Abstract: Technology of heat hydrogen treatment of titanium alloy is a new technology which can improve the microstructure and machinability of titanium alloy by using the reversible effect of hydrogen in titanium alloy, and the heat hydrogen treatment furnace is an important equipment for hydrogen permeation and dehydrogenation of titanium alloy. The heating uniformity and heating efficiency are important factors to be considered in the design of heating chamber, and also important indexes to measure the performance of heat hydrogen treatment furnace. The design of heating chamber directly affects the efficiency and quality of titanium alloy in the process of heat hydrogen treatment. The numerical simulation of the temperature field in the vacuum heating process of the hydrogen heat treatment furnace suitable for titanium alloy was carried out, and the mathematical model of vacuum heating was established. The comparison of numerical simulation and experiment under no-load condition showed that they were basically consistent. On this basis, the influence of the design parameters, such as the heating power and the heating bandwidth, was carefully studied from the heating efficiency and the heating uniformity under load. The results show that the heating efficiency and heating uniformity can be properly improved by choosing reasonable heating power and width of heating zone.

Key words: hydrogen treatment furnace, temperature field, numerical simulation, heating uniformity