Melting of bulk non-ferrous metallic materials by microwave hybrid heating (MHH) and conventional heating: a comparative study on energy consumption

Abstract

Foundry industries aim at reducing energy consumption in processing of materials. Continuous efforts are ongoing to exploit unconventional energy sources such as microwave energy to overcome drawbacks of conventional sources. In the present work, a comparative study of electrical energy consumption during melting of known quantity of metallic material in microwave oven and in conventional muffle electric furnace is carried out. The non-ferrous bulk metallic materials such as tin, zinc, aluminum and brass are used as candidate materials. A 900-W modified domestic microwave oven, operating at 2.45 GHz and a conventional muffle furnace are used for the study. The electrical energy consumed for melting of known quantity of metallic materials is presented along with the observed material wastage during melting process. The study shows that microwave oven consumes significantly lesser time than the conventional muffle electric furnace for the melting of known quantity of candidate materials. It is found that melting bulk metallic materials by microwave irradiation reduces electrical energy consumption than that of conventional melting process. In addition, material wastage is around twofold lesser by microwave melting process than the conventional melting process for the known quantity of candidate materials.

Cladding techniques that achieve a solid metallurgical bond with the least amount of base material dilution - An overview

“…It is regarded as a slow and inefficient mode of heating as energy transfers from one molecule to another through lattice vibration thereby, generates problems related to thermal gradient due to change in microstructure with varying mechanical properties. It is also known to be outside to inside mode of heating [30][31][32][33]. In correlation to unconventional sources of cladding conductive mode of cladding lacks in various domains.…”

Influence of tungsten carbide-cobalt reinforcement on flexural behavior of iron-based composite developed through microwave

“…The earlier researcher used microwave energy for heating, cladding, sintering, joining, and also for melting some ferrous and non-ferrous low melting point materials. 31,49 But in the present work, high melting point materials, WC212Co, EWAC1004, and SS316-based MMC'S with varying compositions were prepared to enhance the mechanical properties. These materials are widely used in the auto and aerospace industries.…”

Processing and characterization of SS316 based metal matrix composite casting through microwave hybrid heating

“…[30][31][32][33][34] The problems faced during the development of metallic materials using electromagnetic radiations (microwaves) have been overcome by many researchers by using a novel technique of microwave hybrid heating (MHH). 3,35,36 The bidirectional, volumetric, and uniform heating with less thermal gradient and hence fewer defects in the casting is the beauty of MHH. It also improves the microstructure, grain growth, porosity, density, and microhardness of the casting.…”

“…The possibility for the development of a material system like nickel base MMCs, aluminum, magnesium, lead, tin, copper, etc. was explored by researchers/academicians 35,36 by using a novel and efficient MHH. However, a few works have been done on iron-based alloy SS316 metal matrix composites by MHH.…”