Had to pick between ceramic fiber blanket and insulating firebrick for my furnace rebuild

I was relining my small furnace last month and couldn't decide between ceramic fiber blanket and insulating firebrick for the hot face. I went with the blanket because it was cheaper and easier to cut, but now after 10 melts I'm noticing it's starting to degrade faster than I expected. Anyone else run into this problem with blanket wear or should I just tear it out and switch to brick?

3 comments

3 Comments

paul28623d ago

Blanket wears way faster than brick especially with flux heavy melts. Bite the bullet and switch to IFB now before that blanket crumbles into your next pour.

daniel47411d ago

Huh, 60 heats out of blanket? That's crazy talk. @ivan_mason I gotta ask, what kind of binder were you running with that?

ivan_mason22d ago

You mentioned "blanket wears way faster than brick" and that's mostly right but its not always true. It really depends on the specific blanket type and your melt chemistry. High alumina ceramic blankets with proper binder can actually outlast cheap IFB in some situations, especially if you're running steady temps under 2300F. I've seen guys swap to blanket and get 60+ heats before any real wear shows up. The real killer is flux and mechanical abuse, not just blanket vs brick. IFB can spall and crack just as bad if you're rough with it or get flux on it. So yeah, blanket fails different than brick but saying it always wears faster is a bit of a broad stroke.