In extreme working conditions, the rapid temperature increase can even lead to evaporation, making an electron beam an excellent tool in heating applications, such as welding.
[2] This source of heat or phase transformation is absolutely sterile due to the vacuum and scull of solidified metal around the cold copper crucible walls.
For mass production of steels, large furnaces with capacity measured in metric tons and electron-beam power in megawatts exist in industrialized countries.
These welders feature working vacuum chambers ranging from a few liters up to hundreds of cubic meters, with electron guns carrying power of up to 100 kW.
Modern electron-beam welders are usually designed with a computer-controlled deflection system that can traverse the beam rapidly and accurately over a selected area of the work piece.
Electron-beam direct manufacturing (DM) is the first commercially available, large-scale, fully programmable means of achieving near net shape parts.
Electron-beam machining is a process in which high-velocity electrons are concentrated into a narrow beam with a very high planar power density.
The resulting surface finish is better and kerf width is narrower than what can be produced by other thermal cutting processes.
Maskless electron lithography has found wide usage in photomask making for photolithography, low-volume production of semiconductor components, and research and development activities.
Electron-beam evaporation uses thermionics emission to create a stream of electrons that are accelerated by a high-voltage cathode and anode arrangement.
E-beam processing has been used for the sterilization of medical products and aseptic packaging materials for foods, as well as disinfestation, the elimination of live insects from grain, tobacco, and other unprocessed bulk crops.