Mathematical and Physical Simulation of a Top Blown Converter

A mathematical model of a top blown converter, which was based on a physical model of a 30 t vessel, was developed in this study. A simplified model consisting of the converter was used in the mathematical simulation. With the simplified model, it is possible to run a large number of tracer calculations within a short time, compared to solving for the entire flow evolution each time. A cavity depth and radius comparison has been done between the physical model and the mathematical model, which showed a good relative difference of 2.5% and 6.1% for the cavity depth and radius, respectively. The velocity change in the bath of the converter was monitored by setting several monitoring points in the physical model. A fully developed flow field was assumed to occur when the fluctuations in these points were small or periodic. It took approximately 25 s to get a developed flow field. In addition, the predicted mixing time showed a good relative difference of 2.8% in comparison to the experimental data. A simplified model consisting of the converter has been used in the mathematical simulation. The comparison between the physical model and the mathematical model shows that the simplified top blown model can successfully be used to calculate long-time simulations, and the mixing time calculations in frozen field can save a large amount of time compared to the simulation time using a transient flow field.