Loss mechanism of micro-carbon ferromanganese during RH refining

ABSTRACT

It is of great significance to improve the yield of ferroalloy for steelmaking to reduce cost and save energy. In this paper a kind of loss mechanism of micro-carbon ferromanganese which has micro content of carbon during RH refining of interstitial free steel was investigated. The flow field of argon gas in the RH degassing vessel was investigated through numerical simulation. Through force analysis and particle tracking of the micro-carbon ferromanganese, it was found that micro-carbon ferromanganese with size smaller than the critical value of 1.01 millimeters has a large probability to be carried away into the RH vacuum pipeline. The micro-carbon ferromanganese of small particle was easily lost into the vacuum pipe by the upward flow of argon gas. Industrial experiment was conducted and a novel mechanism was confirmed that increasing the vacuum pressure during addition of the micro-carbon ferromanganese could improve the yield greatly.

KEYWORDS:

• Micro-carbon ferromanganese
• RH degassing vessel
• loss
• critical size

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No. U1760108 and 51874001. The authors are thankful to Shougang Jingtang United Iron and Steel Co., Ltd. for the support on the field test.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China: [Grant Number 51874001]; National Natural Science Foundation of China: [Grant Number U1760108].