Thermal diffusivity measurements of some synthetic CaO-Al2O3-SiO2 slags

In an attempt to systematize the knowledge of the heat conduction of liquid silicates, the effective thermal diffusivities of some synthetic slags containing CaO, Al2O3, and SiO2 have been measured, using the three-layer laser-flash method on a differential scheme in the temperature range of 1625 to 1825 K. The effective thermal diffusivities measured, which are a combination of the phononic and photonic heat-transfer mechanisms, were found to increase with increasing temperature for all the presently investigated slags. The slag compositions were chosen in such a way that the changes in the effective thermal diffusivities would reflect the changes in the structure of the slags. It was observed that, at a CaO/Al2O3 molar ratio of 4.42, an increase of the SiO2 content had very little effect on the effective thermal diffusivity values. On the other hand, addition of SiO2 to a slag with the CaO/Al2O3 molar ratio of 2.59 resulted in a significant increase in the effective thermal diffusivity. The addition of Al2O3 to slags with a constant CaO/SiO2 molar ratio resulted in a marked increase in the effective thermal diffusivity. Both these trends indicate that there might be an influence of the network formation in silicate melts on the effective thermal diffusivity.