Slag eye formation in single and dual bottom purged industrial steelmaking ladles

Argon gas is often injected from the bottom of the ladle during steel refining operations. The injected gas interacts with the liquid (metal and slag) bath and enhances the momentum, heat, and mass transfer rate in the melt. However, during these gas–liquid interactions, an opening of the slag layer called slag eye is formed, which exposes the molten metal surface to the atmosphere, which is generally undesirable. In the current work, a transient, three-dimensional mathematical model is used to study the turbulent gas–liquid interactions in single as well as dual bottom blown industrial steelmaking ladles. A Coupled Level Set Volume of Fluid (CLSVOF) model is used for tracking the steel-argon, steel-slag, and argon-slag interfaces, from which the slag-eye area has been predicted. It is found that the inlet gas purging rate, melt height, slag layer thickness, angular and radial positions of the gas inlets affect the slag opening area. Non-dimensional empirical correlations are proposed to predict the slag opening area in both single as well as dual purged ladles, using non-linear regression analysis.