During the past few years, efforts were incessantly aimed at increasing the life of the refractory lining and thus making the production process more cost-effective. The optimaiity criterion for targeting higher ladle life was assumed to be the higher refractory life of the ladle metal zone as slag zone bricks can be repaired during ladle campaign life. Hence, selection of high performance refractory for the metal zone is the most important aspect of ladle life.Slag compatibility with the refractory lining for suitable glaze formation to control corrosion and controlling thermal expansion behaviour and oxidation are the major issues for metal zone refractory life. Different types of refractory like AMC, spinel, magnesia-carbon were tried in the metal zone. The AMC bricks used in the lower metal zone were eroding faster due to high corrosion of the AMC bricks with the bottom slag. To resist the slag corrosion, magnesia-carbon bricks were tried in the lower metal zone. The slag corrosion resistances of magnesia-carbon bricks was found better than AMC bricks as the dissolution rate of tabular based AMC in the ladle slag was observed faster than the magnesia-carbon. Magnesia carbon bricks and fired spinel bricks made from of a typical mineral recipe consisting of low porosity fused alumina and fine (<20 micron) pre-fired spinel in the matrix were tried in full metal zone.The present paper deals with the comparative analysis of properties, performance and techno-economical feasibility of different types of refractory used in the steel metal zone.
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