Why Infrared Quartz Heaters are More Efficient than Ceramic Heaters?

Derek Burkholder
May 21, 2021
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Why Infrared Quartz Heaters are More Efficient than Ceramic Heaters?

Introduction

Infrared quartz heaters are popular today in many industrial heating applications. However, quartz is not the only material commonly used to construct infrared heaters.

Often, ceramic is utilized as the base material in infrared heaters, but it produces less efficient heaters than when quartz is used as the base material. Although ceramic and quartz can both be used to manufacture effective infrared heating elements, heaters made with quartz are preferred by many buyers due to their higher efficiency.

It is essential to understand what exactly makes quartz heaters superior to ceramic infrared heaters. This post discusses both ceramic and quartz heaters followed by the differentiating factors that make quartz heaters more efficient than ceramic heaters.

A General Introduction to Ceramic Heaters and Quartz Heaters

The two main materials used in infrared heater manufacturing are ceramic and quartz due to their material stability at high temperatures.  The primary source of heat in both types of heaters comes from a coiled wire heating element, typically made of an iron-chromium-aluminum alloy.

  • Most ceramic infrared heaters contain the coiled wire heating element embedded within a ceramic structure.  The heating element produces infrared energy which is primarily absorbed by the ceramic and then re-radiated to the process.  This re-radiated infrared energy is mostly comprised of longer-wavelength infrared.  The hot ceramic heater face also provides some amount of convection heating in addition to infrared heating.
  • In quartz infrared heaters the coiled wire heating element is either contained within a quartz tube or wrapped around the outside of a quartz tube. Because quartz is essentially transparent to infrared, all of the energy generated by the element is transmitted through the quartz directly to the process.  The infrared energy generated by these elements is typically comprised of medium to short-wavelength infrared energy.  Since the quartz is not absorbing the produced energy, the majority of energy produced goes directly to the product in the form of infrared energy, rather than less efficient convection heating energy.

Now that both types of electric heaters are introduced, let us discuss why electric quartz heaters are preferred over ceramic heaters.

6 Reasons Why Quartz Heaters Are Chosen Over Ceramic Heaters

The qualities of quartz heaters that make them more efficient than ceramic heaters are listed below.

  1. Electric quartz heaters consume less energy than ceramic heaters to produce the same results.
  2. Because quartz heaters directly transmit the energy and do not rely on convection heating, they are better than ceramic heaters at targeting their heat to specific areas.  The convection heat produced by ceramic heaters will go wherever the air currents in the process go.
  3. Ceramic heaters lose a good portion of their heat to convection, which heaters the air around them rather than directly heating the target. On the other hand, the energy produced by quartz heaters goes directly to the target without losses to the air.
  4. Quartz infrared heaters offer very fast heat-up and cool down times. Ceramic heaters, however, require more time to heat circulating air and warm up the room via convection.
  5. Quartz heaters can be used to create quieter heating equipment as in most cases air movement from noisy convection blowers is not needed.
  6. In ceramic heaters, a good deal of energy is lost heating the ceramic base material of the heaters, but quartz absorbs nearly no energy from the heating element, so losses to the base material are very minimal.

With the higher performance efficiency of infrared quartz heaters now understood, it is important to acknowledge the value of quality. You must invest in high-quality quartz heaters to realize the benefits discussed above. Hence it is recommended to buy quartz heaters from a trusted manufacturer like Casso-Solar Technologies. The company has been a trusted choice of customers for infrared solutions for over 60 years. They supply high quality and high-performance infrared heaters to numerous applications and industries, such as plastics, textiles, glass, metals and more.

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Written by:
Derek Burkholder
Vice President of Sales & Engineering
Derek Burkholder holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University and is Vice President of Engineering & Sales at Casso Solar. Previously holding the title of Engineering Manager, Derek draws upon over a decade of industry knowledge to write extensively about the construction & application of heating systems such as industrial ovens, dryers, furnaces, and infrared heaters for industrial manufacturing processes.