Numerical Analysis on Velocity and Temperature of the Fluid in a Blast Furnace Main Trough

• Main Authors: Yao Ge, Meng Li, Han Wei, Dong Liang, Xuebin Wang, Yaowei Yu
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2020-02-01
• Series: Processes
• Subjects: main trough; transient fluid of hot metal and molten slag; wall shear stress; conjugate heat transfer; refractory
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9717/8/2/249

The main trough is a part of the blast furnace process for hot metal and molten slag transportation from the tap hole to the torpedo, and mechanical erosion of the trough is an important reason for a short life of a campaign. This article employed OpenFoam code to numerically study and analyze velocity, temperature and wall shear stress of the fluids in the main trough during a full tapping process. In the code, a three-dimensional transient mass, momentum and energy conservation equations, including the standard k-ε turbulence model, were developed for the fluid in the trough. Temperature distribution in refractory is solved by the Fourier equation through conjugate heat transfer with the fluid in the trough. Change velocities of the fluid during the full tapping process are exactly described by a parabolic equation. The investigation results show that there are strong turbulences at the area of hot metal’s falling position and the turbulences have influence on velocity, temperature and wall shear stress of the fluid. With the increase of the angle of the tap hole, the wall shear stress increases. Mechanical erosion of the trough has the smallest value and the campaign of the main trough is estimated to expand over 5 days at the tap hole angle of 7°.