Increasing the Refractory Wear Profile Control on the Steel Ladles at the VM do Brazil

摘要

A significant improvement of the steel ladle performance was achieved by permanent statistical track of the main operational factors affecting the steel ladle performance at V&M do Brazil. The work was based on the identification and selection of the major metallurgical and operational variables responsible to refractory wear and failures and its continuous statistical monitoring. The main variables that show a directly correlation with the refractory wearing performance were: Number of days of ladle in campaign, number of heats per day during the campaign, time process in VD, %MgO in ladle furnace slag, binary basicity in the secondary refining slag, average power on time in ladle furnace and amount of addition of fluorine in ladle furnace per heat. This paper describes specific points in this development that resulted in significant reduction of the major wearing factors. The resulting ladle life increase and the reduction of failures attained in the last seven years and continuing are a clear demonstration of the benefits.