GB1080165A - Improvements relating to the continuous treatment of strip or sheet material - Google Patents

Abstract

To minimize leakage from a treatment chamber through which strip or sheet material, e.g. strip metal 3, is continuously passed and which is supplied with a gaseous medium at a pressure above atmospheric, the material inlet and outlet openings in the chamber are provided with sealing <PICT:1080165/C6-C7/1> <PICT:1080165/C6-C7/2> enclosures 13 and 14 supplied with gaseous fluid at a pressure at least equal to that of the gaseous medium. The strip metal 3 passes first through a heating chamber 1 and then through a cooling chamber 2. Each chamber is divided into upper and lower chambers 6, 7 between which the strip passes and gaseous medium supplied to the chambers by fans 9, 10 and 19 flows through apertures in the walls adjacent the strip (as indicated by the arrows, Fig.3) to floatingly support the strip. The enclosures 13 and 14 are divided into upper and lower compartments supplied by fans 15 with gaseous fluid whose pressure is controlled by dampers 17 and which passes through apertures in the walls of the compartments adjacent to the strip to oppose leakage of gaseous medium from the chambers 1 and 2. The medium supplied to the chamber 1 may be heated by a heater 18 and that supplied to the chamber 2 may be recirculated as at 20. The gaseous medium may be of a non-oxidizing nature and the gaseous fluid may be air or may be the same as the gaseous medium.