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Picture a single moving conveyor stopping at fix points (stations) the unit then moves down to whatever is on the conveyor and then moves back to get out of the way. It's possible that it could have been designed to actually work with a moving conveyor as well to keep the flame (I think that's a given at this point) on the target while the conveyor moved.
Feel like taking that ceramic mount off and snooping around inside to see how it's constructed? What about the brass port, I don't see bolts on that but it looks like it may be threaded?
My best guess is that the circular lower lower portion with the holes was fed natural gas, I'm guessing those holes are aimed at an angle not straight up, it looks like something that had a focal, point. IF the target were small the upper portion looks like it would be a vacuum intake to suck in exhaust gas AND AMBIENT AIR. By the time the ambient and exhaust gas mixed in that ceramic module the temperature was low enough to keep the bulk of the unit from heating up.
Think of it as a pulse heater for a very small target, like maybe 1/4 inch max.
From the two new photos it appears that the darkened part is not from burning, but from some metal to ceramic contact. Small particles of the metal (like steel) rub off onto the coarse ceramic when the device is used, the ceramic acting inadvertently as a fine grinding stone. That creates the dark marks seen in the photos. It could be a rounded piece of steel like in the shape of a bearing. It looks like maybe (although the photos are not good enough to be sure) that the metal is rotated during some part of the process, unless those marks came during the storage of the device.
A guess would be it might be a jeweler's tool or a bearing tool, but it's very hard to guess. At this point at least by guessing we can try to find ways to eliminate the guesses and thus narrow down the possibilities
We assume it is something that does something, isnt that great? So we've narrowed it down ha ha.
It could also be a scam, just to see what people think it is when really it does nothing
It could also be something someone built as an experiment that didnt even ever work
Your statements make more sense to me than my previous one's of a free air target My Al. It makes more sense that the ceramic portion made physical contact, as that would make my theory that the primary reason it's ceramic is to avoid heat transfer to the main body of the assembly.
Perhaps the lower portion fitted around something much larger than the assembly blowing a natural gas torch through to heat the upper assembly which was still a vacuum assembly for exaust gasses.
It definitely created fusing/shaping heat for something. I'm going to lean towards glass forming of some kind now.
Oh, could it have been used to create the globes for vacuum/transmitter tubes? That would actually make a lot of sense, I think. The small hole in the ceramic nozzle would form the little "nub" on the top of the glass globe, and perhaps the holes in the bronze part are made to hold onto the pins (perhaps suction to pull it in the opposite direction)? Just a shot in the dark, but it'd be cool....
Derstrom, I would call if a fuser. It could have anyone of a thousand other names none of which anyone that doesn't KNOW what it is, is called. Common in industry.
There's no possible reason for a heated stream coming from the ceramic end, there's only one inlet tube it's BRASS, and no electrical contacts so plasma sputtering or anything like that seems unlikely, but this is why I want to see whats INSIDE that ceramic housing and the brass one as well. From what angle were these pictures taken from that might be hiding the one bit we need to see that defines what this does?
Like the endless flow of posts that occurs here about a great variety of topics, I will say once again, there is not enough information to solve the problem.
Nobody said the stream coming from the ceramic end was heated. Only the glass of the globe would have to be hot, and the ceramic is just there to insulate it.
But I agree, I would like to see what's inside before saying anything more
I agree that the only way to solve this is to find someone who used or built this thing. There's too many possible guesses and no way to prove any.
If it was a vac tube thing, that vac tube must have only been 1/2 inch high.
I looked around at some jeweler's tools but found nothing that requires 3d accurate motion, or even 3d inaccurate motion.
Since it has to move along three axises, it must have worked in conjunction with something else that was stationary.
Ceramic is very rigid in addition to being able to handle high heat. Might make a decent base for a scanning tunneling electron microscope with the 3d axis although somewhat accurate still being only the rough positioning system and some sort of gas to eliminate surface contamination.
Detailed structural images of the insides of the ceramic and brass ends of the business are next =)
I still have my bets hedged on those brass holes being drilled off center to form a point some fixed distance over the plate, and very curious about the internal structure of the ceramic if there is any.
It's a nice item! Expensive ground precision ballscrews for 3 axes. And precision linear bedways. It was an expensive piece of lab equipment.
My guess is that the top ceramic nozzle is a flame heater (a burner) and the bottom is an air cooling vent. It positions itself over a feature of the job, then heats it with the top burner while the bottom vent keeps the rest of the item cool enough.
So I think it is laboratory equipment for heat treatment of something fairly small, that might need to be treated to a "pattern". Maybe used for bearing race heat treatment? It could move in a small circle and treat a particular part of the bearing race?
Putting the crazy idea theme aside, could it possibly be related to the manufacture of piezoelectric disks? Specifically, the binder burnout & sintering processes?
I never quiet understood why people think this is for a really high temperature process, there's only one hose going into each of the brass/ceramic ends, generally speaking any high temperature torch setup is going to be a mixed gas and it's typically mixed in the manifold closest to the burner to avoid the possibility of feed line explosions, if either manifold had a mixing chamber it'd have two hoses going to it, I somehow doubt they'd have a single feed line of 1/4 inch of mixed gas, but I could be wrong. The ceramic isn't just good for high temperatures it's also isolates heat conduction preventing the main manifold from heating up.
Just my thoughts I still think the ceramic end is a diffuser to suck up exhaust gasses and ambient air to cool it down before it hits the main manifold body.
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