Ventilation is important in livestock raising barns in general and hog barns in particular. Ventilation chimneys typically with an associated fan are used to exhaust air from the barns. Generally these chimneys are assembled from prefabricated sections.
Currently sections are made from rotary molded “rotomolded” plastic tubes, and from a plastic sheet welded longitudinally to form a tube. As the chimneys ventilate to the outside air, they tend to ice up in winter. Sometimes chimneys are insulated after installation in the barn attic to overcome the icing problem. Some sections are formed from inner and outer tubes welded longitudinally from plastic sheets, and spaced at the ends by a circular spacer typically ¼ inch thick.
None of these solutions are particularly satisfactory, although better than no ventilation.
The invention is directed to a method of forming an insulated chimney section by forming inner and outer tubes by welding plastic sheets to form tubes, inserting a sheet of insulation formed into a tube between inner and outer tubes, and attaching a male coupling at one end and a female coupling at the other. The male and female couplings are adapted to engage matingly. The invention is also directed to chimney sections manufactured by the method and chimneys constructed from the sections.
Although the invention is described with respect to methods of manufacture of chimney section by welding plastic sheets into inner and outer tubes and inserting a sheet of insulation between the inner and outer tubes and attaching male and female coupling s at the ends, sections manufactured by the method and chimneys constructed from the sections, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the invention is not limited to the method of manufacture, sections and chimneys, but extend to similar methods, sections and chimneys.
It is a principal object of the invention to provide a chimney section having plastic inner and outer tubes separated by insulation. It is a subsidiary object of the invention to provide a chimney section having male and female couplings fitted into the space between the inner and outer tubes. It is a further principal object of the invention to form a chimney section by welding a plastic sheet to form an outer tube and welding another plastic sheet to form an inner tube, and to insert the inner tube inside the outer tube and slide a sheet of insulation material having touching edges between the inner and outer tubes. It is a further object of the invention to insert a male coupling at one end of the section fitting between the inner and outer tubes and to insert a female coupling at the other end of the section fitting between the inner and outer tubes. Other objects will be apparent to those skilled in the art from the following specification, accompanying drawings and appended claims.