Abstract
This study presents the application of additive manufacturing (AM) technology to a W-type INCONEL radiant tube (RT) used to improve its radiant heat efficiency. Appropriate dimensions of honeycomb structure were determined from finite element (FE) analysis and the resulting increase in radiant heat was computed. The honeycomb patterns on the RT surfaces were printed using the directed energy deposition (DED) method. Radiant heat efficiency of a prototype RT with a honeycomb pattern printed was examined in a pilot furnace emulating the continuous annealing line (CAL). Finally, soundness of the prototype RT was tested on-site on the actual the CAL of No. 3 CGL in POSCO Gwangyang Steel Works. The results revealed that partial FE analysis, which predicts the amount of radiant heat by partially modeling the RT structure rather than modeling the entire RT structure, is suitable for overcoming the limitation of the computer memory capacity and calculating the design parameters of honeycomb patterns. The DED is suitable for printing honeycomb patterns on RT with large and curved surfaces. The average amount of gas consumed to maintain 780 °C and 880 °C for 1440 min was reduced by 10.42% and 12.31%, respectively. There were no cracks and no gas leaks on the RT surface in an annual inspection over three years.
Highlights
Additive manufacturing (AM) has emerged as a breakthrough processing technology owing to its various advantages, such as ease of fabrication of complex geometry parts, improvement of expensive raw materials’ yield [1,2,3,4,5]
The design variables of the honeycomb pattern printed on the radiant tube (RT) surface were calculated by finite element (FE) analysis of radiant heat transfer
The actual size prototype honeycomb pattern was printed on the RT surface by the directed energy deposition (DED)
Summary
Additive manufacturing (AM) has emerged as a breakthrough processing technology owing to its various advantages, such as ease of fabrication of complex geometry parts, improvement of expensive raw materials’ yield [1,2,3,4,5]. AM parts (made from the AM process) can be applied in diverse fields and contribute in various ways to the system to which they belong. The final product of the continuous annealing process is a finished cold-rolled steel strip. In this process, the strips are annealed in a reheating furnace, with an atmosphere stabilized and maintained without chemical change. The strips are annealed in a reheating furnace, with an atmosphere stabilized and maintained without chemical change This type of annealing is done in a continuous annealing line (CAL), commonly referred to as CAL in the steelmaking industry
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