Solution Cases [case-022] Continuous Furnace with Superheated Steam
- Continuous Furnace
- AllFit® Series
Enabling heat treatment with a continuous furnace in a superheated steam atmosphere
Problem
One characteristic of continuous furnaces is the higher productivity compared to batch furnaces.
While it is necessary to introduce a continuous furnace in order to achieve a dramatic increase in productivity over batch treatment, the following issues are problems for introducing superheated steam (*) in a continuous furnace.
- Because a continuous furnace does not use an overall heating structure like a batch type does, the superheated steam condenses at low-temperature parts and can affect the treated products.
- Because shutters and other physical partitions cannot be installed, it is difficult to control the superheated steam area inside the furnace.
* Superheated steam is steam that was heated to a temperature higher than the boiling point. It features the ability to rapidly and evenly heat the target product under nearly anoxic conditions.
Please see here for details.
Solution
By further advancing and optimizing the atmosphere separation technologies that we have developed with conveyor furnaces for electronic component production, we made it possible to control the superheated steam area.
This allows treatment in a stable atmosphere. Condensation does not occur even at 250°C low-temperature treatment.
Results
- This makes it possible to perform heat treatment with superheated steam in a continuous furnace with superior convective heat transfer performance and heating efficiency.
- The use of a continuous furnace can be expected to improve productivity.
