Abstract
The paper presents new results concerning the influence of the gas density and porous plug diameter on the nature of liquid steel stirring with an inert gas in the ladle. The tests were carried out on a cold model of a 30t ladle using particle image velocimetry (PIV) with a high-speed camera to analyse the plume zone formed during the supply of argon and helium as a stirring gas. The similarity criteria for the investigation of stirring processes in cold model in the past were discussed and compared. The modified Morton number was used in this paper to relate the gas flow rate in the model with real objects. The presented results constitute complete documentation of the influence of the plug diameter and gas density on the size of formed gas bubbles and the velocity of gas bubbles rising in different zones of the plume, plume, and spout geometry, including the expansion angle, spout height, open eye area, and gas hold-up.
Highlights
Stirring of liquid crude steel with inert gas is an essential treatment step in secondary metallurgy
The gas flow rate was varied between 15 and 100 L/h at 3 atm, which is equal to argon flow rates between 35–140 L/min of a real ladle when using modified Morton number, Equation (6)
In order to assess the effect of the injected gas density and nozzle diameter, all experiments were carried out with the same gas flow rates
Summary
Stirring of liquid crude steel with inert gas is an essential treatment step in secondary metallurgy. Stirring with an inert gas, such as argon, can be carried out as a separate treatment step of steel melt for chemical and thermal homogenisation, or as a part of other secondary metallurgical processes (e.g., desulphurisation with slag), removal of non-metallic inclusions, and other processes. There are steps in steel production when stirring can be prohibited, such as the step between vacuum processing and continuous casting of some very low carbon melts. In this case, stirring can be suppressed in order to prevent the carbon pick-up from wear refractories. Thereby, the stirring procedure cannot be neglected as it has an important role in obtaining the required cleanliness and quality of the produced steel products
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