Behavior of Multicomponent Gas Bubbles in Glass Melts

A mathematical model is proposed to study the behavior of multicomponent gas bubbles in glass melts. The effects of the melt temperature on bubble radius, trajectory, and composition were studied as a function of time, both accounting for and disregarding bubble boundary motion. It is shown that accounting for the boundary motion results in shorter refining times, smaller bubbles, and larger concentrations of the gaseous species than if this motion is disregarded. It is also shown that the bubble trajectory is almost a linear function of time and that mass transfer has a very small effect on bubble trajectory and refining times; however, it has a strong influence on the bubble radius, which, in the absence of mass transfeir, increases linearly with the temperature.