8th International Congress on Science and Technology of Ironmaking - ICSTI 2018

Significant Blast Furnace (BF) hearth lining life extension is the target of the improved BF-hearth lining observation management; provided by Paul Wurth, Germany, (PWDE). The hearth lining main property modifications occur noteless during the running BF-life campaign and influenced the real hearth lining wear profile. No classical hearth lining temperature and heat flux observation implementation can detect the main physical and chemical property modifications and their alterations during the running BF-campaign. A number of main measuring disadvantages and poor evaluation results prevents up to this day the necessary true hearth lining wear profile calculation. For example: • Supply of unsufficient hearth lining temperature and heat flux data; • Formations of „heat resistances“, like joints, slots, gaps, structure transformations, embrittlements, like „brittle layers“; • Particular variations of the lining grades TC-values and their alterations during the running BF-campaign. It is very noticeable, that the classical measured value disadvantages and ist poor evaluation results take place already in an early stage of the running BF-campaign.The real hearth lining weak points, like accelerated wear, „hot spots“ or critical reduced hearth lining thickness, can`t detect in an early stage for appropriate counter measurements. PWDE has developed and improved in the last decade precise multipoint temperature & heat flux sensor Probes, (MTP-sensor probes). Meanwhile, the well experienced tool is implemented in a number of BF-hearth bottom and side walls, recording excellent performance data results. The new developed chilling device, necessary for safety pilot core probe drillings and core probe extractions in the BF-hearth lining without salamander tapping will be introduced in this paper. The paper highlights the well experienced hearth lining measuring tool (MTP- sensor probe) for an improved lining observation, true lining wear forecasts and an extended BF-hearth lining life campaign; inspite of „heat resistances“ and / or „brittle layer“ formations in the BF-hearth lining.