Data are given on arc melting plant for synthesizing and producing fusion-cast refractories. The technical characteristics of experimental plant type EDP-600 with moving electrodes are such as to allow one to synthesize fused materials on the basis of the oxides Al 2 O 3 , MgO, Cr 2 O 3 , and ZrO 2 , and also allows one to produce refractory components for industrial glass-melting furnaces. The DSPM-1.5 arc furnace is recommended for the industrial production of fusion-cast baddeleyite-corundum, high-alumina, and chromium-bearing refractories.Fusion-cast refractory materials have unique properties: no permeable porosity, high structural density and thermomechanical strength parameters, and exceptionally high corrosion resistance to mineral liquids (slags, glasses, fluxes, glass sinters, and so on), so they have a special place amongst refractories used in the metallurgical and glass branches of industry. The proportion of fusion-cast refractories in the total consumption in glass-melting furnaces of traditional design is 40%, while in electrical furnaces it attains 80%. Current glass technology could not operate without fusion-cast refractories. The largest world producers (the USA, France, Japan, and Hungary) have been supplemented in the period 1990 -2005 by new producers in Belgium, Australia, India, China (over 8 plants), and the Ukraine.A basic technological operation in making fusion-cast refractories is the production of a homogeneous liquid of given chemical composition and required properties. In the industrial production of such refractories, only arc melting furnaces are used, where the heat source is electric arcs. The concentrated deposition of energy in small volumes in such furnaces provides high temperatures necessary for melting charges on the basis of refractory oxides Al 2 O 3 , ZrO 2 , Cr 2 O 3 , MgO, SiO 2 , and so on. An electric arc provides also a high heating rate, high throughput, and in most cases the required purity of the melted components.Industrial production of these refractories requires special melting plant, which is hardly used at all in metallurgy and is made to special order. There is a basic specification for melting an oxide charge in an arc furnace, namely a high temperature of 2200 -2700°C, which should melt the oxides and produce a fluid for making items of mass 200 -800 kg by casting in a mold.At present in the Russian Federation, the producers of fusion-cast refractories are the Shcherbinka Plant for Electromelted Refractories (SZEPO) Company and the Podol'skogneupor Company. Their products are represented by two types of refractory: baddeleyite-corundum ones of grade Bk-33, Bk-37, and Bk-41, and corundum ones of grade KEL-93 and KEL-95. Refractories made by reductive melting in furnaces of type OKB 2130 and OKB 2126 [1, pp. 32 -34] are characterized by an elevated tendency to show damage (bubbles, streaks, and so on) on contact with the glass. There are high indices for bubble formation in Russian fusion-cast baddeleyite-corundum and corundum components on account p...
