06-10-2021

MM439: Iron and steel making

Manish M. Pande,
Dept. of Meta. Engg. & Mat. Sci.,
IIT Bombay, Mumbai
October 2021

Primary steel Making – Basic Oxygen Steelmaking

• History

• Operation

• Construction

• Mass and Heat Balance

• Refining

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Primary steel Making – Basic Oxygen Steelmaking

History

Ancient times

Early 1970s

1850

Late 1970s
1879

Early 1980s
1950
Image- Steeluniversity.org

Primary steel Making – Typical Process Input

Hot metal composition – C- 4.2-4.8%, Si- 0.4-1.0%, Mn- 0.3-0.9%, P- 0.08%, S-

0.02-0.04%, O-negligible

Temperature -1300-1350 OC

Scrap, Lime, Iron ore, Oxygen

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Operation Schematic of operational steps in BOF

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3
1 2

Oxygen lance 2-2.5 m, Progressively lowered

Lime Dissolution
Carbon refining
Si, Mn, P removal
In-blow or sub-lance or manual sampling
Trimming during last part of blow
5 6
Total time 40-45 mins
Ref- Steelmaking and refining volume

Construction details of Basic Oxygen Furnace

Combined blowing

Ref- Steelmaking and refining volume

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Primary steel Making – Basic Oxygen Steelmaking

Basic Oxygen Furnace Configuration MSTS, 10th ed.

Basic Oxygen Steelmaking - Refractory lining

Refractory properties
• Oxidation resistance (Cone)
• Resistance to molten metal erosion (taphole)
• Resistance to mechanical impact, abrasion from scrap
(charge pad, bottom)
• Resistance to corrosive slag (taphole, turndown slaglines)
• Resistance to thermal shock (bottom, stadium)

Refractory composition
• Magnesia-graphite (Slag and metal erosion, oxidizing
atmosphere)
• Pitch impregnated burnt magnesia (mechanical impact
abrasion)
• Resin bonded low-C refractories with anti-oxidants (high-
temperature, oxidizing atmosphere)
BOF cross section

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Temperature measurements on a converter shell and trunnion ring

Shell temperature measurement on a 220 ton BOF

Temperature measurements on a converter shell and trunnion ring

Temperature measurements on a converter shell and trunnion ring

Operating and Maximum wear profile on an

extended campaign life of 15000 heats

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BOF – Oxygen lance technology

Schematic presentation of (a) LD/BOF with conventional lance (b) with lance
provided with post-combustion nozzles
Image- Treatise on process metallurgy

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BOF – Oxygen lance technology

Convergent-Divergent Nozzle

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Mass Balance in BOF

- Law of conservation of mass

- Batch or Continuous process

- Principles of stoichiometry (processes that involve chemical reactions

resulting in formation, consumption and/or transformation of compounds)

- Holds on for total mass of materials and not on the moles

- A convenient basis for the calculation needs to be chosen

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Mass Balance in BOF

Input Output
O2

Pig iron (Hot

Liquid Steel
Metal)
+
Scrap
+ Slag
Lime

Gas

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Heat Balance in BOF

• Law of conservation of energy, specially the First law of thermodynamics

– a sound basis for setting up the energy or heat balance
• Various heat effects: Temperature change (sensible heat), changes due to
state of aggregation (melting, phase transformation), chemical reaction
and mixing and dilution in solutions

Sensible heat of input material (pig iron, lime and gases) + Heat of
reaction (oxide formation) and mixing = Sensible heat of Products
(Liquid steel, slag and gases)

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Mass and Heat Balance in BOF

Input Output
O2

Pig iron (Hot Liquid Steel (C,

Metal: C, Si, Mn, P, S)
Si, Mn, P, S, O)
+
Scrap (composition
same as liquid steel) Slag (CaO, SiO2,
MnO, P2O5, FeO,
+ MgO)
Lime (CaO)
Gas (CO, CO2)

Sensible heat of input materials + Heat of reactions and mixing = Sensible heat of Products

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