In the end, the plan they decided on was to use a blast furnace to make ferrosilicon and then a converter to make silicon steel. [No pop-up novel website]
He looked at the various plans on the table and stretched. From the window, you can see the towering flames of Ma Niao No. 1 and No. 2 blast furnaces in the distance - these two large blast furnaces are a bit wasteful for smelting ferrosilicon. For this reason, the Planning Institute specially approved the project to build a small blast furnace in Ma Niao Iron and Steel Company to specifically refine ferrosilicon.
The "Special" blast furnace is currently undergoing its second drying operation. Compared with the 125 cubic meters of the Ma Niao No. 1 and No. 2 blast furnaces, the "Special" blast furnace is mini-sized, with only 30 cubic meters. However, since it is close to the No. 1 and No. 2 blast furnaces, the high-temperature exhaust gas output from these two blast furnaces can be fully utilized, especially the specially built large hot blast furnace.
These powerful conditions allow the smelting temperature of the special blast furnace to be easily raised to a sufficient temperature. Smelting ferrosilicon requires a high temperature exceeding 1800°C, and hot air exceeding 500°C must be continuously blown into the furnace. This is a condition that is difficult to achieve for ordinary small blast furnaces, but for the Ma Niao blast furnace, which has a dedicated large hot blast furnace It's not a problem for the group.
Now we just have to wait for the oven to be completed before we can test the first furnace of ferrosilicon. The raw materials prepared for refining ferrosilicon have also been shipped successively: quartz sand, pig iron, coke... Just waiting for the blast furnace to be opened, experimental refining can be carried out.
The phone on his desk suddenly rang. He picked up the phone and saw that the call was from the shift leader of the special blast furnace. He reported that the intermittent blasting of the coke oven had ended, and new coke was now being put in. Carry out uninterrupted continuous blowing work.
"Very good, continue to run according to the work schedule." Ji Wusheng ordered. The oven work had lasted for 48 hours before this. Ji Wusheng looked at the schedule and found that the first formal feeding would start in about 4 hours. He decided to take a nap first: once the furnace was turned on, he would probably have to stare at it for 24 hours straight.
Ji Wusheng woke up on time one hour before starting the furnace. He washed his face and put on his work clothes. Several apprentice technicians led by him were already waiting outside the office.
The apprentice technicians were young men with some cultural background that he personally selected from among the steel-making workers in the Ma Niao Complex. Currently, I am being trained as a shift leader, and of course I will take on more important tasks in the future.
But good seedlings are lost in frequent accidents. The veteran technicians are well aware of the dangers of working in front of the furnace, and generally try to avoid doing dangerous work personally, and will take preventive measures if they participate. However, the natives of this time and space who have just come into contact with the monster of modern industry have no intuitive understanding at all. Many people did not live long enough to be recognized by Ji Wusheng and had already turned into elements in the smoke and steel.
"Let's go." Ji Wusheng checked everyone's work equipment and said simply. In front of the office building, I boarded the commuter train running inside the steel complex and headed to the blast furnace.
The Ma Niao Iron and Steel Consortium has begun to take shape, although in Ji Wusheng's opinion, this consortium is really shabby. However, according to the standards of this time and space, it is already at the level of science fiction. The rails on the ground, the iron frames and pipes in the sky, and the numerous chimneys are enough to make the natives who enter the factory for the first time be horrified and think that they have entered a certain "demon world".
Ji Wusheng got off the car in front of the "stop" of the No. 2 blast furnace - he wanted to inspect the new blast furnace that was put into operation less than a year ago.
The No. 2 blast furnace was tapping iron. Along with the sound of alarm bells, a furnace flame more than one meter long shot out from the tap hole, and the steam was overwhelming. The fire under the blast furnace was dazzling, and the hot molten iron in the furnace was rolling and beating, glowing with a scorching light; the molten iron was poured out, and chips flew everywhere. The boiling boiler is like a "mountain of flames", spitting out hot flames, and the molten iron in the furnace is like rolling magma, with iron flowers splashing around from time to time.
In the production workshop, workers kept stirring the red and hot molten iron, and their soaked clothes clung to their backs. Standing in front of the blast furnace, the huge mouth with red flames 5 meters away continued to press waves of heat. Along with the spray of steel spray from time to time, the surrounding air was also distorted. The outline of the blast furnace has long been swallowed up by the red flames, and even the steelworkers who are rising and falling next to them, waving stirring rods, seem to be sucked into the big mouth at any time.
Such a grand scene would be thrilling even for the elders, but for Ji Wusheng it was a daily occurrence. The volume of the blast furnace in front of him is less than 1/4 of the blast furnace he worked in in the old time and space.
Naturalized migrant workers work in front of blast furnaces with temperatures above 1,600°C every day. The temperature in the workshop is as high as 55°C, and we work in this environment for 12 hours a day, working in shifts day and night. Half the time is spent in front of a high-temperature furnace. For safety reasons, they wore Lingao-made protective goggles, hard hats, large gloves, thick socks and other protective tools. You must also wear thick canvas long-sleeved protective clothing, each piece of which is several layers thicker than ordinary summer clothing. Each and every one of them had their faces stained black by the smoke.
But the whole body's defense is just to resist the flying iron flowers. As long as there is a mistake, the sparks will burst out, and a piece of red iron will collapse like a bullet. If it hits a person, it will be fatal - with Lingao's medical treatment Level, it is impossible to cure injuries caused by working in front of the furnace.
Ji Wusheng felt beads of sweat falling from his forehead. The average temperature in the blast furnace workshop throughout the year was more than 40 degrees Celsius, and it could reach more than 60 degrees Celsius in summer when it was hot.
The taphole was sealed again. Furnace director Zhao Youcai held a temperature measuring gun in both hands and quickly came to the furnace to test the temperature of the molten iron in the furnace. If the temperature is too high, he will add material to the furnace; if the temperature is low, he will instruct the blower room to increase the blowing air. At this time, beads of sweat flowed out from under his safety helmet, and the protective clothing on his body was completely soaked.
Zhao Youcai came from Guangdong - he was not a refugee, but he immigrated across the sea himself. He was originally working as a blacksmith in Shaoguan, but due to the recent sluggish business, he heard that Lingao needed a large number of blacksmiths, so he came to work. After entering the steelmaking plant, he worked as a foreman at the No. 1 blast furnace.
He has worked as a blacksmith in the earthen iron kilns in Shaoguan for more than ten years and has accumulated rich experience; he can judge the approximate temperature by looking at the fire and smoke. Most of the old craftsmen who were born as blacksmiths and ironworkers have accumulated such experience, but there is neither a standard nor a specific number for this kind of experience accumulation. After arriving at Lingao, through systematic training and furnace practice, his experience was systematically and theoretically sorted out - he is also a studious person, participated in the training class of the steel plant, and became a key worker. His sensitivity to temperature soon came into Ji Wusheng's sight. After working as his "apprentice technician" for a period of time, Zhao Youcai became the director of the No. 2 blast furnace.
"Chief——" Zhao Youcai saw Ji Wusheng and hurried over to greet him.
Ji Wusheng shook his hand: "How is it?"
"It's the second time this class has fired. Everything is normal. Today's conversion rate is very good, I think it can exceed 1." Zhao Youcai showed a proud smile on his face.
"Good job." Ji Wusheng nodded, "You hand over the work in hand to the foreman on duty first, and we go to the special blast furnace."
Zhao Youcai went to go through the handover procedures. Ji Wusheng looked around the blast furnace to see the production situation. The current production situation of the two blast furnaces and one open-hearth furnace was quite stable. Although it was limited to the problem of the furnace material, the intervals between minor repairs, medium repairs and major repairs were somewhat short. , but at any rate continuous production was maintained. It roughly meets the current industrial demand for steel.
However, the shortage of special steel and the shortage of profiles are still the main problems before him. Although the amount of steel produced is considerable, the production capacity of the steel rolling mills that process profiles is far from meeting the current needs of the industry. No matter what enterprise uses it, iron ingots and steel ingots cannot be used directly.
After solving the problem of silicon steel, we must try to produce some equipment for the steel rolling mill and expand the production scale of the steel rolling mill. Ji Wusheng was thinking.
In front of the special blast furnace, workers participating in the trial work have gathered. After the oven work was completed, the workers were cleaning the ash and unburned coke ash in the furnace. Ji Wusheng watched the workers' operations and asked the foreman on duty:
"How's the furnace going?"
"Everything is normal and no damage was found."
Ji Wusheng walked to the silo, where the raw materials for this trial had been prepared: coke, quicklime, pig iron that had been processed into rods, and quartz sand that had been crushed evenly.
Ji Wusheng knew that in addition to coke, quicklime, quartz sand and pig iron had been tested by the Central Laboratory of Heavy Industry and prepared according to the optimal ratio. These pig irons are specially purchased from Guangdong and then processed through desulfurization and dephosphorization.
The pig iron produced by our factory is not used because Tiandu iron ore itself contains high manganese content, so the pig iron produced by Ma Niao's blast furnace also contains high manganese content.
To make ferrosilicon steel, the manganese content is required to be less than 0.35. Excessive manganese content will affect the magnetism of silicon steel sheets. Not only that, silicon steel also requires as few impurities as possible, especially low carbon, low sulfur and low nitrogen. Therefore, in the first step of preparing ferrosilicon, it is necessary to control the content of harmful elements. This will make it easier to improve the yield when using the converter to make steel in the next step.
Ji Wusheng immediately ordered: "Start loading! Turn on the equipment!"
The workers began to fill the furnace with coke, and at the same time began to blow hot air into the furnace. As the amount of coke filled increased and the duration of the blast increased, the bottom of the furnace began to turn red, and the flame in the furnace gradually turned from red to white, and finally turned red. It became a strong white flame light. Ji Wusheng could feel the strong thermal radiation even while standing on the observation platform. Workers began to add quicklime at a ratio of 3 to 4% while adding coke. Add until the oven is two-thirds full.
