Saint Petersburg Mining University, Saint Petersburg, Russia:

V. Yu. Bazhin, Head of the Industrial Automation Department, Doctor of Technical Sciences, Professor, e-mail: bazhin_vyu@pers.spmi.ru
G. V. Konovalov, Associate Professor at the Department of Metallurgy, Candidate of Technical Sciences
T. R. Kosovtseva, Associate Professor at the Department of Computer Science and Computer Technology, Candidate of Technical Sciences, e-mail: tkosov@list.ru

Montanuniversität, Leoben, Austria:

J. Schenk, Head of Chair of Ferrous Metallurgy, Full Professor, Dipl.-Ing., Dr. Techn.

The Bessemer process enabling to produce high-quality steels was implemented at steel mills of the Urals region more than 200 years ago. At the beginning of the 20^th century, the process was modified by scientists from the Mining Institute and was then adopted by copper and nickel alloy producers. The converter process became one of the key processing stages with Russian copper and nickel smelters. This paper examines certain ways to improve the tuyere air flow in a horizontal converter. The authors came up with a generic equation for calculating specific blast air pressure and discuss the use of hydrothermal and aerodynamic techniques for tuyere purging. The blast air limit was determined for a horizontal converter that is characterized with massive melt ejections. The authors demonstrate that, in spite of all the process and design improvements, the modern converter process still has three major drawbacks. They include process cycling, the gas ductwork not being completely tight, unbalanced thermal and chemical status of the vessel leading to excessive thermal and chemical loads on the tuyere zone and incomplete slag formation in zones that are farther from the tuyeres. Research work is ongoing on a novel continuous converter design which involves the use of special-design unsubmerged tuyeres. Such tuyeres produce spatially oriented high-pressure blasts which enable consistent rotation of the molten matte in a tight cylindrical vessel.

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