Problems of nontraditional glass melting

Abstract

In the USSR the most highly developed is the cyclone glass-melting furnace (see Fig. i). Its main element is the cyclone chamber, which consists of a vertical, metal, water-cooled cylinder with a restriction in the lower part. A mixture of fuel and oxidizer is fed through several burners tangentially located in the upper part of the chamber, and is burnt, forming a gas vortex. The batch, entering the chamber through the cover after several seconds is heated, fuses, and under the action of the centrifugal forces of the gas current, is thrown on to the walls of the cyclone chamber. The resulting melt with inclusions of unmolten grains of silica flows into the receiver tank situated below.