Experimental Analysis of the Aluminium Melting Process in Industrial Cold Crucible Furnaces

Most of industrial sector desires high-purity metals and alloys. Morita et al. [ 1 ] underlined that due to the outstanding properties of high-quality titanium alloys such as the corrosion resistance or the biocompatibility, these alloys are more often used as the material for the medical implants. Moreover, Fadeev et al. [ 2 ] also pointed out the importance of the high quality alloy for the gas turbine blades. Moreover, the metals used for these state of the art technologies, such as titanium or aluminium, are highly reactive. In consequence, levitation or semi-levitation melting techniques are desirable to guarantee the required quality of the processed metals or alloys. One of the semi-levitation methods is the application of a cold crucible furnace (CCF). As the authors of [ 3 ] stated the CCF melting or smelting is usually conducted in a vacuum or neutral atmosphere, e.g., argon. The study presented in [ 4 ] showed that a method of metal processing is also interesting from the economic point of view in case of the relatively expensive titanium alloys. Due to an electromagnetic field, the processed metal is pushed away from the crucible walls. Additionally, the crucible walls and the crucible bottom are water-cooled. The high temperature difference between the molten metal and the crucible bottom results in the formation of so-called skull.