WORLD CEMENT

International Cement Review's Technical Forum.

Question: I would like to know the influence of iron ore addition in raw mix ie in burnability, specific heat consumption, etc. Answer: The iron oxide additions in your raw mix increase the melt content at the clinkering temperature in the kiln. The iron oxide forms the mineral C4AF which is a liquid in the burning zone. This fluxes the combination into the clinker minerals increasing the burnability and reducing the fuel consumption. Question: We're suffering from brown clinker. As the results of microscopic analyses, there surely should be reducing condition in the burning of the kiln. So we increased the cooling air flow into the kiln to supply sufficient oxygen. It's getting better but we still have brown clinker. We can't increase the cooling air rate anymore because we already operated the exhaust fan with fully opened condition. So we're considering reducing the coal flow rate. It means clinker production should be decreased. What's the next methods we can do except reduction of throughput production to avoid the brown clinker. Answer: It sounds to me that you must have combustion problems. I recommend that you should contact specialists and pay for a combustion audit. This will be the best way to find the solution. You might try increasing the primary air flow of the burner to maximum, or reducing the secondary air temperature by running the cooler grate with a lower under-grate pressure setpoint. Question: I want to know that proper definition of static pressure. Answer: The static pressure is the pressure with no velocity component. In the kiln hood there will be a slightly negative static pressure. The secondary air will be drawn into the kiln by that negative static pressure. The secondary air has a velocity component. With a pitot tube you can measure the static pressure and the combination of the static pressure and the velocity component. With both measurements you are then able to calculate the velocity at which the secondary air enters the kiln. Question: We are having problems with snowmen. Apart from the method of removal what changes in the burning profile can you recommend to aleviate this problem. What other fluctuations in meal chemistry should we look out for?

Answer: Certainly a change in the burner position might help your snowman problem. The problem is caused by the clinker being too "sticky" when it falls into the cooler. If you push the burner in then there is more time for the clinker to cool and solidify in the outlet section of the kiln before falling into the cooler. Changing the position of the burner is not to be undertaken lightly however. Do it in a planned way and by small steps, observing the effects for some hours between steps. In the raw mix chemistry you are looking for anything which might affect the amount of flux/liquid in the clinker in the burning zone. So alumina, iron, alkalis, fluorides, sulphates, magnesia. My experience was with large snowballs coming through the kiln when magnesia in the limestone changed from 1.3 to 1.6% for a short period. The key thing is stability of the raw mix composition for the main ratios and for the minor oxides and species. Do you have any raw mix proportioning/blending control systems? Question: I would like to know what is the normal number of people working on new cement plants. I understand there is a relation with the capacity of the plant so a relation of workers per million ton could also be useful. Answer: The most efficient plants have manpower productivity of more than 10,000 tonnes per man-year. So a 1 million tonne per year factory would have 100 people. There is a vast range however, and many factors to be taken into consideration; number of kilns, age of equipment, skills and training of workforce, availability of support services. Question: Why does a reducing atmosphere in the kiln cause brown centered clinker? And what are the practical effects of this on the final concrete strengths? Answer: A reducing atmosphere in the burning zone of the kiln leads to the partial reduction of ferric iron, Fe3+, to ferrous iron, Fe2+. These ferrous ions are incorporated in the C3S mineral imparting a brown colouration. It is necessary for the clinker to be slowly cooled in addition to being burnt in reducing conditions for this to occur. This explains why only the cores the nodules are coloured brown. The cooling of the outer layers of the nodules is too rapid for this to occur. The practical effects are that the compressive strength of the cement are substantially reduced due to impaired hydraulic reactivity of the modified C3S. Setting times are also significantly shortened due to higher C3A mineral content as less iron enters into the alumino-ferrite mineral.

Question: We want to konw how coarse quartz particles in kiln feed can affect clinker quality, specially clinker's strength. We had read some articles about this subject, and it would be interesting to know more, especially if there is any correlation between quantity of quartz in coarse fractions and clinker's strength Answer: Coarse quartz crystals in kiln feed cause clinker quality problems due to heterogeneity in the clinker. The reaction of CaO with SiO2 to form C3S and C2S minerals in clinker is a solid state reaction. If there are coarse crystals of quartz (SiO2) then the centres of the crystals remain as unreacted cores of SiO2. There is a secondary problem that as some of the SiO2 is unreacted then a corresponding amount of CaO will be uncombined as free lime. As the SiO2 is not fully combined into the strength developing calcium silicates C3S and C2S, the clinker strength development is reduced. The uncombined free lime can also lead to long term expansion of concrete. This can cause concrete failures and is known as causing durability problems. Question: I am facing the problem of clinker quality in that the core of the clinker is very often brown in colour. What is the solution? Answer: The normal cause of brown cores in cliker is reduction of the Fe3+ to Fe2+. This is caused by insufficient oxygen available to fully combust the fuel in the kiln. You need to improve the control of the combustion. Question: We run a 350tpd kiln with a rotary cooler. We sometimes experience brown centred clinker. We have tested chemically for reducing condition. Some of the brown clinker tests positive but at other times not. Are there other conditions or mechanisms that give rise to brown centred clinker aside from reducing conditions, given our circumstances? Answer: Brown centred clinker is very common and is not necessarily detrimental to cement quality. It is not necessarily caused by reductive burning - this is better indicated by the CO content of the kiln exhaust gases. At the temperature in the burning zone some of the iron is always in the reduced 2+ state. As the clinker cools this Fe2+ oxidises to Fe3+ however if you have large clinker nodules or fast cooling then the cores may not be fully reoxidised. Fast cooling of the clinker is good for cement quality. On balance it is better to have rapid cooling and some brown cores in the clinker rather than having slow cooling, provided that you do not have CO in the kiln exit gases. Question: Please let me know the reason of lumps formation in cement silo sidewall. We have seen that this seems to be a common problem in cement plants in india. Even using lump crushers also does not solve this problem. please inform

the reason behind this. Please note that cement temperature is normally below 100 degree centrigrade & silos are constructed in a manner that moisture can not enter silo. Please inform the soluation for this. Secondly it has been noticed that this problem is more common in inverted cone silos compared to flat bottom silos. Answer: Lump formation on the side-walls of cement silos can have a number of causes, but the most common cause is continued dehydration of gypsum after the cement has been blown into the silo. After being liberated the moisture from the gypsum migrates to the side walls of the silo which are slightly cooled from the outside by the ambient air. The moisture condenses at the side walls and reacts with the cement to form lumps. These lumps can grow to 2m think from the walls of the silo. The solution is adequate control of the gypsum dehydration in the cement mill via ventilation and water injection, followed by cooling of the cement in the separator or cement cooler. Question: We have a problem of raw meal composition change with vertical raw mill stopping. We don't have "Dust bin" for EP dust. Normally we are blending the EP dust with raw meal. We are thinking this problem caused by storage silo segregation and EP dust mix. Please teach me most effective improvement method for this problem. Our plant: 4500t/d 4-stage NSP kiln, LM-41.40 Vertical raw mill, 4800t Air Blending silo, 2 storage silo 4000t. Answer: The problem is really segregation of the kiln feed in the top stage of the preheater. Most of the feed goes to the kiln but some (~5%) escapes as dust and is captured in the ESP. The finer particles tend to escape in the dust and these are usually higher in CaO. Blending the high CaO material with the raw mill product is fine until the raw mill has to stop for maintenance. The best solution is to add the ESP dust directly to the kiln feed rather than to the mill product. The effect on kiln feed chemistry is then constant and unaffected by the starting and stopping of the raw mill. The external dust cycle is constantly added back into the kilns feed whenever the kiln is running. When the kiln is stopped there is no ESP dust anyway. Question Generally it is believed that due to use of petcoke, life of metallic parts (like Dip Tube, Nose Ring Sectors etc) can be affected. I would like to know your opinion in this regard. Answer: Pet cokes are generally high in sulphur content and this will result in higher sulphur dioxide content in the kiln gases. Sulphur dioxide is an acidic gas and therefore more corrosion of metal components in the kiln might be expected. It seems reasonable to expect this to be worse in the preheater components such as the dip tubes than the nose ring castings.

Question: In our plant the conversion factor for raw meal to clinker is within the range 1.65 to 1.7 (clinker yield/raw meal consumption). What are the factors that do influence this factor. Does the equipment design and efficiency have an impact on this. Answer: The raw mix to clinker factor is related to the lime saturation factor of the kiln feed. It is a function of the amount of CO2 present in the kiln feed which will be driven off during the process of calcination. This CO2 is present as CaCO3, calcium carbonate and this determines the lime saturation factor. The conversion factor is normally 1.53 to 1.55. There is a further consideration. Your factor of 1.65 to 1.70 almost certainly relates to the actual amount of feed to the kiln which is converted into clinker. This takes into account the amount of kiln feed lost to the kiln in dust in addition to the CO2 lost in calcination. The collection efficiency of the cyclones at the top of the preheater determine what this combined conversion factor should be Question: I would like to know the way to determine the feeding ratios for raw materials to mill. We have four materials: limestone, clay, iron mineral and silica mineral. Answer: You determine the feeding ratios of raw materials to the raw mill dependent on the chemistry targets of your kiln feed. These targets might be the lime saturation, silica modulus, alumina modulus or an individual oxide or a potential clinker mineral content. If you know the chemical composition of the individual raw materials then the correct proportions for feeding to the raw mill can be found by solving simultaneous equations. In practice the chemical composition of the individual raw materials usually varies a little. In order to compensate for this you need to use control charts and vary the feeding ratios to maintain your kiln feed chemistry targets. Question: Please can you tell me about the limitation of SO3 in clinker? What is the disadvantages of its increase? Is this SO3 able to control setting as the hydrated gypsum does? Answer: The limit on sulphate in clinker is that it restricts the amount of sulphate that can be added as gypsum during cement grinding. International specifications for cement limit the amount of sulphate therefore if the clinker contains significant amounts then the gypsum addition must be reduced to remain within the specification. This can be a disadvantage as the ability to adequately retard the cement can be restricted. There can also be process problems associated with higher sulphates in the kiln. The amount of sulphate relative to the alkalis in the clinker is also important. Sulphate will preferentially be bound as alkali sulphates

and these provide soluble alkalis which influence the hydration reactions of the cement and will control the setting. Sulphate in excess of alkali is likely to be bound as dead-burnt anhydrite and this is essentially inert and therefore will not control the setting. As you can see there are a number of factors to take into consideration. Question: I am working in a cement plant. I would like to ask one question regarding cooler to calciner tertiary air flow measurement. Could you please tell us what is the general method adopting in all cement plants. Is it required continuous measurement or when ever it is required we can measure with some pitot tube. Could you please suggest any instrument which can measure continous tertiary duct air (gas) flow. Temperature of gas is around 850 to 950 Degree C. Answer: The air flow in the tertiary air duct between cooler and precalciner is not normally measured. The tertiary air damper is opened to ensure that there is no CO formation in the precalciner. When there is no CO formation the main induced draft fan of the preheater is pulling sufficient air through the tertiary air duct. A pitot tube can be used to measure the flow through the duct when you are conducting your heat balances and process investigations. There is a company Promecon which is providing equipment for in-process flow measurement. This might be worth investigating. Question: What are the positives, negatives and gains in using a vertical roller mill for grinding cement. Answer: The positives and gains from using a vertical mill for grinding cement are that the power consumption per unit of cement produced is lower by around 30%. The negative aspect is that a much tighter particle size distribution is generated in the cement. There are less coarse particles but also less super-fines. This changes the hydration and strength growth characteristics of the cement, which can be unpopular with customers.