Actively cooled heat protective shield

Claim 1

An actively cooled shield for protecting a wall from a source of heat comprising, in combination: a series of parallel equally spaced cooling pipes having a predetermined outside diameter secured to said wall on the surface thereof facing the source of heat and adapted for connection to a coolant system, and a plurality of protective element bodies associated with and removably supported on said cooling pipes, each formed of a heat-resistant material and having side edges, top and bottom edges, a front surface which faces the source of heat and a back surface which is parallel to the front surface, and a width substantially equal to said spacing between said cooling pipes, and having formed in its back surface a generally cylindrical recess having a diameter larger than the outside diameter of said cooling pipes which extends between its top and bottom edges, equidistant from its side edges, in which a cooling pipe is received with sliding fit, the center axis of said recess being spaced inwardly from said back surface a distance selected to cause the interior cylindrical portion of the recess to engage an arcuate portion of the exterior surface of a respective cooling pipe throughout an angular range from about 210° to about 300°.