MANUFACTURING PROCESS

LESSON 22
MELTING PRACTICE - CUPOLA FURNACE
Electrodes
One of the most important elements in the electric circuit and
consumable cost in electric furnace steel making are the electrodes The electrodes deliver the power to the furnace in the
form of an electric arc between the electrode and the furnace
charge. The arc itself is a plasma of hot, ionic gasses in excess of
6,000F. Electrodes come in two forms: amorphous and
graphitic carbon, or graphite. Since only graphite electrodes are
used in steel making only they will be discussed here.

Electrodes are commonly available in sizes from 15 - 30 inches

in diameter varying lengths to 10 feet. They come in three
grades: regular and premium and the newer DC grade.
Basic Oxygen Furnace: Process Description
The oxygen steel making process converts the molten iron from
the blast furnace - with up to 30% steel scrap - into refined steel.
High purity oxygen is blown through the molten bath to lower
carbon, silicon, manganese, and phosphorous content of the
iron, while various fluxes are used to reduce the sulfur and
phosphorous levels. The impurities and a small amount of
oxidized iron are carried off in the molten slag that floats on
the surface of the hot metal.
BOF Facility

The actual furnaces are a small part of the facility as the schematic drawing shows. Gas cleaning devices and materials
handling equipment occupy most of the space.

Graphite electrodes are composed of a mixture of finely

divided, calcined petroleum coke mixed with about 30% coal tar
pitch as a binder, plus proprietary additives unique to each
manufacturer. This mixture is extruded at approximately 220F,
the softening temperature of pitch, to form a cylindrical rod
known as a green electrode. The green electrode is now given
a controlled bake in a reducing atmosphere at temperatures as
high 1800F and again impregnated with pitch to increase its
strength and density and lower the electrical resistivity. The
electrodes are now ready to be graphitized, i.e. converting the
amorphous carbon into crystalline graphite. This is accomplished by passing an electric current through them and heating
them to as much as 5000F. The graphitizing consumes as
much as 3000-5000kWH/ton of electrode. The final product is
strong, dense, and has a low electrical resistivity. Lastly the
electrode is machined to its final shape. Into each end of the
electrode is a recess in which threads are machined. These are
used to accept a threaded nipple manufactured in the same way
so that the electrode column can be lengthened as it is consumed.
Historically, electrode consumption has been as high as 12-14
pounds per tons of steel, but through continuous improvement in electrode manufacturing and steel making operations,
this has been reduced to the neighborhood 3.5 to 4.5 pounds
per ton. Most electrode consumption is through oxidation and
tip sublimation, with some small pieces lost around the
connecting joint. A considerable portion is also lost to mechanical breakage caused by scrap scrap cave-ins in the furnace or
crushing the electrode into the charge.

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Scrap Charging
The first step for making a heat of steel in a BOF is to tilt the
furnace and charge it with scrap. The furnaces are mounted on
trunnions and can be rotated through a full circle.
Molten Iron Charging
Hot metal from the blast furnace accounts for up to 80% of the
metallic charge and is poured from a ladle into the top of the
tilted furnace.
Furnace Operation
The charged furnace is returned to an upright position and a
water cooled oxygen lance is lowered from the top; oxygen is
blown into the bath at supersonic speeds causing rapid mixing
and heat from the oxidation of iron and impurities. Fluxes
(burnt lime, burnt dolomite, and fluorspar) are added to help
carry off the impurities in the floating slag layer. This step
requires only about 15 minutes of an overall 45 minute tap to
tap cycle time.
Tapping
After the steel has been refined, the furnace is tilted (opposite to
the charging side) and molten steel is poured out into a
preheated ladle. Alloys are added to the ladle during the pour to
give the steel the precise composition desired. In some steelmaking applications, further refining is conducted in the ladle to
remove oxygen and sulfur from the molten steel.
Cupola - A cylindrical, straight shaft furnace (usually lined with
refractories) for melting metal in direct contact with coke by
forcing air under pressure through openings near its base

Cupola Furnaces
Cupola furnaces are the oldest type of furnaces used in foundries. They are tall and roughly cylindrical and are most often
used for melting iron and ferro alloys. . Alternating layers of
metal and ferro alloys, coke, and limestone are fed into the

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Cupola furnaces are lined with refractories, or hard, heat

resistant substances such as fire clay, bricks or blocks. The
refractory protects the furnace shell from abrasion, heat and
oxidation. Over time the refractory breaks down and eventually
becomes part of the slag.
Cupola furnaces are usually attached to emissions control
systems to capture air emissions. Usually, the air emission
systems use either high energy wet scrubbers that use water to
remove air pollution from the gas stream or dry baghouse
systems that use fabric filters to capture the emissions.

This diagram of
a cupola
illustrates the
furnaces
cylindrical shaft
lined with
refractory and
the alternating
layers of coke
and metal scrap.
The molten
metal flows out
of a spout at the
bottom of the
cupola.

Steel-making processes
Abstract: Steel is made by the Bessemer, Siemens Open
Hearth, basic oxygen furnace, electric arc, electric highfrequency and crucible processes. In both the Acid Bessemer
and Basic Bessemer (or Thomas) processes molten pig iron
is refined by blowing air through it in an egg-shaped vessel,
known as a converter, of 15-25 tonnes capacity. In the
Siemens process, both acid and basic, the necessary heat for
melting and working the charge is supplied by oil or gas.
Both the gas and air are preheated by regenerators, two on
each side of the furnace, alternatively heated by the waste
gases. The regenerators are chambers filled with checker
brickwork, brick and space alternating. The high nitrogen
content of Bessemer steel is a disadvantage for certain cold
forming applications and continental works have, in recent
years, developed modified processes in which oxygen
replaces air.
Steel is made by the Bessemer, Siemens Open Hearth, basic
oxygen furnace, electric arc, electric high-frequency and crucible
processes.
Crucible And High-frequency Methods
The Huntsman crucible process has been superseded by the
high frequency induction furnace in which the heat is generated
in the metal itself by eddy currents induced by a magnetic field
set up by an alternating current, which passes round watercooled coils surrounding the crucible. The eddy currents increase
with the square of the frequency, and an input current which
alternates from 500 to 2000 hertz is necessary. As the frequency
increases, the eddy currents tend to travel nearer and nearer the
surface of a charge (i.e. shallow penetration). The heat developed in the charge depends on the cross-sectional area which
carries current, and large furnaces use frequencies low enough to
get adequate current penetration.
Automatic circulation of the melt in a vertical direction, due to
eddy currents, promotes uniformity of analysis. Contamination
by furnace gases is obviated and charges from 1 to 5 tonnes can
be melted with resultant economy. Consequently, these electric
furnaces are being used to produce high quality steels, such as
ball bearing, stainless, magnet, die and tool steels.

Cupola Furnace

Figure 1. Furnaces used for making pig iron and steels. RH side
of open hearth furnace shows use of oil instead of gas

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MANUFACTURING PROCESS

furnace from the top. Coke makes up 8 - 16% of the total

charge to provide the heat that melts the metal (USEPA, 1992).
Limestone is added to react with impurities in the metal and
floats to the top of the metal as it melts. As in steel melting,
this limestone/impurities combination is called slag. By floating
on top of the metal while it melts, the slag protects the metal
from oxidation.

MANUFACTURING PROCESS

Acid And Basic Steels

The remaining methods for making steel do so by removing
impurities from pig iron or a mixture of pig iron and steel
scrap. The impurities removed, however, depend on whether an
acid (siliceous) or basic (limey) slag is used. An acid slag
necessitates the use of an acid furnace lining (silica); a basic slag,
a basic lining of magnesite or dolomite, with line in the charge.
With an acid slag silicon, manganese and carbon only are
removed by oxidation, consequently the raw material must not
contain phosphorus and sulphur in amounts exceeding those
permissible in the finished steel.
In the basic processes, silicon, manganese, carbon, phosphorus
and sulphur can be removed from the charge, but normally the
raw material contains low silicon and high phosphorus
contents. To remove the phosphorus the bath of metal must
be oxidised to a greater extent than in the corresponding acid
process, and the final quality of the steel depends very largely on
the degree of this oxidation, before deoxidisers-ferro-manganese, ferro-silicon, aluminium-remove the soluble iron oxide
and form other insoluble oxides, which produce non-metallic
inclusions if they are not removed from the melt:
2Al + 3FeO (soluble) 3Fe + Al2O3 (solid)
In the acid processes, deoxidation can take place in the furnaces,
leaving a reasonable time for the inclusions to rise into the slag
and so be removed before casting. Whereas in the basic furnaces,
deoxidation is rarely carried out in the presence of the slag,
otherwise phosphorus would return to the metal. Deoxidation
of the metal frequently takes place in the ladle, leaving only a
short time for the deoxidation products to be removed. For
these reasons acid steel is considered better than basic for certain
purposes, such as large forging ingots and ball bearing steel.
The introduction of vacuum degassing hastened the decline of
the acid processes.
Bessemer Steel
In both the Acid Bessemer and Basic Bessemer (or Thomas)
processes molten pig iron is refined by blowing air through it in
an egg-shaped vessel, known as a converter, of 15-25 tonnes
capacity (Fig. 1). The oxidation of the impurities raises the
charge to a suitable temperature; which is therefore dependent
on the composition of the raw material for its heat: 2% silicon
in the acid and 1,5-2% phosphorus in the basic process is
normally necessary to supply the heat. The blowing of the
charge, which causes an intense flame at the mouth of the
converter, takes about 25 minutes and such a short interval
makes exact control of the process a little difficult.
The Acid Bessemer suffered a decline in favour of the Acid Open
Hearth steel process, mainly due to economic factors which in
turn has been ousted by the basic electric arc furnace coupled
with vacuum degassing.

Open-hearth Processes
In the Siemens process, both acid and basic, the necessary heat
for melting and working the charge is supplied by oil or gas.
But the gas and air are preheated by regenerators, two on each
side of the furnace, alternatively heated by the waste gases. The
regenerators are chambers filled with checker brickwork, brick
and space alternating.
The furnaces have a saucer-like hearth, with a capacity which
varies from 600 tonnes for fixed, to 200 tonnes for tilting
furnaces (Fig. 1). The raw materials consist essentially of pig
iron (cold or molten) and scrap, together with lime in the basic
process. To promote the oxidation of the impurities iron ore is
charged into the melt although increasing use is being made of
oxygen lancing. The time for working a charge varies from about
6 to 14 hours, and control is therefore much easier than in the
case of the Bessemer process.
The Basic Open Hearth process was used for the bulk of the
cheaper grades of steel, but there is a growing tendency to
replace the OH furnace by large arc furnaces using a single slag
process especially for melting scrap and coupled with vacuum
degassing in some cases.
Electric Arc Process
The heat required in this process is generated by electric arcs
struck between carbon electrodes and the metal bath (Fig. 1).
Usually, a charge of graded steel scrap is melted under an
oxidising basic slag to remove the phosphorus. The impure
slag is removed by tilting the furnace. A second limey slag is
used to remove sulphur and to deoxidise the metal in the
furnace. This results in a high degree of purification and high
quality steel can be made, so long as gas absorption due to
excessively high temperatures is avoided. This process is used
extensively for making highly alloyed steel such as stainless,
heat-resisting and high-speed steels.
Oxygen lancing is often used for removing carbon in the
presence of chromium and enables scrap stainless steel to be
used. The nitrogen content of steels made by the Bessemer and
electric arc processes is about 0,01-0,25% compared with about
0,002-0,008% in open hearth steels.
Oxygen processesThe high nitrogen content of Bessemer steel
is a disadvantage for certain cold forming applications and
continental works have, in recent years, developed modified
processes in which oxygen replaces air. In Austria the LID
process (Linz-Donawitz) converts low phosphorus pig iron
into steel by top blowing with an oxygen lance using a basic
lined vessel (Fig. 2b). To avoid excessive heat scrap or ore is
added. High quality steel is produced with low hydrogen and
nitrogen (0,002%). A further modification of the process is to
add lime powder to the oxygen jet (OLP process) when higher
phosphorus pig is used.

The Basic Bessemer process is used a great deal on the Continent

for making, from a very suitable pig iron, a cheap class of steel,
e.g. ship plates, structural sections. For making steel castings a
modification known as a Tropenas converter is used, in which
the air impinges on the surface of the metal from side tuyeres
instead of from the bottom. The raw material is usually melted
in a cupola and weighed amounts charged into the converter.

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The Kaldo (Swedish) process uses top blowing with oxygen

together with a basic lined rotating (30 rev/min) furnace to get
efficient mixing (Fig. 2a). The use of oxygen allows the
simultaneous removal of carbon and phosphorus from the (P,
1,85%) pig iron. Lime and ore are added. The German Rotor
process uses a rotary furnace with two oxygen nozzles, one in
the metal and one above it (Fig. 2c). The use of oxygen with
steam (to reduce the temperature) in the traditional basic
Bessemer process is also now widely used to produce low
nitrogen steel. These new techniques produce steel with low
percentages of N, S, P, which are quite competitive with open
hearth quality.

(a) Vacuum induction melting within a tank for producing

super alloys (Ni and Co base), in some cases for further
remelting for investment casting. Pure materials are used and
volatile tramp elements can be removed.
(b) Consumable electrode vacuum arc re-melting process (Fig. 4)
originally used for titanium, was found to eliminate hydrogen,
the A and V segregates and also the large silicate inclusions. This
is due to the mode of solidification. The moving parts in
aircraft engines are made by this process, due to the need for
high strength cleanness, uniformity of properties, toughness
and freedom from hydrogen and tramp elements.
(b) Electroslag refining (ESR) This process, which is a larger
form of the original welding process, re-melts a preformed
electrode of alloy into a water-cooled crucible, utilising the
electrical resistance heating in a molten slag pool for the heat
source (Fig. 5). The layer of slag around the ingot maintains
vertical unidirectional freezing from the base. Tramp elements
are not removed and lead may be picked up from the slag.

Other processes which are developing are the Fuel-oxygen-scrap,

FOS process, and spray steelmaking which consists in pouring
iron through a ring, the periphery of which is provided with
jets through which oxygen and fluxes are blown in such a way
as to atomise the iron, the large surface to mass ratio
provided in this way giving extremely rapid chemical refining
and conversion to steel.
Vacuum degassing is also gaining ground for special alloys. Some
14 processes can be grouped as stream, ladle, mould and
circulation (e.g. DH and RH) degassing methods, Fig. 3. The
vacuum largely removes hydrogen, atmospheric and volatile
impurities (Sn, Cu, Pb, Sb), reduces metal oxides by the C O
reaction and eliminates the oxides from normal deoxidisers and
allows control of alloy composition to close limits. The clean
metal produced is of a consistent high quality, with good
properties in the transverse direction of rolled products. Bearing
steels have greatly improved fatigue life and stainless steels can
be made to lower carbon contents.

Figure
Typical vacuum arc remelting
furnace

Figure
Electroslag remelting furnace

Notes:

Figure 3. Methods of degassing molten steel

Vacuum melting and ESR. The aircraft designer has continually
called for new alloy steels of greater uniformity and reproducibility of properties with lower oxygen and sulphur contents.
Complex alloy steels have a greater tendency to macro-segrega-

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MANUFACTURING PROCESS

tion, and considerable difficulty exists in minimising the nonmetallic inclusions and in accurately controlling the analysis of
reactive elements such as Ti, Al, B. This problem led to the use
of three processes of melting.