[TheForge] Re: Salt Pot Electrodes

[MRScherm at aol.com]

Sorry, I did not see the original question on salt pot  electrodes, but we 
make ours from 4 inch square type 446 stainless, which is  pretty much industry 
standard.  There are six "legs" that are set in pairs  every three feet in our 
salt furnaces which are 120 inches deep.  The legs  protrude thru the outer 
steel wall of the furnace, go thru the insulation  material, and thru the fire 
brick, then make a 90 degree turn downward and sit  about two inches from the 
fire brick wall.  The portion in the salt is  approximately two feet long.  
They will last about two years, and there  isn't much left of them when we 
change them, as you cant turn off the furnace,  ever!  The real corrosion takes 
place where air can get at the metal, in  other words at the surface.  Salt is by 
far the best heating medium, no  surface scale on the parts, and as there is 
a natural swirl in the furnace,  the temperature is exactly the same at top, 
middle and bottom (ten feet down)  and so gives very uniform heating of the 
part.  We run three different  furnaces, one at 1850F, one at 800F, and one at 
2200F, and use the middle one  for both preheating and quenching our tool 
steels.  We use Barium Chloride  salt in the low temp furnace, and that's the one we 
pay major money to dispose  of.  
Mike Schermerhorn