Electrode phenomena in a multiphase AC arc were successfully visualized using a high-speed observation system with a bandpass filter system to understand the erosion mechanisms of tungsten-based electrodes due to the droplet ejection and electrode evaporation. The obtained results indicated that both droplet ejection and electrode evaporation contributed to the electrode erosion in the multiphase AC arc. The erosion by droplet ejection mainly occurred during the cathodic period, while electrode evaporation mainly occurred during the anodic period. The rates of erosion by droplet ejection and evaporation were estimated to be 6 and 3 g/min, respectively, when the arc current was 100 A. The results of an evaluation of the possible forces acting on the electrode tip suggested that the electromagnetic force was the dominant force in the cathodic period, resulting in droplet ejection.

The objective of the present study is to understand fluctuation phenomena in a multiphase AC arc as a heat source for material processing based on the high-speed visualization technique of the temperature field. The multiphase AC arc is one of the most attractive thermal plasmas which possess extremely high temperature, high chemical reactivity, rapid quenching capability, and selectivity of the reaction atmosphere in accordance with required chemical reaction. In particular, the multiphase AC arc has a strong advantage on higher energy efficiency compared with other thermal plasmas. Therefore, this heat source has been applied to innovative material processing such as in-flight glass melting. However, the temporal and spatial characteristics of the multiphase AC arc have not been clarified although these are essential to control the characteristics of the products such as particle size distribution, yields of the desired materials. The high-speed visualization of the temperature field of the multiphase AC arc was conducted at 1x10 4 fps as typical framerate to observe the dynamic behavior of the multiphase AC arc in millisecond time scale. An optical system including the band-pass filters was combined with the high-speed camera to observe particular line emissions from atomic argon with negligible emissions from thermal plasma. The obtained experimental results indicated that the temperature of the multiphase AC arc was around 1.0x10 4 K. The arc temperature fluctuated in the range from 0.6x10 4 to 1.3x10 4 K. Consequently, the arc temperature in the multiphase AC arc is sufficiently high to treat the refractory metals and/or ceramics powders. Furthermore, the obtained temperature was well-validated by the conventional spectroscopic method with high accuracy.

Temperature characteristics of a multiphase AC arc in various working pressures were investigated by an innovative observation system consisting of a high-speed video camera and band-pass filters. Thermal plasmas have been widely applied to many industrial fields because of their unique advantages such as high temperature, high enthalpy, and rapid quenching capability. In particular, the multiphase AC arc is advantageous in terms of large plasma volume and high energy efficiency. Therefore, this heat source has been applied to innovative material processing such as in-flight glass melting, and functional nanoparticles fabrication. However, the temperature field and its fluctuation characteristics in the multiphase AC arc have not been understood because of the difficulties of temperature measurement due to their rapid fluctuation in millisecond timescale as well as the axisymmetric spatial characteristics. To understand and control the fluctuation phenomena is important to realize this method as industrial technology. Temperature measurement system using a high-speed camera was constructed to visualize the temperature fields of the multiphase AC arc. The fluctuations in the two-dimensional intensity distributions of particular line emissions from atomic argon were successfully observed. By analyzing these images using the Boltzmann plot method, the temperature distribution was estimated. The experimental results indicated that the arc temperature fluctuated in the range from 6,000 to 12,000 K. Higher temperature, smaller arc existence area, and decrease in the diameter of the arc were observed with an increase of working pressure. The arc temperature in the multiphase AC arc is sufficiently high to treat the refractory metals and ceramics powders at high processing rate.

E ects of electrode and phase con gurations on arc behavior and temperature distribution in a multiphase AC arc were successfully clari ed. A high-speed video camera with band-pass lters were addressed to measure the arc. A multiphase AC arc is promising material processing technology owing to the characteristics of large high-temperature volume and high energy e ciency. The arc behavior was observed by imaging arc discharge with a high-speed camera in millisecond time scale. The temperature was conducted by Boltzmann plot method using two types of argon line emissions ltered by the band-pass lters. The obtained excitation temperature is high with a range of 7.0 10 3 to 1.3 10 4 K. The arc swing in front of electrode becomes wider and the temperature uniformity improves as the number of electrodes and phases increase. The characteristic time due to uctuation of 12-phase AC arc was 1.4 ms, which was su ciently shorter than the residence time of raw material in the arc. The 12-phase AC arc is useful for material processing in terms of temperature uniformity and uctuation time.

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