducer fan housing. A baffle structure mounted on the outer draft inducer fan housing side serves to guide the cooling air flow along the inner shaft end bearing area and shield the burner flames from disruption by the cooling air flow area after it contacts the inner shaft end bearing area.