Abstract: A driving agent vacuum pump configured as a micropump is presented. The vacuum pump includes an evaporation chamber and a pumping chamber, which are separated by a jet arrangement. The jet arrangement includes a planar arrangement of at least one jet running vertically in depth between two plates. The two plates cover the evaporation chamber and the pumping chamber about the jet arrangement. An opening is provided in the pumping chamber above the jet arrangement for taking in an agent to be pumped. A second opening is provided for driving out a compressed gas below the jet arrangement. A connection is provided between the evaporation chamber and the pumping chamber through which a condensed driving agent is returned.

Abstract: A processing system utilizing a supercritical fluid for treating a substrate is described as having a pump for recirculating the supercritical fluid over the substrate. For various applications in supercritical fluid processing, the fluid temperature for the treatment process can elevate above the temperature acceptable for safe operation of the pump. Therefore, in accordance with one embodiment, a fraction of supercritical fluid from the primary recirculating flow of supercritical fluid over the substrate is circulated from the pressure side of the pump, through a heat exchanger to lower the temperature of the supercritical fluid, through the pump, and it is returned to the primary flow on the suction side of the pump. In accordance with yet another embodiment, supercritical fluid is circulated through the pump from an independent source to vent.

Abstract: This invention discloses improvements on previous inventions for catalytic conversion of coal and steam to methane. The disclosed improvements permit conversion of petroleum residua or heavy crude petroleum to methane and carbon dioxide such that nearly all of the heating value of the converted hydrocarbons is recovered as heating value of the product methane. The liquid feed is distributed over a fluidized solid particulate catalyst containing alkali metal and carbon as petroleum coke at elevated temperature and pressure from the lower stage and transported to the upper stage of a two-stage reactor. Particulate solids containing carbon and alkali metal are circulated between the two stages. Superheated steam and recycled hydrogen and carbon monoxide are fed to the lower stage, fluidizing the particulate solids and gasifying some of the carbon. The gas phase from the lower stage passes through the upper stage, completing the reaction of the gas phase.

Abstract: A vapor jet vacuum pump includes a housing having an inlet port and a foreline conduit, a vapor jet assembly within the housing, a vapor source for supplying a vapor to the vapor jet assembly, and at least one ejector stage. The ejector stage includes an ejector nozzle mounted in the foreline conduit and a fluid inlet located external to the housing and coupled by an ejector conduit to the ejector nozzle. The fluid inlet may be an air inlet for drawing in air at atmospheric pressure. The ejector stage may be driven by a backing pump coupled to the foreline conduit.

Abstract: A diffusion pump is provided with an outer body and a chimney positioned within the outer body. A top cap is positioned about the top of the chimney to form an annular passageway (or an annular array of passageways) therebetween. A guard ring is positioned generally above the top cap. Coolers cool the outer body and the guard ring and working fluid present in the base of the outer body is heated to cause evaporated oil to pass up the chimney. A baffle, substantially thermally isolated from the guard ring, is contained within the outer body.

Abstract: A high vacua diffusion pump for use in a vacuum system including a chamber to be evacuated and a positive displacement pump. The diffusion pump includes a pump body structure having an open upper end and a closed lower end. A boiler and jet assembly is yieldably supported within the pump body and produces jet streams that impel the residual air molecules through the exit port. A ceramic heat break having a labyrinth passage therethrough positively separates the temperature of the condensing wall surface from the boiler temperature. A cooling system permits selective rapid cooling of the boiler and is openable to permit rapid re-heating of the boiler. In one embodiment, the pump includes a room temperature condensing surface, and in another embodiment a non-room temperature condensing surface is provided.

Abstract: A counterflow helium mass spectrometer leak detector in which a helium sample passes in a reverse direction through a diffusion pump to a mass spectrometer for measurement. The diffusion pump includes a conventional foreline and a second foreline provided with an ejector stage. A test sample is coupled from a test port through a bypass valve to the conventional foreline in a high sensitivity mode and is coupled to the second foreline in a low sensitivity mode. In the low sensitivity mode, the bypass valve is closed. An apertured control plate in the diffusion pump controls the relative reverse rates of duffusion from each foreline to the diffusion pump inlet by controlling the rates of vapor flow an annular pumping stages and to the ejector stage. The ejector stage includes a nozzle for directing a stream of vapor into the second foreline so as to inhibit flow of helium into the diffusion pump and establish a lower reverse diffusion rate at the second foreline.

Abstract: An improved vacuum diffusion pump is shown. The pump consists of the conventional elements of a pump body with inlet and outlet ports, a vaporizer, a vapor jet assembly such as a vapor chimney within the pump body and cooling means associated with the outer walls of the pump body. A fan is positioned between the top of the vapor chimney and the inlet port of the diffusion pump. When rotated, the fan drives oil vapors "backstreaming" from the pump body downwardly into and against the walls of the pump body. The fan may be driven by external means but preferably is driven by a turbine positioned in or near the vapor chimney and attached to either an axial shaft supported within the chimney or directly to the fan itself. The turbine is driven by the fast moving oil vapors and in turn drives the shaft or directly rotates the fan. A cap for the chimney may also be fixed to the shaft and rotated therewith, thereby imparting a tangential flow to vapors passing out of the chimney.

Abstract: A diffusion pump, particularly adapted to pump light gases at a constant rate, includes a flow path for condensate from a cool wall of a body assembly to a region substantially in the center of a liquid pool of vaporizable diffusion pump liquid. Heat to vaporize the liquid in the pool is applied to a peripheral side wall of the pool so that vapor rises from the periphery of the pool to a jet assembly, from which the vapor is emitted through nozzles against the cool wall. The jet and body assemblies are mounted on a shelf above the surface of the pool and are substantially thermally isolated from a heat source for the pool. A fore line includes a plurality of baffle plates that are substantially thermally isolated from the cool wall by a vacuum space. The baffle plates are warm enough to boil away substantially all high vapor pressure materials contacting them, yet cool enough to condense the diffusion pump fluid vapor that contacts them, whereby the condensed vapors in the fore line flow back to the pool.

Abstract: A cryopump having a generally axially symmetrical housing provided at one end with an entrance opening defined by a plane for passage of molecules of the gas to be pumped and plates defining condensation surfaces arranged to be brought to low temperature for condensation of molecules of the gas to be pumped, and a thermal radiation shield disposed in the region of the entrance opening, with the condensation surfaces being oriented substantially at right angles to the plane of the entrance opening and the radiation shield being composed of a plurality of elongate metal strips so positioned that their longitudinal axes are parallel to the condensation surfaces.

Abstract: A vacuum diffusion pump includes a body assembly fabricated from a single piece of deep drawn sheet metal whereby a cylindrical wall of the body assembly, a flange for connecting the diffusion pump to a vacuum chamber, and a floor for a pool of diffusion pump fluid are all formed from the single piece of sheet metal. A boiler for heating the fluid to a vapor includes a cylindrical heating surface centrally located in the pool and extending axially from the bottom surface of the pool. The heating surface is surrounded by a separator tube having openings close to the bottom of the pool so that liquid in the pool enters an annular space between the separator and heating surface close to the bottom of the pool and rises in the annular space while being heated to vaporization. A solid heat insulator is located in another annular space between a cup and the exterior of a segment of the body wall that confines the pool and the exterior of the floor.

Abstract: In a vacuum system a baffle-valve acts first as a baffle to reduce the backstreaming of a diffusion pump fluid into the main vacuum chamber being evacuated and secondly it can be used as a valve to provide complete isolation between the diffusion pump and the vacuum chamber. This enables the chamber to be open for service work while the diffusion pump is kept operating for rapid pump down. The foregoing dual use of the baffle/valve increases pumping efficiency because of higher conductance.

Abstract: A steam flow vacuum pump has a grooved cylindrical pump body surrounded by a housing having a radius slightly greater than the pump body and a high-power ventilator pulsating the air in the housing. The housing is provided with vents on the opposite side to the ventilator. The swirling flow of the air causes a great cooling of the pump body.