The selection of experimental tube heating furnaces needs to be comprehensively considered from six core dimensions: temperature control, structural design, atmosphere control, safety performance, operational convenience, cost, and maintenance. Let's take a detailed look below!

A commonly used experimental vacuum tube furnace (click on the image to view product details)

1. Temperature control: match experimental requirements, reserve margin
Maximum temperature and continuous operating temperature
Select the upper temperature limit of the equipment based on the characteristics of the experimental materials. For example, metal alloy melting requires a high temperature of over 1800 ℃, while sample drying may only require 300-500 ℃.
Reserve a temperature margin of 100-200 ℃ to cope with temperature fluctuations or future experimental upgrade needs. For example, if the experimental requirement is 1000 ℃, it is recommended to choose equipment with a maximum temperature of 1200 ℃.
Heating element matching: Different elements have different temperature ranges and need to be matched with the experimental temperature:
Resistance wire: 250-1200 ℃ (such as Fe Cr Al alloy);
Silicon carbide: 1200-1400 ℃;
MoSi ₂ (silicon molybdenum rod): 1400-1800 ℃ (prolonged use below 800 ℃ is prohibited).

Temperature control accuracy and heating rate
High precision temperature control systems (such as PID regulation and multi-stage program control) can ensure temperature stability and improve experimental reproducibility. For example, the growth of graphene requires precise control of the heating rate.
Rapid Heat Treatment (RTP) function: If rapid heating/cooling (such as 50 ℃/s) is required, equipment equipped with infrared lamp heating should be selected.

2. Structural design: adapted to sample characteristics and experimental scenarios
Temperature zone length and uniformity
The length of the temperature zone determines the uniform heating area of the sample. Long strip heat treatment requires a longer temperature zone (such as 1200mm), while small chip testing only requires a shorter temperature zone (such as 300mm).
Constant temperature zone and total heating zone: The length of the constant temperature zone (temperature difference in the central area ≤ ± 1 ℃) should cover the sample size to avoid edge temperature deviation affecting the results.

Selection of furnace structure
Horizontal tube furnace: easy to operate, suitable for routine experiments such as powder sintering and catalyst testing.
Vertical tube furnace: utilizing gravity to evenly distribute gas, suitable for special scenarios such as crystal growth and quenching experiments.
Rotating tube furnace: The uniform heat treatment or coating effect of powder is achieved through the rotation of the furnace tube, which is suitable for the preparation of battery materials.

Pipe diameter and furnace tube material
Pipe diameter selection: determined based on the sample volume. Large volume samples require a larger tube diameter (such as 100mm), while small tube diameters (such as 20mm) are preferred for trace samples to reduce heat loss.

Furnace tube material:
Quartz tube: ≤ 1200 ℃, good chemical stability, suitable for inert atmosphere experiments;
Corundum tube (alumina): ≤ 1700 ℃, wear-resistant and corrosion-resistant, suitable for acidic atmosphere;
Metal tube (such as stainless steel): ≤ 1000 ℃, suitable for high pressure or reducing atmosphere.

3. Atmosphere control: meet special experimental conditions
Atmosphere type requirements
Vacuum environment: To prevent material oxidation (such as high-purity metal preparation), equipment equipped with a vacuum system (ultimate vacuum degree ≤ 10 ⁻ ³ Pa) should be selected.
Inert gas protection: such as Ar, N ₂, used to prevent sample oxidation or reduction reactions.
Special gas treatment: such as H ₂ reducing atmosphere and CO corrosive atmosphere, it is necessary to choose equipment with good airtightness and equip gas purification devices.

Atmosphere control system
Accurate control of flow rate, pressure, and purity is required. For example, CVD (Chemical Vapor Deposition) experiments require accurate control of gas ratios to achieve uniform growth of thin films.

4. Safety performance: ensuring the safety of experiments and personnel
Security protection function
Overtemperature alarm: When the temperature exceeds the set value, it will automatically power off and sound an alarm.
Leakage protection: prevent electrical faults from causing safety accidents.
Emergency stop: One click stop heating and cut off power to respond to unexpected situations.
Explosion proof design: For experiments involving flammable and explosive gases, explosion-proof equipment should be selected and equipped with gas leak detection devices.

Electrical safety
Check the insulation performance and shell grounding of the equipment to ensure compliance with national electrical safety standards.

5. Convenient operation: improve experimental efficiency
Operation interface
Priority should be given to devices with touch screen control and intelligent programming, supporting multiple program settings (such as heating constant temperature cooling curves) to reduce manual intervention.
Customized tube furnaces support remote monitoring of temperature curves through a mobile app and real-time adjustment of experimental parameters.

Maintain convenience
Vulnerable parts such as furnace tubes and heating elements should be easy to replace. For example, modular designed equipment can quickly disassemble furnace tubes and shorten maintenance time.
Equipped with automatic cleaning functions (such as high-temperature self-cleaning programs) can reduce the impact of residues on equipment lifespan.

6. Cost and Maintenance: Balancing Budget and Performance
Initial procurement cost
The price is affected by factors such as temperature limit, atmosphere control, heating elements, etc. For example, equipment equipped with MoSi ₂ heating elements and vacuum systems may be 2-3 times more expensive than regular equipment.

Long term operating costs
Energy consumption: Efficient insulation materials (such as alumina fibers) can reduce heat loss and energy consumption.
Consumable cost: The lifespan of quartz tubes is about 50-100 experiments, and that of corundum tubes can reach over 200 experiments, depending on the frequency of the experiments.
Maintenance frequency: Good heating elements (such as imported silicon carbide) have a lifespan of over 5000 hours, reducing replacement costs.

After-sale service
Choose a manufacturer that provides installation and debugging, operation training, and a warranty period (usually 1-3 years) to reduce the risk of later use.

Small dual temperature zone experimental tube heat treatment electric furnace (click on the picture to view product details)

In general, experimental tube heating furnaces are commonly used as heat treatment experimental equipment in university laboratories and industrial and mining enterprise laboratories, and are highly favored by major universities and enterprises. Before choosing, you can communicate with relevant technical personnel about the parameters you want, so as to customize experimental tube heating furnaces that are more suitable for your own experiments!Click to learn more Experimental tubular heat treatment electric furnaces! Or click on online customer service to learn more about product information!