I member placing an aluminum foil plate inside the microwave, my mom quickly ran over and opened the microwave, and boy was she upset. Putting foil in a microwave can cause fire.
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I member placing an aluminum foil plate inside the microwave, my mom quickly ran over and opened the microwave, and boy was she upset. Putting foil in a microwave can cause fire.
Microwaves are electromagnetic radiation. That’s not just pedantic, it’s important for understanding the principle. The microwave indices high voltage and current in the foil, which the foil cannot handle. The microwave heats the material, not the air in the oven, and in the case of aluminum foil, this can get very hot, much hotter than you can get in a conventional oven. This is what causes the aluminum foil to ignite. It’s also the reason why the instructions say that you should not run the oven alone. Put something containing water in as well and it stabilizes the temperatures.
Aluminum foil conducts electricity. Exposed to the intense electromagnetic field in a microwave oven, electrical arcs can develop between different areas on the metal, which can cause the evaporation of some of the aluminum as vapor, which then (also being conductive) can also sustain arcs. All of that can make you think the foil is on fire but it’s easy to show that is not the case since the flames cease instantly when the microwave is shut off.