Why attend metal exhibitions? SUBCONTRATACIÓN ’21 and METAL MADRID 21
26 de November de 2021
Steelmaking in an electric arc furnace
26 de March de 2023
Steel manufacturing in Blast Furnace
Starting from iron as raw material, both in the form of ore and concentrated in the form of synthesized, pellets, etc., it is melted in a blast furnace (as can be seen in image 2), with coal and coke, helped by fluxes. In this fusion process, a mass of liquid steel is formed covered by a fluid slag in which a large part of the impurities remain. The objective is to obtain liquid iron pig iron.
Periodically, the lower part of the furnace (crucible) is emptied and the slag is removed. The drawing shows the exit holes for the pig iron and the slag with impurities.
Blast furnace diagram
The pig iron is transported in closed ladles to keep it in a liquid state to the refining facilities where secondary metallurgy is carried out. This process will determine both the chemical composition of the steel and its metallurgical quality in terms of cleanliness of impurities and low content of gases such as oxygen and nitrogen.
The most used type of installation is the LD converter, which is a cylindrical container with a conical top in which liquid iron is deposited and oxygen is injected to maintain its temperature and facilitate the cleaning of impurities. Another widely used process is called AOD, but there are more names with variants applied to the original LD.
From this point in the process, we can say that we have steel, although still in a liquid state.
In subsequent posts we will see the solidification and transformation processes until reaching commercial steel products as we know them in industrial practice when we manufacture parts with high or low mechanical demands.
Do you have questions about the process or want to make a query?
