Effect of Salt Tracer Dosages on the Mixing Process in the Water Model of a Single Snorkel Refining Furnace

The improvement in mixing conditions in a vacuum refining unit plays an important role in enhancing the purity and decarburization of molten steel. Mixing time is an important index to evaluate the operation efficiency of a metallurgical reactor. However, in water models, the effect of salt tracer dosages on the measured mixing time in a vacuum reactor is not clear. In this study, a water model of a Single Snorkel Refining Furnace (SSRF) was established to study the effect of salt solution tracer dosages on the mixing time of monitor points. The experimental results show that, in some areas at the top of the ladle, the mixing time decreases first and then increases when increasing the tracer dosage. Numerical simulation results show that, when the tracer dosage increases, the tracer flows downwards at a higher pace from the vacuum chamber to the bottom of the ladle. This may compensate for the injection time interval of large dosage cases. However, the mass fraction of the KCl tracer at the right side of the bottom is the highest, which indicates that there may be a dead zone. For the dimensionless concentration time curves and a 99% mixing time, at the top of the vacuum chamber, the curve shifts to the right side and the mixing time decreases gradually with the increase in tracer dosage. At the bottom of the ladle, with the increase in tracer dosage, the peak value of the dimensionless concentration time curve is increased slightly. The mixing time of the bottom of the ladle decreases significantly with the increase in tracer dosage. However, in the dead zone, the mixing time will increase when the tracer dosage is large. At the top of the ladle, the effect of the tracer dosage is not obvious. The mixing time of the top of the ladle decreases first and then increases when increasing the tracer dosage. In addition, the mixing time of the top of the ladle is the shortest, which means that sampling at the top of the ladle in industrial production cannot represent the entire mixing state in the ladle.