Today in this article we will be going to see the overview of Electric Arc Furnace, which includes it's definition, types, construction details, working principle, applications, advantages, and disadvantages. So let's dive into the paper right now.
It is an extremely hot enclosed region, where heat is produced using electrodes for melting certain materials such as steel (scrap) without changing the electrochemical properties of the material(metal).
The electric arc produced between the electrodes and the metal is used for melting the metal(scrap).
The explanation for the types of furnace are as follows.
DC Electric furnace is advanced of AC Electric Furnace. The DC furnace system has only one graphite electrode and the remaining electrodes are embedded at the bottom of the furnace.
In DC Electric Arc Furnace, Current flows from Cathode to Anode.
In the AC Electric Arc Furnace, three graphite electrodes are used which acts as a cathode and the scrap itself acts as Anode. I will elaborate on this process below.
When the power supply is given to the cathode and anode, the ions start transferring from cathode to anode & anode to cathode simultaneously and due to this, heat is generated which can melt the Pig iron and scrap.
The spark is generated at the electrode due to the collision of ions when transferring between cathode and anode respectively. The spark generated is used to melt the metal quickly.
After the arc is shielded by electrodes, the voltage is increased for speeding up the melting process.
During melting, the impurities present in the molten pool deposits on the surface as a slag. Other impurities will be escaped out from the container. In this process, carbon, silicon, and manganese get oxidized and the reactions are as follows.
2C+O2→ 2CO
Si + O2→ SiO2
2mn + O2→ 2mno
The oxides of Manganese(mn) and Silicon(Si) reacts with each other to form a slag and Carbon is reacted with oxygen to form Carbon monoxide(CO). The CO burns in the container itself.
mno+SiO2→ mnSiO3
Here mnSiO3 is a slag.
The slag formed is removed from the container by tilting it one side down and the rest of the material is the purest form of steel which is to be taken out from the container.
Thus by the use of Electric Arc Furnace, we can get the purest form of steel.
This is the detailed working of Electric Arc Furnace. Now let's discuss the advantages and disadvantages of it.
The advantages of Electric Arc Furnace are as follows.
The disadvantages of Electric Arc Furnace are as follows.
The applications of Electric Arc Furnace are as follows.
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