Induction Heater using either mosfets or IGBT's.

I would like to build an induction heater (small) design, useful for melting steel or aluminum using eddy currents, or a steel crucible and melting the aluminum inside (would that work?) 8O

I have quite a few power mosfets, and two IGBTS I managed to scrounge up for such a project. Would this work with any high frequency generator, or does it need to be a bit more complex than just "mosfet's swinging around". :grin:

I know you can make a small one using a ZVS driver. But is there another (more efficient and maybe a little more powerful?) Way to make an induction heater? I've been looking at various circuits but i don't think that any of them really work all too well. Any ideas or circuit plans that have been proven to work would be really nice. Thank you.

Induction Heating*-*www.dansworkshop.com


you will find usefull info here on this topic
many circuits and working methods tips and tricks
perhaps you have already read this
if this is the case please disregard this post

i used the google search for 'induction furnace schematic'

https://obrazki.elektroda.pl/60_1294464202.jpg
I made this circuit and it seems to work well, in theory anyway. xD

Would this idea work well? If at all? Thank you.

If you want to see it yourself on the internet to see how it works, go to
Circuit Simulator Applet

here. xD

Jaredmister1 said:

I would like to build an induction heater (small) design, useful for melting steel or aluminum using eddy currents, or a steel crucible and melting the aluminum inside (would that work?) 8O

Click to expand...

Hi Jared,

I design induction heaters professionally so maybe I can help.

The minimum power to melt steel with a very well insulated crucible is about 2kW in. All powers quoted are input from the line. 5kW is much better and 10kW is easy. Aluminum is quite difficult to melt because it is so electrically conductive. 5kW minimum. If you plan on rolling a heater from scratch, plan on a year to get a 5kW class unit running reliably enough not to be needing a constant diet of IGBTs.

Two proven designs that you might be interested in. First is my open sourced Royer heater, the latest version good to about 2kW

neon-john com

(sorry, this board won't let me post clickable links. Go there, click on "induction heaters" and then click on "Open source Royer type heater")

The second is by a friend of mine, Jonathan who has built a 10kW heater. He routinely melts all common metals and even does levitation melting.

mindchallenger com <slash>inductionheater

His pages aren't the best organized so you'll have to wade through a lot of preliminary stuff to get to the good stuff.

John

Hi,
I think it would be better if you use a half-bridge converter. Since you really don't need output voltage regulation, you could use IR2151 or IR2153 or anything similar [oscillator + half-bridge hi-lo side driver]. This would really simplify circuit design. If you search around on google you can find quite a few circuits using IR215x and half-bridge converter.

Hope this helps.
Tahmid.

https://obrazki.elektroda.pl/25_1294841239.jpg
How's this?

---------- Post added at 07:51 ---------- Previous post was at 06:06 ----------

https://obrazki.elektroda.pl/33_1294847549.jpg

We offer a couple of open-source induction heater projects on our page **broken link removed**
there are links to blogs, full plans, even PCB Eagle files and Gerbers for you to make your own boards.

Enjoy!

Garett