Modeling the Dynamics of Precipitation and Agglomeration of Oxide Inclusions in Liquid Steel

Abstract

Deoxidation and refining of liquid steel is the site of many complex phenomena, such as liquid–gas–solid multiphase flow, turbulence, precipitation, agglomeration, and extraction of multicomponent inclusions. The steel industry is very interested in developing a framework to integrate these different mechanisms. This is based on three pillars: chemical thermodynamics, population balance, and transport phenomena. Accordingly, a homebrewed thermo-kinetics code is interfaced with a commercial Computer Fluid Dynamic code through a population balance module. The population balance module resorts to the classic Quadrature Method of Moments extended to multicomponent inclusions. This paper is focused on a comparison between three-dimensional numerical results obtained with or without taking into account precipitation kinetics. This distinction is important since under an assumption of local equilibrium, harmful inclusions are completely dissolved before the continuous casting occurs, whereas when using precipitation kinetics, harmful inclusions can be present in the final product. This is consistent with industrial samples.