Chamber furnaces are a generalized name of the industrial furnaces group, in which products remain stationary relative to the furnace during the heating period. Chamber furnaces are used for heating metal billets before rolling and forging, for heat treatment of metal and glass products, for ceramic and enamelled products baking.

Chamber furnaces are classified by construction: vertical furnace, bell-type furnace, soaking pit, bogie-type furnace, pit furnace, etc. If there are several products at the same time in the chamber furnace, and they are loaded and unloaded one by one, the furnace temperature is constant. During complicated  treatment regimes, when products must be heated (or cooled) at a certain speed, the furnace temperature is changed accordingly.

Chamber furnaces are heated by gas or liquid fuel. Thermal chamber furnaces operating with the atmosphere of controlled composition are heated by electric resistance heaters or radiant tubes. Electric heating is often advisable to ensure the accuracy of heat treatment and heating without controlled atmosphere composition. Chamber furnaces with a fixed hearth are the most widespread and are used in forging shops. Workspace of these furnaces (Fig. 1) has a parallelepiped form with the length of 0.6-2 m, the width of 0.6-1.5 m and the height of 1 m. Such furnaces productivity is 70-600 kg/h, heat flow is 5000-7000 kJ/kg.