Apparatus and method for treating and/or cleaning of objects, particularly circuit boards

Claim 1

In an apparatus for one of treating, cleaning and treating and cleaning an object having a width B, especially a circuit board, with a flood flow of a fluid, said apparatus comprising means for moving said object along a path through said apparatus in a workpiece feed direction and at least one flood flow device having a length L and two opposing longitudinal sides positioned along said path, the improvement wherein each of said flood flow devices is located above said path to reduce apparatus expense and minimize assembly cost, and further comprising a fluid damming means contacting said path on each of said opposing longitudinal sides of each of said flood flow devices to define a fluid pool region above said path so that in operation a fluid pool arises in said fluid pool region between each of said flood flow devices and said fluid damming means for said flood flow device, and wherein said flood flow device comprises a plurality of fluid feed pipes, a fluid receiving chamber of a larger diameter than that of said fluid feed pipes, said fluid receiving chamber being connected to the feed pipes so as to be able to receive fluid therefrom, a perforated mask located downstream from the feed pipes in the receiving chamber, said perforated mask being provided with a plurality of through-going holes, and a distributor chamber provided with a single outlet mouth located downstream of the perforated mask, said distributor chamber with said outlet mouth and said path defining a flooded space for fluid adjacent said path, and the fluid receiving chamber, the distributor chamber, the outlet mouth and the flooded space extending over the entire length L of the flood flow device, said plurality of feed pipes connected with the fluid receiving chamber also being distributed over the entire length L and the holes of said perforated mask being distributed over the entire length L of the flood flow device, wherein the length L of the flood flow device is approximately at least equal to the width B of the object.