2013 Volume 85 Issue 1 Pages 32-37
Crucible furnaces are widely used for melting and holding metals in the non-ferrous foundry industry. Although the crucible furnace has various advantages, it has also the disadvantage of lower thermal efficiency. This disadvantage can be improved by the thermal reuse of combustion exhaust gas. However, higher thermal efficiency of the melting crucible itself has yet to be achieved. In this study on the development of a new crucible, the aim was to increase the thermal efficiency of the crucible by 9 to 13% compared with conventional melting crucibles by applying vertical grooves around the outer crucible surface which increases the thermal exchange surface area by 30%. We also performed investigations on the physical properties of the developed crucible and microscopic analysis of the melting crucible material in order to clarify the destruction mechanism of the crucible.
