Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Introduction
Electroslag remelting (ESR), also known as electro-flux remelting, is a process of remelting and refining steel and other alloys for mission-critical applications in aircraft, thermal power stations, nuclear power plants, military
technology, et al
Electro-slag remelting is used to manufacture high quality ingots. ESR
uses a consumable electrode made of cast metal. AC current is passed
through the electrode to produce electrical arcing and this melts the metal.
The molten metal is collected in a water cooled mold. Electrode is gradually
lifted and as the metal melts it forms an ingot in shape of the mold. The
arc is always submerged in slag. This prevents any contamination from atmosphere and it also absorbs already present impurities from the melt. The
overall yield of this process is low. The costs of production is high, and
products from this operations cant be used casually.
This report describes the design principles underlying an ESR plant.
Problem Description
An ESR plant is to be designed that can produce cylindrical ingots of following specification.
diameter range: 130-300mm
length: 1500mm
Typical alloys to be produced
High speed steel (High Segregation)
Hot die steel (High Segregation)
Stainless Steel (Low Segregation)
High quality of the product is the primary design criterion. All facilities
including auxiliaries must be optimized for maximum production.
3
3.1
Machine Specifications
Mechanical aspects
3.2
Mold Design
The copper mold used has a melting point of 1085 degrees C. The melt is at
about 1500o C. The mold is prevented from melting by cooling the mold with
running water. The mold has to dissipate heat. Assuming a realistic amount
to be 2.5MW/m2 .
T
(1)
Q = 2.5 106 = k
x
The slag temperature is 1900o C. And we dont want the temperature inside
the pipe to reach 250o C. The temperature difference would be around T =
170o C. This gives us the thickness of the mold
x = 25.5mm
.
The hydraulic radius is calculated as
Hydraullic Radius=
Area
P erimeter
. Using this for the water jacket we observe that deq = 2x = 51mm
Nu =
hdeq
= 0.023Re0.8
P r1/3
d
Kw
(2)
v deq
(3)
Red =
hT = 2.5 106
taking temperature drop at surface to be 50degC. We get h = 50000W/m2 K.
Using this we calculate deq , by putting this in equation 2 and eliminating
using equation 3. We get deq as
0.6 0.023 2.291/3 Re0d .8
deq =
50000
Here we take Prandtl number(Pr) 2.29 based on the value of h.
Melting rate of tool steel = 0.2kg/mm of perimeter
Therefore for our scenario melt rate = 200kg/hr
(4)
(5)
deq
(6)
This gives Pressure difference of 22781 Pa. Here friction factor is taken as
0.015 for highly turbulent flow, also length of the mold is taken as 0.5m .
Work is given by
P
v2
+ g(z2 z1 ) +
(7)
Ws =
2
3.3
3.3.1
The mast supports the entire weight of the electrode, electrode gripping
system and the platform that it is mounted on. To have smooth operation
4
as well as long life we should use two masts to support the system. This
will prevent buckling that might occur in single mast systems over time. To
produce a 130mm ingot the electrode must be a little less is diameter so
that it can be accommodated in the mold. We take electrode diameter to be
90mm. Using this we calculate the height if the ingot. This turns out to be
3.4 meters. Including all other machinery that is installed the height of the
mast must be atleast 4 meters. For this the height of the building must be
at least 5 meters.
3.3.2
Drive
Two drives are needed in our ESR apparatus. One drive for electrode movement and another for mold movement. The heaviest electrode that our machine needs to lift is about 850kg(a little more than the heaviest ingot that
is produced). We have a desired production rate i.e the rate of movement of
mold. This is taken to be about 50mm/min. This is used to estimate motor
speed and such. We use a standard screw of 5TPI (Turns per inch). This
gives rotation rate of 10 RPM. This is the rotation of the screw. This motion
is transfer to screw using a motor.
The motor is a key element of the system. The standard DC motor
available in market is at 1500 RPM. To get 10 RPM at screw we add a
reduction gear box of reduction = 150. This tremendously increases the
torque of the motor.
Speed control is of utmost importance to robust design so we need to
have a feedback sensor along with the ball-screw. This feedback is used by
the control system to adjust the speed of electrode
The speed of the electrode can be calculated using electrode diameter,
ingot diameter and mold speed
velectrode =
dinogt
delectrode
vi ngot
.
For 130 mm case vinogt = 4.79RP M . So we can use a similar motor to
drive the electrode with gear box of 30. The other electrodes are closer in
diameter to the ingot so their speed is less than 5RPM.
The extreme position of the moving platform must have a safety switch.
So we need to install safety switches at bottom of the mold. These stop the
machine in an event of overshoot.
6
3.3.3
Electrode Handling
3.3.4
Slag Handling
A spout is created in the mold that can be opened to let the slag out. Slag
has often calcium fluoride which produces Hydrofluoric acid which is small in
amount but prolonged exposure can be dangerous. For sake of worker safety
the mold is covered from top and an exhaust pipe is added. Another hopper
is need to be present with mold to add new slag powder to the operation.
3.3.5
Ingot Handling
Using a moving mold as we are using makes the ingot handling much simpler. Upon completion mold can be moved above the ingot and ingot can be
extracted using a forklift.
3.4
Electrical systems
The major function of ESR is to melt metal using electrical arcing. For
this we want to have a low voltage so that we can have high current for the
same power. Current causes the heating of the electrode and melt rate is
dependent on the current supplied. The desired voltage is 40-50V, this is
determined by the slag composition, and ingot geometry. Current required
for melting can be estimated using the fact that melt energy is 1.2kW.h/kg.
This gives current as 60 A/kg. Overall we will need maximum of 50000A.
This current can be single phase AC or 3 phase AC. Single phase AC is more
suited to our application as we use a single electrode.
3.4.1
Motors
3.4.2
Water Pumps
We need to use electrical pumps that have adjustable flow rates. Since different electrodes will have different dissipation heats. The flow rates can be
predetermined empirically and can be used at presets at various ingot sizes.
3.4.3
Controls
Wiring
10
3.4.6
Connectors
For normal wiring standard connectors can be used. For the hanging bus bar
and other bus bars we silver the surface of contact withe the connectors. High
contact resistances can cause contacts to break on high currents. Silvering
helps reduce the contact resistance.
11