Ceramic Coatings: Good as Gold
Coated industrial infrared lamps (shortwave and medium-wave) can offer a key efficiency advantage (compared to standard, non-coated T3 lamps, T4 lamps, or twin tube lamps). Certain coatings act as a reflector around the section of the lamp not aimed directly at the product, thus focusing the majority of the emissions toward your product. This creates opportunities for lower energy use or faster run times.
While gold coated lamps offer this unidirectional advantage with 100% reflectivity, ceramic coated lamps offer 90% reflectivity (an indistinguishable difference in most processes) along with a number of key advantages:
Lower Cost: Because of the cost of gold itself, gold-coated lamps are priced higher than their ceramic-coated counterparts.
Higher Operating Temperature: Gold, when exposed to the normal operating temperature of the heating element, will dissipate over time unless constantly exposed to an air cooling system. This results in losses in reflective efficiency. Ceramic lamps are applied in excess of 1200°C (well over gold’s melting point of 1064°C), meaning no air cooling is required, and no efficiencies are lost.
Longer Operating Life: Because ceramic-coated tubes do not suffer from the same dissipation as gold-coated, they need to be replaced less often, providing additional savings over the long run.
Ceramic coated lamps can be custom fitted to most IR applications, and can provide process efficiencies and long-terms savings for a minimal upfront cost. For more information, please contact a member of the Anderson Thermal team at 800-720-5256 or by clicking here.
IR Insights is a biweekly newsletter in which the Anderson Thermal Devices team shares some of their collective 75+ years of experience in process heating. Anderson Thermal Devices is a US-based manufacturer of industrial infrared heaters. Benefiting from 75+ years in infrared heating, our team is eager to find the right solution for your application.
