Decarburization of Levitated Fe-Cr-C Droplets by Carbon Dioxide

Experiments have been conducted at 1873 K (1600 °C) to study the kinetics of decarburization of Fe-Cr-C levitated droplets containing 10, 17, and 20 wt pct Cr using argon–carbon dioxide gas mixtures containing up to 30 pct CO2, at flow rates of 100, 1000, 3000 and 12200 mL min−1. It was found that chromium did not have a strong influence on the kinetics of decarburization while showing only minor effects on the extent of carbon removal. The results indicate that, for high carbon concentrations in the melt, the decarburization rates were controlled by mass transfer in the gas phase. Conventional formulation of governing mass transport numbers did not adequately describe the experimental observations made in this work. The observed rates are consistently higher than the values predicted using either the Ranz–Marshall correlation or the Steinberger–Treybal equation. A new correlation has been proposed to express the decarburization kinetics of levitated droplets for gas-flows in the range of Reynolds numbers between 2 and 100. The experimentally-derived model was found to be in excellent agreement with rate data derived from studies conducted by other researchers using levitated droplets.