EFFECT OF BLENDING OF QUARTZITE ON THE PROPERTIES OF SILICA BRICKS

摘要

The quality of silica bricks largely depends on the inherent properties of quartzite; and it varies mostly with the change of sources. In accordance, the product properties get affected which get reflected during service. This article mainly focuses on the property improvement of silica bricks with usage of raw materials from different sources and finally establishing the fact that blending of appropriate raw material from different sources can actually lead to enhanced product properties. Different set up of experiments were conducted with varying raw material sources and satisfying results were obtained with respect to transformation and thermal expansion behaviour in bricks, the prominent amongst all being that for the blended raw material composition. Crack is a very common phenomenon in silica bricks resulting due to the stress generated within the brick during heating and/or cooling cycles. The process of blending helps in crack minimization to a huge extent. The blending process utilizes the advantages and disadvantages of either of the blended raw materials thereby resulting in the optimization of all the desired final product properties. The X-Ray Diffraction of various brick samples were carried out to characterize the phases present. Apart from these, brick properties like apparent porosity (AP), bulk density (BD), cold crushing strength (CCS), true specific gravity (TSG), and permanent linear change (PLC), Creep are also correlated with the individual raw material analysis report.