LADLE FURNACE

LADLE FURNACE is employed to heat up, to hold and to finish all kinds of metal melts.

The main physical principle of an electric arc furnace is the transfer of energy from electric line to the furnace through heat radiation and conduction generated by an electric arc.

The Ladle furnace employs two systems namely:

1. Arc Regulatory System- incorporates Marcos, which is a control system for 3-phase arc furnace.

2. Auxiliary systems- this system includes temperature control, cooling systems, energy optimization, voltage and current control. The parameters and process control is commenced by automation systems (PLC based).

The focus of ladle furnace is to keep the molten iron scrap at constant temperature of 1640.38 degree Celsius.

 CONSTRAINTS:

1. Impurities.
2. Distance of electrode from the molten scrap iron.

The distance between the electrodes and molten iron scrap plays a vital role as only at particular arc length the electrodes produce the perfect temperature of arc, which is required to maintain the constant temperature for the molten iron. The arc length depends on the current and voltage.

Let us now take two extreme conditions of arc length.

1. When the electrodes and the molten scrap iron is on contact then it carries the      maximum current, as the air resistance is negligible. Therefore it doesn’t give us the required energy.

2.  When there is infinite gap between the electrode and the molten iron scrap then the      resistance becomes infinite and there is negligible current flowing.

So, we see taking in account of the two extreme conditions that for optimization of electrode energy we are required to maintain certain required air gap (arc length).