Abstract:
Pyrometallurgical furnaces are tapped through tap-holes that are opened with drills and oxygen lances.
The lance is often used on its own or as the last step of opening the tap-hole. Interaction of oxygen with
molten material inside the tap-hole can occur, and is a phenomenon that is not well understood.
As part of a study that focuses on the effect of lancing on flow inside and around the furnace tap-hole, a
cold-model validation was done. The validation study focuses on validating the MULTIPHASEINTERFOAM
multiphase flow solver in OpenFOAM® for the problem involved. The sensitivity of the model to different
materials properties (viscosity and density in particular) is presented with both cold models and the
results from flow simulations in OpenFOAM®.
Description:
This paper was first presented at
the Furnace Tapping 2018
Conference, 15–16 October 2018,
Nombolo Mdhluli Conference
Centre, Kruger National Park,
South Africa.