Online monitoring of corrosion behavior in molten metal using laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy

The corrosion behavior of structure materials in direct contact with molten metals is widespread in metallurgical industry. The corrosion of casting equipment by molten metals is detrimental to the production process, and the corroded materials can also contaminate the metals being produced. Conventional methods for studying the corrosion behavior by molten metal are offline. This work explored the application of laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) for online monitoring of the corrosion behavior of molten metal. The compositional changes of molten aluminum in crucibles made of 304 stainless steel were obtained online at 1000°C. Several offline techniques were combined to determine the corrosion mechanism, which was highly consistent with previous studies. Results proved that LIBS was an efficient method to study the corrosion mechanism of solid materials in molten metal. [Display omitted] •The corrosion behavior of structure materials in direct contact with molten metals is widespread.•Conventional methods for studying the corrosion behavior by molten metal are offline.•LIBS is proposed as an online method to study the corrosion behavior of molten metal.