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Improvement of Ladle Life in the Bhilai

Steel Plant
a
S. S. Ghose
a
Bhilai Steel Works, Bhilai, M.P.
Published online: 11 Jul 2014.

To cite this article: S. S. Ghose (1964) Improvement of Ladle Life in the Bhilai Steel Plant,
Transactions of the Indian Ceramic Society, 23:1, 115-117, DOI: 10.1080/0371750X.1964.10855489

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0371750X.1964.10855489

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 Improvement of Ladle Life in the Bhilai Steel Plant
S. S. GHOSE
Bhilai Steel Works, Bhilai, M.P.
T HE consumption of refractories used in lining
the steel teeming ladles, constitutes a major
percentage of the total refractories consumption
in a Steel Plant and hence any attention paid
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towards improving the ladle life is well justified.
In Bhilai Steel Plant, moreover, there are only
nine ladles of 270 ton capacity to service six
250-ton capacity open-hearth furnaces i.e. 1.5
ladles per furnace and thus ladle life becomes
vitally important, in maintaining a high level
of productions in the Steel Melting Shop.
In view of the above, special attention has
been paid in regard to the ladle life at Bhilai
right from the commissioning of the Steel Melt-
ing Shop in October, 1959. Attempts to im-
prove the ladle life and the results obtained,
so far, are outlined in this paper.
Some of the principal factors which affect
the ladle life are ( 1) types of steel made,
(2) temperature of steel tapped, (3) amount of
slag carried over into the ladle, (4) duration
of the teeming, (5) the pattern of brick lining
in the ladle, (6) workmanship of the brick
lining, (7) quality of the ladle bricks and (8)
quality of the mortar used for brick lining.
The Refractories Engineering Department has
direct control over the items 5, 6, 7 and 8 and
hence main attention was focussed on these
items.
The pattern of brick lining: The brick lining
of the ladle was done initially as per the draw-
ing supplied by "Gipromez" the Soviet organi-
sation who have put up the plant. However,
from observations of the wear pattern of the
115
med ladles, some design changes in the brick
lining were made to obtain better ladle life.
Thus, the observations revealed that where
the metal stream from the launder of the open
hearth furnace strikes the ladle, the rate of wear
is quite severe and in this "Striker Patch" area
the lining thickness was increased.
Similarly the height of the intem1ediate stage
of brickwork was also increased as considerable
wear was noticed at the junction of the inter-
mediate and the topmost stage of the brickwork
as per the original drawing. These two small
changes in the arrangement of brickwork of the
ladle have proved to be very satisfactory in pro-
longing the ladle life.
Workmanship: The importance of close and
tight joints properly filled in with mortar in the
brick lining of ladles is well-known and this has
all along been emphasized at Bhilai. The Su-
pervisors check the ladle brickwork joints with
gauges and more than 1.5 to 2 mm joint thick-
ness is not allowed.
Quality of the ladle bricks: The importance
and the great influence of the quality para-
meters of ladle bricks on ladle life are well-
known and generally recognized. However,
the dimensional accuracy and minimum size
variations of ladle bricks are not usually given
the proper importance in Indian steel plants.
At Bhilai Steel Plant, it was decided to use
ladle bricks conforming to Soviet Specification,
for reasons stated earlier. The Soviet Specifica-
tions for High-Grog Fireclay bricks for the
lining of the Steel teeming ladles are as follows:
 %(Al2 0 3 +Ti0 2 )-not less than 39 %Apparent Porosity 15-17 14-16.5
Refractoriness-not less than 1730°C
Cold Crushing strength
Refractoriness under load-T a,
Kg I Cm 2 350-500 500--600
not less than 1420°C
Linear Reheat Shrinkage at 1400°0, As a result of the gradual improvement
not more than 0.2% of indigenous ladle bricks the import of ladle
Apparent Porosity not more than 18% bricks has been gradually brought down as
Crushing Strength in KgjCm 2 shown below :-
not less than 400
Imported ladle bricks
Size Tolerances-not more than + 1 to 1.5%
depending on dimensions. Year % of the total requirement
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High-grog ladle bricks confom1ing to the

1960-61 77
1961-62 65
above specifications were not available indigen-
1962-63 46
ously in 1959 and hence imported Russian ladle
1963-64 10
bricks were used initially to reline the ladles.
1964-65 0
However, to have the above type of indigenous
ladle bricks the refractory manufacturers were The quality of the mortar: The quality of
infonned of the requirements and specifications the fireclay mortar used for ladle relining. plays
of the high grog ladle bricks and trial orders to a significant role in determining the ladle life.
evaluate the service perfom1ances of improved The fireclay mortar should be fine-grained, of
indigenous ladle bricks were given to those in- good plasticity, of sufficient refractoriness and
terested. The service performance data of the should possess low after shrinkage or preferably
indigenous ladle bricks were made available to slight after expansion.
the manufacturers and joint discussions were
held for further improvement of the quality of At Bhilai, ordinary fireclay mortars having
ladle refractories. the following properties were used initially.

As a result of this healthy co-operative efforts .Fireclay Fireclay

between the steel plant and the refractory manu- Mortar Mortar
facturers, the current ladle brick supplies of one No. 1 No.2
indigenous manufacturer is in no way inferior Refractoriness °C 1680 1660
to the imported Russian ones as will be evident
% linear after shinkage
from the data given below:-
at 1350°C for 1 hour 0.6 1.05
Indigenous Russian
Ladle Ladle However, as a result of research work taken up
Bricks Bricks in the Refractories Laboratory, an improved
fireclay mortar having reheat expansion was de-
(Al 2 0s+Ti02) % 35.3 41.04
veloped. This is being manufactured in the
Refractoriness °C 1710 1750 Mortar Shop of the Refractory Materials Plant
Refractoriness under load at Bhilai and is being regularly used for ladle
oc relining with very satisfactory results·. There is
Ta 1480 1480 no steel penetration in the joints of the ladle
Te 1590 bricks and after tapping occasional cold heats,
Reheat shrinkage at twelve to fourteen feet skulls have come out
1450°C 0.2-0.3 0.2 cleanly from the ladle, without damaging the

116
 13 12'76 12'54
13'03

12 12'00 11'9

1963 II
10
9
13
12
II 11"07 11"10
1962
10
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10'0

9
13
12
II
10'65
10'2
1961 10 98 10'0

9
Jan. Feb. Mar. Apr. May Jun July Aug. Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec.
Fig. !-Average ladle life in heats
Year 1961 1962 1963
Average ladle (No. of heats) 10.35 10.25 12.32

brickwork. The properties of this improved fire-
clay mortar are,
Refractoriness °C 1690-1700
% linear expansion at 1350°C 2.13
The results of ladle life obt'ained at the Bhilai
Steel Plant arc shown in the Figure 1.
In 1961, about 90 per cent of the ladle bricks
used were imported, in 1962 about 50 per cent
ladle bricks used were imported whereas in 1963
about 90 per cent of the ladle bricks used were
indigenous. The impact of the changes made to
obtain better ladle life and the improvement of
the quality of the indigenous ladle bricks arc
quite obvious from the graph. Incidentally,
this improvement in ladle life made it possible
to tap 21 heats on 8-7-1963 and 23 heats on
17-10-1963 with only nine ladles and also is res-
ponsible, in no small measure, for the record
output of 1.15 million tons of steel ingots (i.e.
115 per cent of the rated capacity), of the steel
melting shop at the Bhilai Steel Plant.
The consumption of ladle bricks at Bhilai is
the lowest in India to-day. This work of im-
proving the ladle life is continuing and still
better results are expected in future.
Acknowledgements
The author would like to· place on record his
appreciation of the keen interest taken by the
staff and workers of the Opeh Hearth Ladle Re-
pair Section, in the above work. Sincere thanks
are due to the Chief Superintendent (Iron &
Steel) and the General Superintendent, for the
encouragement given and interest shown. Last-
ly, the author would like to thank the General
Manager, for his kind permission to publish this
paper.

117