Abstract: Swirl tube separator for separating solids from a gas-solid containing feed comprising a tubular housing, an inlet for introducing a gas-solids mixture at one end of said housing, a solids outlet opening at the opposite end of said housing, and a co-axial positioned tubular gas outlet conduit placed at an end of said housing, wherein along the axis of the tubular housing a vortex extender pin is present.

Abstract: In a device for storage and dispensing of equally shaped discs or disc-shaped elements mounted in one or more piles having a center bore and contained in a housing or frame in which threaded spindles are positioned (parallel to each other and the axis of the pile) around the piled discs with the outer rim of the disk lying inside the grooves of the threaded spindles so that the discs move along the pile axis by synchronously turning the spindles and having a manipulator to feed in or release a disc into a desired position, the improvement characterized in that the threaded spindles have a region or two regions in which the threads of the spindle vary in pitch and preferably also in diameter. This is achieved in case of a single-pile by increasing the pitch and the outer diameter of the thread of the spindles in the center region compared to the rest of the spindle, whereas for the two-pile version the end portions of the spindles vary in pitch and outer diameter. The core diameter is always constant.