Numerical, Physical, and Industrial Investigations on Hot Metal Desulphurization—From Macromixing Conditions to Reaction Rate Phenomena

The efficiency of the hot metal pretreatment process plays a very important role in achieving high-quality and low-cost advanced steel. From macromixing phenomena obtained by numerical modeling and physical experiments to compound interaction databases from industry trials, the Authors compared fundamental relationships from the literature with their own laboratory results and plant data. A simple numerical model based on the LES turbulence approach was well-validated by water modeling. Hence for a 300-ton ladle, the mixing time and mixing power were predicted. Finally, the mass transfer controlled rate was calculated based on a computational fluid dynamics model and thermodynamic model, which indicated results limitations. Moreover, from the industry data, it was found that the rate constant of the desulfurization process varies within a wide range, affecting the efficiency of the sulphur removal degree from values 0.6 to 0.98.