Closed and quasi‐closed yoke configurations for travelling wave induction heaters

The salient features of the travelling wave induction heating (TWIH) make them very important technique in the field of heating flat metals. This study proposed two novel configurations, closed and quasi‐closed, of the heater yoke. The proposed yokes designed to reduce the problems of slot effects and reduce the leakage flux, in order to focus the magnetic field within the heating region, which lead to improve the performance of the TWIH system. A finite‐element simulation and analysis is represented in this study by using ANSYS ® programme code. A comparison analysis between the proposed configurations and the traditional one shows a superior performance of the proposed types for workpiece thickness >2 mm. The proposed methods give progress in produced power, efficiency and temperature about; 7–23, 15–40 and 10–25%, respectively, for thickness >2 mm. Moreover, wider and uniformed heat distributions are achieved with conjunction of typical yoke.