Static structures (e.g. – buildings) – Composite prefabricated panel including adjunctive means – Sandwich or hollow with sheet-like facing members
Reexamination Certificate
2000-03-21
2002-01-22
Callo, Laura A. (Department: 3635)
Static structures (e.g., buildings)
Composite prefabricated panel including adjunctive means
Sandwich or hollow with sheet-like facing members
C052S788100, C052S309140, C428S034000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06339909
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a spacer profile for a spacer frame to be mounted in the marginal area of an insulating window unit, by forming an intermediate space between the panes, with a chamber for receiving hygroscopic materials and with at least one contact web resting on a pane inside on at least one side of the chamber, which is connected with the chamber via a bridge section.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
In the sense of the invention, the panes of the insulating window unit are normally glass panes of inorganic or organic glass, without limiting the invention. The panes can be coated or finished in any other way, in order to impart to the insulating window unit special functions, such as increased heat insulating or sound insulating capabilities.
The most important tasks of spacer frames are to space apart the panes of an insulating window units, to insure the mechanical strength of the unit and to protect the space between the panes from external influences. Primarily in insulating window units with high heat insulation, special attention has to be paid to the heat transmission characteristics of the peripheral connection, including the spacer frame and the spacer profiles or frame limbs constituting the same. It has been frequently proven that use of the conventional metallic spacers resulted in a reduction of the heat insulating properties of an insulating window unit. The reduced heat insulation effect appears clearly in the area of the peripheral connection, in the formation of condensation water at the margin of the inner pane at low external temperatures. There are general attempts to eliminate such formation of condensation water even at low external temperatures by keeping the temperature in the area of the peripheral connection at the inner pane as high as possible. Developments in this direction are known under the term of “warm edge” techniques.
In addition to metallic spacer profiles, for quite a long time spacer profiles of plastic materials have been used, thus taking advantage of the low heat conductivity of these materials. However plastic spacer profiles have the disadvantage that they can be bent only with considerable effort or not at all for the production of spacer frames made in one piece. Therefore plastic profiles are cut into straight bars to the size of the respective insulating window unit and interconnected to form a spacer frame by means of several corner brackets. Compared to metal, as a rule such plastic materials also have a low diffusion tightness. Therefore in the case of plastic spacers special measures have to be taken insuring that air humidity existing in the surroundings does not penetrate the intermediate space between the panes to the extent that it depletes the absorption capability of the drying agents normally provided in the spacer profiles, impairing the function of the insulating window unit.
Furthermore a spacer profile has also to prevent the filling gases in the intermediate pane space, such as argon, krypton, xenon, sulfur hexafluoride from escaping. Conversely, nitrogen, oxygen etc. contained in the outer atmosphere should not penetrate the intermediate pane space. Diffusion tightness it applies to vapor diffusion tightness, as well as to gas diffusion tightness for the mentioned gases.
In order to improve the vapor diffusion tightness, DE 33 02 659 A1 proposes to provide a plastic spacer profile with a vapor barrier, by applying a thin metal foil or a metalized plastic foil to the plastic profile on its surface which in assembled state faces away from the space between the panes. This metal foil has to span across the intermediate pane space as completely as possible, insuring the desired vapor barrier effect. The disadvantage here is that the metal foil creates a path of high heat conductivity from one pane of the insulating widow unit to the other. This considerably reduces the effect intended by using a plastic material for the profiles, namely the reduction of heat conductivity of the peripheral connection.
Other spacer profiles, for instance the ones which meet the aforementioned “warm-edge” conditions, use special stainless steels, which in comparison to other metals have a lower heat conductivity, for profile materials. Examples are mentioned in “Glaswelt” 6/1995, pages 152-155. The spacer frames made thereof consist of one piece and are closed at all corners.
A spacer profile of the kind mentioned at the outset is known from DE 78 31 818 U1. The contact webs, there named flanks, to be connected via a sealing adhesive with the panes of the insulating window unit, form the force application points for a specially designed tool fixing the contact webs during bending. The spacer profile is made in one piece of the same material, presumably a metal, which can be bent at right angles obviously only by means of the indicated procedure. Indications as to heat insulation or even measures for improving the heat insulation can not be found in the publication.
OBJECT OF THE INVENTION
It is the object of the present invention to provide a spacer profile which can be produced on a large scale and at low cost, with high heat insulating characteristics, whereby from such a spacer profile it should be possible to make a one-piece spacer frame, so that when cold or only slightly warmed, the profile will be bendable in such a manner as to avoid deformation. The spacer profile should also be advantageously in a position to permit to a limited extent relative motions of the glass panes as a result of inner pressure or shearing strain.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
This object is achieved with a spacer profile in which the profile corpus of the spacer profile is formed by an elastically-plastically deformable material with low heat conductivity and at least the contact web is firmly materially connected with a deformable reinforcement layer.
The profile corpus comprises volumwise the main part of the spacer profile and imparts to the same its cross section profile. It comprises especially the chamber walls, the bridge sections, as well as the contact webs.
Elastically-plastically deformable materials are materials wherein after the bending process elastic restoring forces become active, which is typically the case of plastic materials as to which one part of the bending occurs through a plastic, irreversible deformation.
Plastically deformable materials comprise such materials wherein after deformation practically no elastic restoring forces are active, such as is typical for metals bent beyond their apparent yielding point.
The term “materially connected” means that the profile corpus and the plastically deformable layer are permanently connected to each other, for instance through coextrusion of the profile body with the plastically deformable layer, or by separately laminating the plastically deformable layer on it, optionally by means of a bonding agent, or by similar techniques.
Materials with poor heat conductivity or heat-insulating materials are materials which with respect to metals have a clearly reduced heat conduction value, i.e. heat conduction reduced at least by a factor of 10. The heat conduction values &lgr;are typically of the order of magnitude of 5 W/(m·K) and below, preferably smaller than 1 W/(m·K) and even more preferred smaller than 0.3 W/(m·K).
Surprisingly it has been found that already by reinforcing only the contact webs of the spacer profile made of elastically-plastically deformable material with a plastically deformable reinforcement layer, a good cold bendability of the profile can be achieved. The so-formed sandwich composite produces a high bending resistance moment with the characteristics of the plastic materials and the profile contour. This however results in higher bending forces, but insures only minimal resilience in the bent state, as well as high corner rigidity and yields stiff, and easy to handle spacer frames. The elastic restoring force of the profile body material can therefore act only minimally.
The layer thickness of the reinforcement layer depends on the pr
Brunnhofer Erwin
Goer Bernhard
Regelmann Jürgen
Callo Laura A.
Technoform Caprano + Brunnhofer oHG
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