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By Wellington Ribeiro Moreirar, Anderson Willian Henrique Santini, Lívia Mara Cândido, Adriano Raimundo Totour

Rejects generated in mining projects usually do not have associated economic value. Most of the ore beneficiation processes occur by wet process with a higher fraction of water and ultrafine granulometry, which makes it difficult to dispose of these wastes. In 2013, studies with new tailings treatment and filtering technologies were initiated with the objective of eliminating the disposal of the residue generated in the industrial process to wet in dams. In this context, we tried to evaluate an alternative for the dewatering of the sludge and the tailings, aiming at their disposal in piles. Essentially, we sought to consolidate the application of the high-pressure filtration technology for the effluent dewatering, in order to allow its transport and its disposal in a sustainable way. The studies performed in a pilot filter showed good performance and allowed the industrial implantation. The studies and geotechnical indications of composite tailings (flotation and sludge) make it possible to dispose of the tailings in piles due to their better values of humidity, which allows them to be safely stacked.

Oct 3, 2019

By Dustin Vickress

The premature failure of copper staves in the lower stack and bosh is frequently the cause for an interim blast furnace repair at great cost to the blast furnace owner. Protective accretions may form on the stave hot face, but when these accretions are lost the staves can begin to deteriorate both due to abrasive wear from exposure to the descending burden materials and due to thermal cracking from exposure to hightemperature process excursions. These mechanisms can lead to failure of cooling passages, which forces blast furnace operators to shut off these channels, accelerating the rate of copper stave wear. Finger cooler technology was developed to extend blast furnace life by restoring cooling to damaged staves. Evidence for their effectiveness is presented herein in the form of experimental test work and conjugate heat transfer (CHT) analysis carried out using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations. These tests demonstrate that under typical blast furnace excursion conditions, a stave fitted with finger coolers will undergo half the temperature rise of a stave fitted with conventional cigar coolers.

Aug 17, 2017

By Julián Andrés Ortiz González

This work presents a series of experiments of Fatigue Crack Growth (FCG), which are intended to provide evidence about the main parameter controlling this phenomenon, whereas still no agreement about this, since the Paris´ theory is based on the principle that FCG is controlled by the ?K and the Elber´s theory says that the driving force is ?Keff. For the development of the experiments, some DC(T) specimens were machined with two different thicknesses: 2 and 30 mm to perform FCG tests in plane stress and plane strain state, respectively. Besides this, all FCG tests were carried out with a constant ?K e Kmax, measuring the strain with a Strain-Gage bonded on the back face of the specimen and seven Strain-Gages located on the crack growth path. The data needed to measure the crack opening load, and the ?Keff, were collected through a program developed in Labview. Finally, the data post-processing was carried out based on the ASTM standards and several articles of recognized authors in this field, in order to compare the two positions with the experimental data, and this way conclude which is the most consistent theory with the observed behavior.

Aug 16, 2017

By D. F. Rodríguez-Pérez, J. Salinas-Reyes, Luis R. Salazar-Garza, C. A. Gómez-De-La-Garza

The Pickling Line Tandem Cold Mill (PLTCM) from Ternium Pesquería started in 2013. It is a line with 5 stands, 6 high; focused mainly on the exposed automotive market, with a wide spread of products with high quality requirements. In addition the operational continuity is very important, for this, one of the greatest challenges is to ensure operational discipline, the order of production, the quality of the input (hot band), operational interruptions, equipment failure, breakage of strip in the mill, among others. In relation to this, it has a strong impact on productivity, customer compliance, damage to equipment, rolls, safety, quality, reprocessing among others. Here is present the results obtained in the project "decrease of strip breaks" which focused on several fronts, discipline in the order of production, previous review of raw material in surface and dimensional defects with automatic inspection equipment in the hot mill, as well as in PLTCM, generation of logic in the redundant systems of alerts and prevention to avoid or minimize strip breaks that were high impact in the past. All these multidisciplinary actions led as a whole to a significant improvement in the performance indicators of the PLTCM, in productivity, compliance, reprocessing and quality in the cold rolled mill.

Oct 1, 2019

By Geovane Viturino da Silva, Jeziel de Melo Canedo, André Wulff Hirano, Maxwell Pereira Cangani, Luiz Henrique Curado Ribeiro

With the deterioration of the quality of the iron ore, the new conditions of quality of the raw materials (mainly sinter feed) were adapted to their processes, resulting in the need for changes in the chemical quality of the sinter for blast furnaces in the Ternium Brazil, without changing the parameters of chemical, physical and metallurgical quality. Due to the change in this scenario, there was a great impact on the quality of the fine iron ore this year in 2019, due to which the work ranges of sinter MgO and B2 were currently modified to minimize these impacts in the blast furnaces of Ternium Brazil. This work aims to minimize the effects of the sinter worsening, with the reduction of the sinter MgO and B2 bands, with an increase of 2% in the mixture yield and FeT elevation in the range of 1.6% in the sinter product.

Oct 1, 2019

By D. A. Aranda-Regino, C. Gómez-de-la-Garza, J. Ramírez-Cuellar, L. A. Leduc-Lezama

The Pickling Line Tandem Cold Mill (PLTCM) at Ternium’s Pesqueria plant with a 5 stands, 6 high configuration started in 2013. At the time of the start up the work roll specification and grinding practices were stablished following a low risk policy to be able to sustain any start-up associated accident. Once a stable operation has been achieved both these policies are being modified to improve productivity and reduce costs. The specified hardness of the rolls has been increased and efforts are being made to optimize the grinding according to the rolling campaign length and materials. The fatigue damage in work rolls, after rolling and its removal by grinding was followed by hardness measurements made at the end of the rolling campaign and after grinding. Softening of the rolls after rolling was found mainly in final stands to be related to the averaged stress experienced during the campaign, the original roll hardness was recovered after grinding. Hardness evolution was also followed after each grinding step finding that the total amount of grinding could be reduced. The grinding practice was modified accordingly for the first stands and the yield of work rolls in them has improved.

Oct 1, 2019

By Fernando Velazquez Guzman

Titanium is an alloying element used to refine grain size in steel and improve its physical and mechanical properties. In some stainless steels it is used to increase the resistance to corrosion by the precipitation of titanium carbides or carbonitrides. Its alloying performance is highly variable and depends largely on the stage of the secondary metallurgy process when it is added. Furthermore, the addition method (wire injection or direct addition) has a remarkable influence in secondary refining. This paper describes the tests performed in vacuum degasser (VD), with a highly compacted and encapsulated Ferrotitanium wire (FeTi HC). The yield of titanium in steel increased from 52% to 89%. Moreover, the consumption of the highly compacted Ferrotitanium was optimized.

Oct 30, 2017

By Daniel Andrade Paes de Lima, Gerson Evaristo de Paula Júnior, Beatriz Fausta Gandra

The gradual reduction of the sinter feed size has been a complicating factor in the maintenance of sintering productivity. In addition, pellet feeds have been used for chemical correction. Because of this, it is necessary an effective cold agglomeration step in sintering to keep the ironmaking competitiveness. Thus, in the present paper, four different technological routes for cold agglomeration with sinter feeds (drum mixer, intensive mixer + drum, double drum and HPS - Hybrid Pelletized Sinter) were evaluated in pilot scale and their impacts on the indicators of the sintering and the sinter quality was obtained. It was found that the best results on granulation index and, consequently, productivity were obtained in the route using HPS. However, the sinter from this process was the most fragile among the analyzed ones. The performance of the double drum process was superior to the intensive mixer from the point of view of productivity and sinter quality.

Oct 1, 2019

By Davi Silva Braga, Alexssander Lopes Sampaio, Rodrigo Carneiro de Oliveira

Vallourec was world pioneer in the deployment, development and consolidation of technology for the use of pulverized charcoal as the main energy source on the first Grate-kiln pelletizing plant in Brazil. The objective of this work was to delve into the subject and to bring more information about this innovative practice of Vallourec that has been attracting the attention of other companies in the steel industry. Industrial tests confirmed the technical feasibility, taking Vallourec ahead in the project of adaptation and investment. With consolidated data of two years and five months from the beginning of the implementation, the main benefits are the average reduction of CO₂e emissions by 50%, cost reduction higher than expected and return on investment in just 19 months.

Oct 1, 2019

By Emerson Sena Balbino, Emylle Alves Leitão, Gabriel Arthur Guieiro, Lucas van Melis

The deployment of autonomous haulage system causes several impacts in mining production chain, being necessary an appropriate change management policy, crucial to observe and gather all the benefits brought by the technology. The change management is also necessary to guarantee the adaptability of the organization in the long term. This paper briefly presents the technology deployed in the autonomous trucks at Vale's iron ore Brucutu mine, the changes that the operation team faces in the adoption of autonomous technology and the required training path to develop new procedures to deal with the sensitivity of the autonomous haulage system, besides the new operational dynamics from a process point of view, with safer, more consistent and more productive operations.

Oct 3, 2019

By Henrique Dias Gatti Turrer, Marcelo Nazaro Silva, Henrique Lopes Martins Pereira, Claudio Luis Goulart

The Minas-Rio industrial complex uses a pipeline with extension of 529 Km to transport the iron ore concentrate to the filtering industrial complex and exporting port. Since project phase, bench lab tests have provided important information for the pumped slurry rheology control. Based in these tests results was possible to verify the effects of slurry stability, rheology controller type and particle size distribution in the regrinded concentrate yield stress and relative viscosity. Controlling some characteristics of pumped slurry, such as particle size distribution, pH and solids concentration guaranteed to achieve the necessary rheology properties for its safe pumping through pipeline and resulted in a performance improvement over the years.

Oct 3, 2019

By Ádria Rocha Corrêa

Durante a solidificação de ligas metálicas, o produto fundido se contrai, o qual provoca o surgimento de espaçamentos vazios na interface metal/molde chamados de “gaps”. Estes gaps causam o aumento da resistência térmica influenciando em toda a cinética da solidificação. A transferência de calor durante a solidificação depende do conhecido parâmetro chamado de coeficiente global de transferência de calor ( hg). Este parâmetro é representado pela equação do tipo: hg =C.t-n, a qual indica que a eficiência térmica na interface metal/molde decai com o tempo. Muitos parâmetros podem influenciar o coeficiente global de transferência de calor (hg), neste estudo, os percentuais de Sn em ligas do sistema Al-Sn são analisados (10,20,30 e 40%Sn). Portanto, o principal objetivo deste estudo é propor uma relação matemática que descreva, para o sistema Al-Sn, a evolução hg em função do teor de Sn. A relação matemática foi obtida através do método dos mínimos quadrados

Aug 17, 2017

By José Divo Bressan

Present work examines material surface damage by cavitation erosion of metals or the wear phenomenon from water bubbles collapse near the metallic surface. Material surface damage by cavitation erosion is due to wear mechanisms of liquid micro-jets impingement and shock waves. Experimental cavitation in tap water was investigated, using the proposed new design of compact rotating disk equipment. In this device, a rotating disk with cavitation inducers and specimens fixed on it ran in tap water to provide cavitating flow at constant high speed of 47.9 m/s similar to service conditions in pumps and propellers. Two types of cavitation inducers in the rotating disk were investigated: through-holes and pins. Carburized cast iron, aluminum, brass and bronze specimens were tested in this device. The cavitation damage mechanisms were observed by scanning electron microscope. Surface damage in the specimens was measured by mass loss and plotted in graphs of mass loss versus running time. After 25 hours testing, the specimens surface showed pitting formation and mass loss. All specimens presented surface damage: pit diameter size was about 100 or 150 to 300 micron. In aluminum specimen, damages by burned pit formation and plastic deformation could be seen, however, the mass loss was lower than the expected, possibly due to alumina film formation. Present equipment had quite good test reproducibility when compared with results from literature.

Jul 31, 2018

By Alexandre Gonçalves Andrade, Crisley Dellaqua Pacheco, Gabriel Miranda Teixeira, Aline Maria Santoro Nasaré, Tatiane Ferreira Alvarenga

Diffuse emissions are that directly related to particulate matter suspended from civil structures, materials disposed in conveyor belts carried out by wind, stack e reclaimers operations and that one where dust collectors are not able to act correctly. Vale implemented in the last years a unique system capable to measure this kind of dust, called RAMPs (Dust Monitoring Automatic Network), which creates an analytical net in Tubarao industrial site, located in Vitória, ES. In order to prevent diffuse emissions in Tubarao’s pellets stockyard, it was proposed and developed a predictive model based on operational and climate variables available on the site, using big data and advanced analytics tools. The models developed shows to be adherent to the real emissions rates measured by the RAMPs and proved to be an efficient tool to predict emissions over the internal target with 4 hours of precedence.

Oct 1, 2019

By Luiz Peixoto, Andrea Falcon

There are a few ways to impact the capacity of a reciprocating compressor, by altering suction and discharge pressure and recirculation. By reducing the pressure drop in the section before the compressor it is possible to provide a higher suction pressure and subsequently achieve a higher compressor flow rate. The increase in the suction pressure while maintaining the discharge pressure reduced the demanded compressor Head. When considering oxygen compressors it is necessary to cautiously evaluate the safety norms and parameters due to the risk of explosions and fires due to high oxygen velocity.

Oct 3, 2019

By Breno Totti Maia

In the present paper, a new energy balance equation was developed, considering the slag phase, in order to define the effects of jet penetration and determine a new value for the factor K. The factor K measure the resistance to momentum transference between exit nozzle and metallic bath. The experiments were performed based on the same conditions of the article used as a comparison. The results showed the same behavior between the experiments and it was possible to determine a new value for the factor K, which changed from the unit order for the metal phase system to hundredths order for the metal and slag phase systems. These results are considered unprecedented.

Aug 17, 2017

By Paulo Rodrigues dos Santos Junior, Luciano Passos de Jesus, Vagno Dordenoni Beltrame, Vinicius Antonio Ramos Pin

Faced with an increasingly demanding and selective market, a thorough analysis of each step of the processes is required in order to achieve high levels of performance. In addition to a major factor of importance in the rolling process, due to its high price, the rolls represent one of the main items in the cost of hot coils production. Using the 6 sigma methodology, there were opportunities for improvement in the grinding process, fatigue analysis, improvement in NDT in rolls, as well as means to guarantee operational stability, which allowed the reduction of roll’s consumption and consequently the cost of production.

Oct 11, 2019

By Elizaveta Cheremisina

In steelmaking process lime serves as flux. Rapid lime assimilation and slag formation of the desired composition have a significant effect on the refining reactions. It is important to know the rate limiting step of lime dissolution to control and improve the converter process. Kinetics of pure CaO and industrial lime dissolution in model slag has been studied in the range of temperatures 1300 –1600°C. Lime samples were prepared in cylinder form and immersed in the melt for predetermined time. Considering the total mass balance of CaO in the slag and linear dimensions of lime samples, mass transfer coefficients were derived. Diffusion coefficients were calculated under conditions of non-stationary diffusion. The derived activation energy of less than 200 kJ/mol indicates that diffusion is the limiting step in the process of lime-dissolution in slag.

Oct 30, 2017

By Anivaldo Chevane, Leonardo Xerinda, Rogério Sendela, Andre Vilanculos

Moatize Coal Mine is located in Tete Province, in centre of Mozambique. The deposit contains Gondwana allochthonous coals, and has a large amount of mudstone and siltstone banding. Phosphorus levels in the coal can be high which impacts the use of the coals in steel making where phosphorus is considered a contaminant. The Chipanga seam in the Moatize deposit shows considerable variability, vertically within the seam and laterally across the deposit. The data available from the exploration work indicates that the phosphorus is predominantly present as Apatite but the Crandallite minerals also are significant. The concentration of phosphorus varies with coal particle density with the highest phosphorus levels found for the mid density coal which also shows the highest likely levels of apatite or fluorapatite. Crandallite minerals show higher potential concentrations in the Lower density coal..

Oct 3, 2019

By Osvaldo Guilherme Comineli

While the hot cracking of Cu-containing steels is a serious and widely known problem for the industry, the literature reports that copper only slightly impairs the hot-ductility measured in laboratory. A distinction is drawn between hot ductility and hot shortness and the respective cracking operating mechanism involved at the respective range of temperature. The representability of the laboratory assessment of hot cracking of Cu-containing steels by hot tensile tests compared with actual results in industrial practice is discussed. The effectiveness of the variable affecting in each cracking mechanism and respective temperature range, focused in improving the hot cracking assessment of Cu-steels and the relative importance of oxidation will also be discussed. It is concluded that the hot tensile test in argon might be a good simulation if properly interpreted and that the role of oxidation is secondary in causing hot shortness. A schematic diagram for the hot tensile test is proposed.

Oct 30, 2017