The Difference Between Electric Arc Furnace & Submerged Arc Furnace

Electric arc furnace and submerged arc furnace: both are essential electric furnaces in the metal smelting industry. Many customers may have doubts when choosing. Let HANI explain the difference for you.

1. Properties:

1） Electric arc furnace:

It is an electric furnace that smelts ores and metals at high temperature generated by an electrode arc.

2.）Submerged arc furnace:

Also known as electric arc furnace or electric resistance furnace. It is an industrial electric furnace with huge power consumption.

2. Features:

1）Electric arc furnace:

The electric arc furnace is more flexible than other steelmaking furnaces, and can effectively remove impurities such as sulfur and phosphorus. The furnace temperature is easy to control, and the equipment occupies a small area. It is suitable for the melting of high-quality alloy steel.

2）Submerged arc furnace:

Its working characteristic is to use carbonaceous or magnesia refractory material as furnace lining and use self-cultivation electrode. The electrode is inserted into the charge for submerged arc operation, using the energy and current of the arc to pass through the charge, and generating energy due to the resistance of the charge to smelt metal.

Industrial furnaces that generate arc heating through metal electrodes or non-metal electrodes are called electric arc furnaces.

Electric arc furnaces can be divided into three-phase electric arc furnaces, consumable electric arc furnaces, single-phase electric arc furnaces and resistance electric arc furnaces according to the arc form.

The furnace body of the electric arc steelmaking furnace is composed of furnace cover, furnace door, tapping groove and furnace body. The furnace bottom and furnace wall are built with basic refractory materials or acid refractory materials. Electric arc steelmaking furnaces are divided into ordinary power electric arc furnaces, high power electric arc furnaces and ultra-high power electric arc furnaces according to the transformer capacity per ton of furnace capacity.

Electric arc furnace is a power frequency electric furnace that uses arc energy to smelt metal.

Electric arc furnaces used in industry can be divided into three categories:

First Type：Direct heating type. 

The arc occurs between the special electrode rod and the smelted charge, and the charge is directly heated by the arc.

Mainly used for steelmaking, and secondly for smelting iron, copper, refractory materials, refining molten steel, etc.

Second type：Indirect heating type. 

The arc occurs between two special electrode rods, and the charge is subjected to the radiant heat of the arc, which is used to smelt copper and copper alloys.

Third type：Submerged arc furnace

Which uses ore with high resistivity as raw material. During the working process, the lower part of the electrode is generally buried in the charge.

The heating principle is: not only use the heat generated by the resistance of the charge when the current passes through the charge, but also use the heat generated by the arc between the electrode and the charge.

So the submerged arc furnace is a kind of electric arc furnace.

If you want to know more, or have needs about electric arc furnace and submerged arc furnace, please feel free to contact us.

E-mail: saleswn@hanrm.com ( Daisy Zhai )

Xian Hani Tech Co.,Ltd.