MHD air preheaters: Preliminary firing tests for materials selection

The development of power generation by MHD involves many basic and engineering questions. A critical problem is the selection, design and fabrication of construction materials for components, particularly for the air preheaters. Their durability and reliability must be guaranteed for thousands of hours. Open-cycle MHD power plants have indirect air preheating using Cowper-type regenerators. The maximum temperature that can be obtained with the preheating system depends upon the thermo-mechanical properties of the materials used. Commercially available magnesia, alumina and zirconia were fired at 1800, 1850, 1950 and 2000 C with 12-h soak times. The results show that the magnesia-based materials with a high content of pure periclase magnesia are the most promising for air preheater application in a MHD power plant with an indirect preheating system. Four samples behaved well after the 2000 C firing test. Further thermomechanical tests are necessary to select the most suitable materials and to decide the maximum working temperature of the materials. If direct preheating is used, the materials selected might not be the most suitable.