Siberian State Industrial University (Novokuznetsk, Russia)

A. A. Umanskii, Dr. Eng., Associate Prof., Director of the Institute of Metallurgy and Materials Science, umanskii@bk.ru
D. T. Feyler, Leading Engineer, Dept. of Ferrous Metallurgy and Chemical Engineering, feyler_dt@sibsiu.ru
R. A. Shevchenko, Cand. Eng., Associate Prof., Dept. of Ferrous Metallurgy and Chemical Engineering, shefn1200@mail.ru
S. V. Feyler, Cand. Eng., Associate Prof., Head of the Dept. of Ferrous Metallurgy and Chemical Engineering, feiler_sv@sibsiu.ru

The study investigates the influence of the tundish working space configuration of a bloom continuous casting machine on the refining conditions of rail steel from non-metallic inclusions. The aim of the research was to substantiate a rational tundish design ensuring higher efficiency of non-metallic inclusion removal through the formation of favorable metal flow hydrodynamics. The investigation was carried out by physical modeling using a laboratory tundish model at a 1:2.5 scale with соблюдением geometric and kinematic similarity. The basic tundish configuration and several variants with full-profile flow-control partitions differing in hole diameters were considered. It was found that the basic configuration promotes the formation of intensive bottom flows directed mainly toward the central strands, which worsens refining conditions. The installation of partitions was shown to change the flow pattern, increase the residence time of metal in the tundish, and promote its movement toward the metal-slag interface. A nonlinear effect of hole diameter in the partitions on melt hydrodynamics was revealed. Pilot industrial testing confirmed the efficiency of the proposed solution by demonstrating a significant decrease in rail rejection rate.
This study was supported by grant No. 25-29-00415 from the Russian Science Foundation, https://rscf.ru/project/25-29-00415/.

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