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:
Sep. 25, 2001
Filed:
Feb. 28, 2000
James A. Cunningham, St. Mary Parish, LA (US);
Other;
Abstract
A valve includes a valve ball and a convex metal valve seat ring that abut along a circle in a metal-to-metal seal. At very high contact forces, the valve ball and/or the valve seat elastically deform to increase the contact area between them and thereby lower the contact pressures applied to the valve ball and valve seat. The valve ball and valve seat are made of materials that do not pressure weld under a wide range of contact pressures. In one embodiment, the valve ball is a stainless steel alloy having a hardness of at least Rockwell 44C and the valve seat is Stellite having a hardness of at least Rockwell 50C. In another embodiment, the valve ball and seat ring are steel alloys having hardnesses above Rockwell 50C.