Pyrometallurgy: Roasting, Smelting, Refining & Electrowinning

Pyrometallurgy: Roasting, Smelting, Refining & Electrowinning

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Induction Furnace use for Fire Assay (1 reply)

L
chemgla68
6 years ago
chemgla68 6 years ago

I have been using a traditional muffle style furnace for years and am looking to speed up the process by switching over to an induction furnace. My question is this - does an induction furnace lower the overall hi temp needed to process ores containing PGM's?  I normally run the muffle up to 2350 and leave it set for an hour before attempting the first pour. 

I know an induction furnace would significantly shorten the time needed to reach hi temp, I'm just looking for some guidance from someone currently using an induction furnace this way.  Things to watch out for, problems I might encounter that can be corrected with a change in the flux concentrations, etc.

 

N
Nije
6 years ago
Nije 6 years ago
Like
1 like by David

I run five different sized induction furnaces starting at 2 kgs and working their way up to 500 kgs and the one thing I know is that its almost impossible to hold the temperature steady. It is possible to reach what we would call "A Holding Charge"   but the temperature will fluctuate wildly dependent on crucible size and type, and the material the crucible is made from and the charge it's self,so if you used anything from say pure graphite all the way to zirconium the input charge and temperature would never be stable but most importantly you would not be able to get a charge into the melt/crucible. If you were successful at that end of the PGM scale (Ru,Rh,Ir) given half a chance it could throw itself out of the crucible.

Sorry to rain on your parade, If you need more information I would be happy to help. 

 

 

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