SMELTING OF IRON

Outline
Iron Ores

Flux

General view of Blast

Furnace plant

Charging Mechanism in
Blast Furnace

Sketch of Blast Furnace

Smelting operation

Chemical Reactions in
Construction and
Blast Furnace
working of Blast Furnace
Formation and tapping
Blast Furnace Charge
of slag
Metallurgical Coke
Coke Manufacturing & Pig Iron- Properties &
uses
its Quality

Iron Ores

The most important variety of iron ore are:

Nomenclature Composition Fe %age

Location
Makarwal, Swabi, Chitral (PAK),
Land of midnight sun (Sweden),
Pennsylvania(USA), Siberia(Russia)

Magnetite
(Black oxide)

Fe3O4

72.4

Hematite (red,
brown &
black)

Fe2O3

40-65

Kala bagh, Chnari, Chaghi, Chalghazi (PAK),

Lake superior, Utah (USA), Lorraine (France),
Amazon basin (Brazil)

Limonite &
other
hydroxide
types of ores

2Fe2O3 . H2O
to
Fe2O3 . 3H2O

20-55

Not found in PAK,

Britains East coast

Siderite

FeCO3

Low in
Fe

Hazara, Mardan (PAK),

South Wales, Staffordshire &west York (UK)

Iron Pyrite
(yellow)

FeS

42

Mardan, Chitral (PAK)

General view of Blast Furnace plant

Sketch of Blast Furnace Plant

Sketch of Blast Furnace

Construction and working of Blast Furnace

Blast furnace consists of a vertical steel shell ~100 ft
high & ~ 21 ft dia and lined with refractory material.
It has a charging arrangement (Bell & Cone) at the
top. Raw material is charged by a skip car through
this charging mechanism into the blast furnace.
It has a means of running off Pig iron & Slag at the
bottom.
Air is blown in near the bottom of the furnace. This
forced draught increases the speed of combustion &
maintains the necessary high temperature.
Cooling water is circulated around the Bosh area in
order to protect the furnace from high temp.

Blast furnace diagram

1. Hot blast from Cowper
stoves
2. Melting zone (bosh)
3. Reduction zone of ferrous
oxide (barrel)
4. Reduction zone of ferric
oxide (stack)
5. Pre-heating zone (throat)
6. Feed of ore, limestone,
and coke
7. Exhaust gases
8. Column of ore, coke and
limestone
9. Removal of slag
10. Tapping of molten
pig iron
11. Collection of waste gases

Blast Furnace Charge

BF charge consists of the following:
Iron ore ; iron oxide in lump or sinter form
Fuel ; coke
Flux ; limestone

In addition Hot air is admitted through the

tuyeres

Metallurgical Coke

Coke is a solid carbonaceous material derived from

destructive distillation of low-ash, low-sulfur
bituminous coal.
The volatile constituents of the coalincluding water,
coal-gas, and coal-tarare driven off by baking in an
airless oven at temperatures as high 1000 C.
Metallurgical coke is produced by carbonization of
coal at high temperatures to produce a macroporous
carbon material of high strength and relatively large
lump size.
Notes:
Metallurgical cokes must have a high strength to support
heavy loads in the blast furnace without disintegration.

Coke Manufacturing Process

Bituminous coal is pulverized by ball mill into fine
powder.
Fine coal is heated in coke oven battery at 700900
C in absence of air. This process is called
Carbonization.
After soaking at this temperature for about 78 hrs.,
it is allowed to cool in the furnace.
Due to coking property of bituminous coal powdered
coal converts into lump size and becomes very hard
and highly porous.
After cooling, the coke produced is crushed into
desired size.

Coke Manufacturing Process

Strength of the coke,
fixed Carbon (88-92%),
sulphur content and
ash content
is determined in the testing laboratory for
justifying the quality of the coke.
By-products like tar may also be collected during
carbonization process.

Quality Control and Standards

Coking coal used should have
low ash content,
low sulphur and
should be highly coking in nature for better quality of coke.
Other properties like
porosity,
abrasive strength and
hardness
must be checked in the laboratory for maintaining the
quality of Metallurgical coke.

Flux
Flux is a material, which is added to the
contents of a Blast furnace or a Cupola for
the purpose of purging the metal of
impurities, and of rendering the slag more
liquid.
The flux most commonly used in iron and
steel furnaces is limestone, which is charged
in the proper proportions with the iron ore
and fuel.

Charging Mechanism in Blast Furnace

Smelting operation
Smelting consists of two operations :
a- Chemical reduction of iron from its oxides by
CO, which is formed by the combustion of C in the
coke with the O2 of the air blast admitted through
the tuyeres near the base.
b- The liquefaction of the gangue by means of flux
(limestone) to form a fusible slag which will run
from the furnace.

Smelting operation
During

the

production

of

pig

iron

(smelting

operation) large amount of gases are evolved ,

which contain about 30% CO having considerable
calorific value.
The exit gases are collected, led through downcomer pipe to a cleaning chamber and electrostatic
dust precipitator & then used as fuel gas in Cowper
Stoves in order to pre-heat the air blast to the
furnace.

Chemical Reactions in Blast Furnace

The air, which is blown at the bottom of the furnace
causes partial combustion of the coke :

2C + O2 = 2CO + Heat

As the CO, which is powerful reducing agent,

rises through the charge, it chemically reduces the
iron oxide :-

Fe2O3 + 3CO = 2Fe +3CO2

 Reduction sequence of iron oxide is as

Fe2O3
Fe3O4
FeO
Fe, when temp is > 570 C
Fe2O3

Fe3O4

Fe,

when temp is < 570 C

The equation # 2 takes place in the upper part of

the furnace, where the temp is too low to melt the
iron formed.
The iron therefore remains as a spongy mass until
it moves down into the lower part of the furnace,
where it melts & runs down over the hot coke,
dissolving C, S, Mn, P & Si as it goes.

SLAG: The slag is a liquid mixture of ash, flux,

and other impurities.
Formation and tapping of Slag
At the time of the reduction of iron oxide, the
gangue, which is composed of silica, combines
with lime to produce slag as :2CaO + SiO2 = 2CaO.SiO2
(Calcium silicate slag)
Calcium silicate slag has much lower melting point
than silica and can run from the furnace quite easily.
The furnace is tapped at regular intervals & the pig
iron is run either into large ladles for transference,
while still molten, to steel making plant, or
alternatively, cast into pigs for subsequent use in the
cupola or open hearth furnace.

Slag(Continue)

Limestone has an other function

the removal of sulphur.
This entails having an excess of lime in the slag and
is often impracticable with low grade ores, since they
contain so much silica, which must be neutralized first.
In British practice the sulphur is removed at a later
stage by adding soda-ash to molten pig iron as it
runs from the blast furnace into the ladle:FeS

(Iron sulphide

Na2CO3 =
Soda ash

in the pig iron)

FeO +

Na2S
joins the slag

CO2

Tapping of Slag

Pig Iron - Properties & uses

Definition:- It is a high-carbon iron made by reduction of
iron ore in the blast furnace.

Metallic iron, which is a product of reduction of

of iron ore, appears in the lower part of stack & in
the bosh.

It contains ~ 1 % C and found to in spongy form. As

this material sinks down in the B.F. and is heated
further, iron dissolves C in increasing quantities.
This reduces the melting temp & it melts and draws
off to the hearth in the form of drops.

Pig Iron (Continue)

Pig iron is really a complex alloy. In addition
to Fe, it contains up to 10 % of other
elements, mainly, C, Mn, Si, S & P.
Total amount of C in the pig iron is usually
between 3 4% & is present either as
compound, iron carbide (Fe3C) or as uncombined carbon in the form of graphite.
Pig iron low in S & high in P may be used in
the manufacture of acid steel & high-duty
iron castings.

Thanks