GB1272093A - Improvements in or relating to clothes washing and spin-drying machines - Google Patents

Abstract

1,272,093. Rotary shaft seals. BRITISH DOMESTIC APPLIANCES Ltd. 17 March, 1970 [19 March, 1969], No. 14466/69. Heading F2B. [Also in Divisions D1-D2] In a combined clothes washing and spindrying machine the arrangement for sealing the hollow driving shaft 11 of a perforated clothes drum 8 in the bottom of a liquid container 1 comprises a support tube 29 for the shaft mounted beneath the container, and a support ring 44 mounted in a liquid-tight manner in the bottom of the container as by a flexible diaphragm 52 for making sliding sealing contact with a cooperating sealing face of a sealing ring 43 secured in a liquid-tight manner to the shaft as by a flexible bellows 39, the arrangement being such that any liquid leakage between the sealing faces is directed into a drain path 29a provided at the outside of the support tube so as to prevent moisture from entering the bore of the support tube and corroding the bearing 37. The clothes drum 8, Fig. 1 (not shown), is secured to a support member in the form of a boss 27 which is clamped by bolts 34 to the shaft 11 for rotation therewith during a spin drying operation. The agitator (2) is mounted by a spider 6 on a shaft 5 which oscillates within the shaft 11 during a washing operation. A seal between the boss 27 and spider 6 is provided by a facetype seal 31 which is urged into sliding sealing contact by a spring 32 and sealed to the boss by a flexible boot 30. The support tube 29 is bolted to a resiliently-mounted frame 12 and carries the support ring 44 by means of four circumferentially-spaced ribs 45, the gaps 29a between the ribs forming the drain path for any leakage which passes through the seal 43, 44 and over the conical surface of a deflecting collar 57. In an alternative arrangement, the sealing faces of the rings 43, 44 are positioned below the top of the support tube 29.