Vacuum pump and heat insulating spacer used in vacuum pump

Abstract

Provided is a vacuum pump for preventing solidification of gas in a thread groove portion, and a heat insulating spacer used in the vacuum pump. The vacuum pump includes a heat insulating spacer that is interposed between a casing and an outer circumferential stator having a thread groove portion, supports the outer circumferential stator coaxially with a rotor in a rotor radial direction, with keeping a gap between the casing and the outer circumferential stator, and has lower thermal conductivity than the casing and the outer circumferential stator.

Claims

1. A vacuum pump, comprising: a casing; a rotor that is supported rotatably in the casing and has a rotor cylinder portion; a stator having a substantially cylindrical shape, disposed coaxially with the rotor between the casing and the rotor cylinder portion; a thread groove portion engraved on either an outer circumferential surface of the rotor cylinder portion or an inner circumferential surface of the stator; and a heat insulating spacer that is interposed between the casing and the stator, supports the stator in a rotor radial direction, with keeping a gap between the casing and the stator, and has lower thermal conductivity than at least either the casing or the stator, wherein the casing has: a cylinder portion; and a base provided under the cylinder portion, and the heat insulating spacer has: an axial supporting portion having a substantially cylindrical shape, extended along a rotor axial direction and interposed between the base and a supported portion provided circumferentially on an outer circumferential surface of the stator; a first radial supporting portion provided circumferentially on an outer circumferential surface of the axial supporting portion and coming into contact with an inner circumferential surface of the casing; and a second radial supporting portion provided circumferentially on an inner circumferential surface of the axial supporting portion and coming into contact with the outer circumferential surface of the stator, and the axial supporting portion bends in the rotor radial direction.

2. The vacuum pump according to claim 1, wherein the heat insulating spacer supports the stator also in the rotor axial direction.

3. The vacuum pump according to claim 2, wherein the first radial supporting portion is disposed on one end side of the axial supporting portion, and the second radial supporting portion is disposed on the other end side of the axial supporting portion.

4. The vacuum pump according to claim 2, wherein the axial supporting portion is formed to have lower rigidity than the first radial supporting portion.

5. The vacuum pump according to claim 2, wherein one end of the axial supporting portion is stretched farther downward from the first radial supporting portion in the rotor axial direction and comes into contact with the base.

6. The vacuum pump according to claim 1, wherein the first radial supporting portion is disposed on one end side of the axial supporting portion, and the second radial supporting portion is disposed on the other end side of the axial supporting portion.

7. The vacuum pump according to claim 6, wherein the axial supporting portion is formed to have lower rigidity than the first radial supporting portion.

8. The vacuum pump according to claim 6, wherein one end of the axial supporting portion is stretched farther downward from the first radial supporting portion in the rotor axial direction and comes into contact with the base.

9. The vacuum pump according to claim 1, wherein the axial supporting portion is formed to have lower rigidity than the first radial supporting portion.

10. The vacuum pump according to claim 9, wherein one end of the axial supporting portion is stretched farther downward from the first radial supporting portion in the rotor axial direction and comes into contact with the base.

11. The vacuum pump according to claim 1, wherein one end of the axial supporting portion is stretched farther downward from the first radial supporting portion in the rotor axial direction and comes into contact with the base.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

(1) FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view showing a vacuum pump according to an embodiment of the present invention;

(2) FIG. 2 is a diagram of a heat insulating spacer shown in FIG. 1, wherein FIG. 2A is a plan view, FIG. 2B a cross-sectional view taken along IIB of FIG. 2A, and FIG. 2C an enlarged cross-sectional view showing substantial portions of FIG. 2B;

(3) FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram for explaining the actions of the heat insulating spacer of the vacuum pump shown in FIG. 1, wherein FIG. 3A is a diagram showing a state obtained prior to thermal expansion of an outer circumferential stator, and FIG. 3B a diagram showing a stat obtained after thermal expansion of the outer circumferential stator; and

(4) FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing assemblage of a casing and a stator that is applied to a conventional vacuum pump.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

(5) In order to achieve the object of preventing solidification of gas in a thread groove portion, the present invention was realized by a vacuum pump that has: a casing; a rotor that is supported rotatably in the casing and has a rotor cylinder portion; a stator having a substantially cylindrical shape, disposed coaxially with the rotor between the casing and the rotor cylinder portion; a thread groove portion engraved on either an outer circumferential surface of the rotor cylinder portion or an inner circumferential surface of the stator; and a heat insulating spacer that is interposed between the casing and the stator, supports the stator in a rotor radial direction, with keeping a gap between the casing and the stator, and has lower thermal conductivity than at least either the casing or the stator.

(6) In order to achieve the object of preventing solidification of gas in the thread groove portion, the present invention was realized by a heat insulating spacer that is used in a vacuum pump having: a casing; a rotor that is supported rotatably in the casing and has a rotor cylinder portion; a stator having a substantially cylindrical shape, disposed coaxially with the rotor between the casing and the rotor cylinder portion; and a thread groove portion engraved on either an outer circumferential surface of the rotor cylinder portion or an inner circumferential surface of the stator, wherein the heat insulating spacer is interposed between the casing and the stator, supports the stator in a rotor radial direction, with keeping a gap between the casing and the stator, and has lower thermal conductivity than the casing and the stator.

Embodiments

(7) A vacuum pump according to a first embodiment of the present invention is described hereinafter with reference to FIGS. 1 to 3. In the following description, such terms as top/upper and bottom/lower correspond to the upper side and the lower side in a vertical direction.

(8) A vacuum pump 1 is a combination pump comprising a turbomolecular pump mechanism PA and a thread groove pump mechanism PB, which are stored in a substantially cylindrical casing 10.

(9) The vacuum pump 1 has the casing 10, a rotor 20 having a rotor shaft 21 supported rotatably in the casing 10, a drive motor 30 for rotating the rotor shaft 21, and a stator column 40 for storing a part of the rotor shaft 21 and the drive motor 30.

(10) The casing 10 is formed into a bottomed cylinder. The casing 10 is configured with a base 11 having a gas outlet port 11a on the side of a lower portion thereof, and a cylinder portion 12 having a gas inlet port 12a in an upper portion thereof and mounted and fixed onto the base 11 by a bolt 13. Note that reference numeral 14 shown in FIG. 1 represents a back lid.

(11) The base 11 has a heater, not shown, which is embedded in the base 11. The heater keeps the temperature of the base 11 at a predetermined temperature (e.g., 80 C.) by means of temperature adjusting means, not shown.

(12) The cylinder portion 12 is attached to a vacuum container such as a chamber, not shown, with a flange 12b therebetween. The gas inlet port 12a is connected to the vacuum container, and the gas outlet port 11a is connected in a communicable manner to an auxiliary pump, not shown.

(13) The rotor 20 has the rotor shaft 21 and rotor blades 22 that are fixed to an upper portion of the rotor shaft 21 and arranged concentrically with respect to the shaft center of the rotor shaft 21.

(14) The rotor shaft 21 is supported in a non-contact manner by a magnetic hearing 50. The magnetic bearing 50 has a radial electromagnet 51 and an axial electromagnet 52. The radial electromagnet 51 and the axial electromagnet 52 are connected to a control unit, not shown.

(15) The control unit controls excitation currents of the radial electromagnet 51 and the axial electromagnet 52 based on detection values obtained by a radial direction displacement sensor 51a and an axial direction displacement sensor 52a, whereby the rotor shaft 21 is supported afloat at a predetermined position.

(16) The upper and lower portions of the rotor shaft 21 are inserted into touchdown bearings 23. When the rotor shaft 21 is uncontrollable, the rotor shaft 21, rotating at high speed, comes into contact with the touchdown bearings 23, preventing damage to the vacuum pump 1.

(17) The rotor blades 22 are attached integrally to the rotor shaft 21 by inserting bolts 25 into a rotor flange 26 and screwing the bolts 25 into a shaft flange 27 while having the upper portion of the rotor shaft 21 inserted into a boss hole 24. Hereinafter, the axial direction of the rotor shaft 21 is referred to as rotor axial direction A of the rotor 20, and the radial direction of the rotor shaft 21 is referred to as rotor radial direction R of the rotor 20.

(18) The drive motor 30 is configured with a rotator 31 attached to the outer circumference of the rotor shaft 21 and a stationary part 32 surrounding the rotator 31. The stationary part 32 is connected to the abovementioned control unit, not shown, which controls the rotation of the rotor 20.

(19) The stator column 40 is placed on the base 11 and has a lower end portion fixed to the base 11 by a bolt 41.

(20) The turbomolecular pump mechanism PA that is disposed in approximately the upper half of the vacuum pump 1 is described next.

(21) The turbomolecular pump mechanism PA is configured with the rotor blades 22 of the rotor 20 and stator blades 60 disposed with gaps with the rotor blades 22. The rotor blades 22 and the stator blades 60 are arranged alternately in multiple stages along a vertical direction H. In the present embodiment, five stages of the rotor blades 22 and four stages of the stator blades 60 are arranged.

(22) The rotor blades 22 are inclined at a predetermined angle and formed integrally on an upper outer circumferential surface of the rotor 20. The plurality of the rotor blades 22 are also installed radially around the axis of the rotor 20.

(23) The stator blades 60 are inclined in the opposite direction from the rotor blades 22 and each sandwiched, in the vertical direction H, by spacers 61 that are installed in a stacked manner on an inner wall surface of the cylinder portion 12. The plurality of stator blades 60, too, are installed radially around the axis of the rotor 20.

(24) The gaps between the rotor blades 22 and the stator blades 60 are configured to become gradually narrow from the upper side to the lower side in the vertical direction H. The lengths of the rotor blades 22 and the stator blades 60 are configured to become gradually short from the upper side to the lower side in the vertical direction H.

(25) In the turbomolecular pump mechanism PA described above, gas that is drawn through the gas inlet port 12a is transferred from the upper side to the lower side in the vertical direction H by means of the rotation of the rotor blades 22.

(26) The thread groove pump mechanism PB that is disposed in approximately the lower half of the vacuum pump 1 is described next.

(27) The thread groove pump mechanism PB has a rotor cylinder portion 28 provided in the lower portion of the rotor 20 and extended along the vertical direction H, a substantially cylindrical outer circumferential stator 70 surrounding an outer circumferential surface 28a of the rotor cylinder portion 28, and a substantially cylindrical inner circumferential stator 80 disposed on the inside of the rotor cylinder portion 28.

(28) The outer circumferential surface 28a and an inner circumferential surface 28b of the rotor cylinder portion 28 are each formed into a flat cylindrical surface. The outer circumferential surface 28a of the rotor cylinder portion 28 faces an inner circumferential surface 70a of the outer circumferential stator 70 with a predetermined gap therebetween, the inner circumferential surface 70a being configured as an opposing surface to oppose the outer circumferential surface 28a of the rotor cylinder portion 28. The inner circumferential surface 28b of the rotor cylinder portion 28 faces an outer circumferential surface 80a of the inner circumferential stator 80 with a predetermined gap therebetween, the outer circumferential surface 80a being configured as an opposing surface to oppose the inner circumferential surface 28b of the rotor cylinder portion 28.

(29) The outer circumferential stator 70 is placed on the base 11, with a heat insulating spacer 90 described hereinafter therebetween, and is also fixed to the base 11 by a bolt, not shown. The outer circumferential stator 70 has an outer circumferential thread groove portion 71 engraved on the inner circumferential surface 70a. The outer circumferential stator 70 has a small-diameter cylinder portion 72 that is stored in the base 11 by means of an insert, and a large-diameter cylinder portion 73 that is stored in the cylinder portion 12 by means of an insert.

(30) The inner circumferential stator 80 is fixed to the base 11 by bolts 15. The inner circumferential stator 80 has an inner circumferential thread groove portion 81 engraved on the outer circumferential surface 80a.

(31) In the thread groove pump mechanism PB described above, the gas that is transferred from the gas inlet port 12a to the lower side in the vertical direction H is compressed by the drag effect of high-speed rotation of the rotor cylinder portion 28 and is then transferred toward the gas outlet port 11a.

(32) Specifically, the gas is compressed in the outer circumferential thread groove portion 71 and then transferred to the gas outlet port 11a after being transferred to the gap between the rotor cylinder portion 28 and the outer circumferential stator 70, or is compressed by the inner circumferential thread groove portion 81 and then transferred to the gas outlet port 11a after being transferred to the gap between the rotor cylinder portion 28 and the inner circumferential stator 80 via a communication hole 29.

(33) A specific configuration of the heat insulating spacer 90 is described next with reference to FIGS. 2A, 2B and 2C.

(34) The heat insulating spacer 90 is made of stainless steel and has thermal conductivity that is lower than those of the aluminum casing 10 and the outer circumferential stator 70. The specific material of the heat insulating spacer 90 may be any material as long as it has thermal conductivity lower than that of the outer circumferential stator 70 or the base 11. Preferably, the material of the heat insulating spacer 90 has thermal conductivity lower than those of the outer circumferential stator 70 and the base 11.

(35) The heat insulating spacer 90 has an axial supporting portion 91 having a substantially cylindrical shape, a first radial supporting portion 92 provided circumferentially on an outer circumferential surface 91a of the axial supporting portion 91, and a second radial supporting portion 93 provided circumferentially on an inner circumferential surface 91b of the axial supporting portion 91.

(36) The axial supporting portion 91 extends along the axial direction matching the rotor axial direction A. The axial supporting portion 91 is made thinner than the first radial supporting portion 92 and less rigid than the first radial supporting portion 92.

(37) The first radial supporting portion 92 is disposed on the lower end side of the axial supporting portion 91 and extends from the outer circumferential surface 91a in a flange-like manner. Note that the first radial supporting portion 92 is preferably disposed with a small gap with a lower end 91c of the axial supporting portion 91. Such a configuration brings the heat insulating spacer 90 and the base 11 into contact with each other by a reduced area. In other words, the area of contact between the first radial supporting portion 92 and the base 11 is small because a part of the first radial supporting portion 92 comes into contact with the base 11, preventing the escape of heat from the heat insulating spacer 90 to the base 11.

(38) The second radial supporting portion 93 is disposed on the upper end side of the axial supporting portion 91. In the present embodiment, the second radial supporting portion 93 is provided upright on the inner circumferential surface 91b at the upper end of the axial supporting portion 91. The length of the second radial supporting portion 93 is set within the range that enables securing of a gap G between the base 11 and the small-diameter cylinder portion 72, as described hereinafter.

(39) The actions of the heat insulating spacer 90 entailed in thermal expansion and enlargement of the outer circumferential stator 70 are described next with reference to FIGS. 3A and 3B. For the purpose of enabling easy understanding of the features of the present application, FIGS. 3A and 3B each exaggeratedly illustrate the length of the second radial supporting portion 93.

(40) As shown in FIG. 3A, with the gap G provided between the base 11 of the casing 10 and the small-diameter cylinder portion 72 of the outer circumferential stator 70, the first radial supporting portion 92 is in contact with an inner circumferential surface 10a of the casing 10, and the second radial supporting portion 93 is in contact with an outer circumferential surface 72a of the small-diameter cylinder portion 72. Thus, the outer circumferential stator 70, positioned coaxially with the rotor 20, is stored in the casing 10 by means of an insert.

(41) The axial supporting portion 91 is held between a bottom surface 73a of the large-diameter cylinder portion 73 functioning as a supported portion of the outer circumferential stator 70 and a top surface 11b of the base 11, to support the outer circumferential stator 70 in the rotor axial direction A. Note that the axial supporting portion 91 is in the shape of a straight line along the rotor axial direction A prior to running the vacuum pump 1.

(42) Once the vacuum pump 1 is run, the heat generated by the rotor 20 and the drive motor 30 increases the temperature of the rotor cylinder portion 28 (e.g., 130 C.). As a result, the outer circumferential stator 70 receives the heat radiated from the rotor cylinder portion 28, has its temperature increased gradually, and begins to thermally expand toward the outside along the rotor radial direction R.

(43) Once the outer circumferential stator 70 is thermally expanded and enlarged, the second radial supporting portion 93 receives outer pressing force of the rotor radial direction R and, as shown in FIG. 3B, the axial supporting portion 91 bends toward the outside in the rotor radial direction R, with the first radial supporting portion 92 as a supporting point. Before and after the thermal expansion of the outer circumferential stator 70, the second radial supporting portion 93 continues to support the outer circumferential stator 70 in the rotor radial direction R, keeping the outer circumferential stator 70 disposed coaxially with the rotor 20.

(44) When the second radial supporting portion 93 bends toward the outside in the rotor radial direction R, the presence of the gap G between the base 11 and the outer circumferential stator 70 can prevent a significant decrease in the thermal resistance on the contact surface between the casing 10 and the outer circumferential stator 70, which can be caused when the outer circumferential stator 70 adheres tightly to the base 11 at high contact pressure. Consequently, the heat of the outer circumferential stator 70 can be prevented from escaping to the casing 10 via the heat insulating spacer 90.

(45) Moreover, because the thermal conductivity of the heat insulating spacer 90 is set to be lower than those of the casing 10 and the outer circumferential stator 70, the heat from the outer circumferential stator 70 is less likely to enter the heat insulating spacer 90, preventing the escape of heat of the outer circumferential stator 70.

(46) In addition, by forming the heat insulating spacer 90 to have a roughly L-shaped cross section, the heat transfer path inside the heat insulating spacer 90 can be lengthened, further preventing the escape of the heat from the outer circumferential stator 70 to the casing 10.

(47) Therefore, in the vacuum pump where, for example, the temperature of the base 11 is controlled to 80 C. and the temperature of the rotor 20 is increased to at least 130 C., if the outer circumferential stator is stored in the casing while in direct contact therewith as in the prior art, there would be a risk that the temperature of the outer circumferential stator drops to 100 C. to fall below the sublimation point of the gas, but if the outer circumferential stator 70 is stored in the casing 10 with the heat insulating spacer 90 therebetween, the temperature of the outer circumferential stator 70 would be stable at approximately 110 C. or higher and therefore kept at the sublimation point of the gas or higher.

(48) In this manner, the heat insulating spacer 90 according to the present embodiment prevents the heat from the outer circumferential stator 70 from escaping to the casing 10 while supporting the outer circumferential stator 70 in the casing 10 in the rotor radial direction R. Accordingly, the temperature of the outer circumferential stator 70 can easily be kept at not lower than the sublimation point of the gas transferred through the outer circumferential thread groove portion 71, preventing the solidification and deposition of the gas in the outer circumferential thread groove portion 71.

(49) Although the outer circumferential thread groove portion is provided on the inner circumferential surface of the outer circumferential stator in the foregoing embodiment, the outer circumferential thread groove portion may be provided on the outer circumferential surface of the rotor cylinder portion.

(50) However, the present invention can be applied to any vacuum pump equipped with the thread groove pump mechanism and is therefore applicable to thread groove-type pumps in addition to combination pumps.

(51) It should be noted that the present invention can be modified in various ways without departing from the spirit of the present invention, and that needless to say the present invention contains all such modifications.

(52) Although the subject matter has been described in language specific to structural features and/or methodological acts, it is to be understood that the subject matter defined in the appended claims is not necessarily limited to the specific features or acts described above. Rather, the specific features and acts described above are described as example forms of implementing the claims.