Development of productivity started in 1981

Chapter 217: Flash Ironmaking Part
On Saturday, April 1984, 4, white clouds were floating above the base. Near the Aerospace Research Institute at the foot of the mountain, a high-altitude airship was carrying the "Departure" space shuttle into the sky.

On the riverside, a 10-story flash iron reduction furnace had been built. It was built by Wang Jiankun using his superpowers the previous evening.

In addition to this reduction furnace that sparkles with a silver metallic luster, there are also iron powder preparation pools, water reservoirs, and molten iron cooling workshops next to it. Further away are hydrogen storage tanks and carbon monoxide storage tanks, which are storage points for two flammable and explosive items. Several pipes connect these tanks to the reduction furnace, and their opening and closing are controlled by valves.

Because it is still in the experimental stage, Wang Jiankun has to use his superpowers to do the initial raw material preparation work himself. After the subsequent tests are completed and the smelting process is explored, he will build a new iron plant near the iron mine.

After finishing his breakfast, Wang Jiankun came to this temporary flash iron-making test site and began to prepare raw materials.

The first thing to do is to process the iron ore. These iron ores were all mined from iron mines in the eastern mountains. They were only simply crushed and cleaned, so he needed to use his superpowers to crush these coarse particles.

While using his super powers to crush the iron ore, Wang Jiankun constantly checked the types and contents of elements in the ore powder and found that the iron content in the ore produced by this iron mine fluctuated around 38%. If these iron ores were to be smelted in a conventional blast furnace, a large amount of coke and slag-forming agents would be required, and the smelting time would be as long as 4 to 6 hours.

In addition to iron oxide, these iron ores also contain silicon oxide, calcium oxide and some sulfur, carbon, aluminum, etc. Wang Jiankun is not sure whether the silicon, calcium, sulfur, aluminum, etc. in them can be completely separated from the molten iron. Therefore, in order to ensure the accuracy of the experiment, he specially processed these ores and controlled these impurity elements in the same proportion, so that he can observe them easily during smelting.

After crushing the coarse iron ore particles into iron ore powder with consistent composition, Wang Jiankun then came to the hydrogen and carbon monoxide storage tanks.

At this time, the tanks had been drained empty, waiting for Wang Jiankun to use his superpowers to fill them up.

Because it is close to the river, it is very convenient to produce hydrogen. He mobilized his superpowers to separate the hydrogen elements in the water and put them into a hydrogen storage tank.

As liquid hydrogen continues to accumulate in the tank, the temperature around the tank is slowly decreasing. Although there are good sealing and insulation layers, some of the tiny molecules of hydrogen will inevitably escape, causing the outer wall of the tank to start cooling down. When the water vapor in the air encounters the low-temperature outer wall of the tank, dew begins to condense on the tank.

While producing hydrogen, Wang Jiankun was also observing the leakage of hydrogen. After some calculations, he confirmed that the leakage was within the expected range and there would be no danger. So he ignored it and concentrated on producing hydrogen and putting it in the tank.

After hydrogen is produced, it is the turn of carbon monoxide.

20 tons of coal had been prepared not far from the carbon monoxide storage tank. Wang Jiankun used his superpowers to extract carbon from the coal, and then combined it with oxygen in the air. The resulting carbon monoxide was continuously stored in the tank.

The boiling point of carbon monoxide is also very low, which is -191.5℃ under normal pressure. In order to liquefy it, the tank made by Wang Jiankun can withstand 200 atmospheres of pressure, the same as liquid hydrogen storage tanks, so the temperature inside the tank is not that low, about -60 degrees Celsius.

At the same time, because carbon monoxide molecules are relatively large and can hardly pass through pressure tanks made of steel and various composite materials, no dew drops appear on the outer wall of the tank filled with carbon monoxide.

After the three raw materials were prepared, Wang Jiankun began to prepare for the formal flash iron-making experiment.

"Attention, all teams. The first experiment of flash iron smelting is about to begin. Please review the operation manual again. Once the experiment begins, each team must strictly follow the procedures."

"Gas Control Team Received."

"Iron Powder Control Team received it."

"Received by the molten iron and slag collection team."

"Magnetic Confinement Control Team Received."

……

After each group gave a clear response, Wang Jiankun checked the raw materials, reduction furnace and pipeline valves again to ensure that no unexpected situations occurred in the first experiment.

Ten minutes later, Wang Jiankun used brainwaves to control the helmet and issued the order to start the experiment. First, the gas control group opened the liquid hydrogen tank according to the process. The liquid hydrogen was gasified and heated in the gasification chamber and then transported to the reduction furnace. Then the carbon monoxide storage tank was opened and gasified and heated in another gasification chamber and then transported to the reduction furnace through a pipeline.

At the exhaust gas outlet, after the gas detection device detects that there is no oxygen, nitrogen and other air components in the exhaust gas, the iron powder control group starts to transport the iron powder to the first chamber of the reduction furnace according to the process.

Then the person in charge of ignition turned on the ignition switch.

The originally quiet test site was suddenly filled with a rumbling sound. The sound continued and almost covered the working noise of the equipment transporting gas and iron powder.

Wang Jiankun used his supernatural powers to observe that as the ignition switch was pressed, the spark plug emitted an electric spark, the hydrogen and iron powder were ignited, and the oxygen in the iron powder exploded with the hydrogen and carbon monoxide.

In Wang Jiankun's mind, particles of iron powder came into contact with numerous hydrogen molecules and carbon monoxide molecules, and then the iron powder shattered instantly. The oxygen elements inside were taken away by hydrogen and carbon monoxide. The iron elements that were freed from the constraints of oxygen elements under high temperature became particularly active.

Some other metal elements such as silicon and aluminum also became active. These different types of elements continued to aggregate and descend. Since silicon and aluminum elements have lower boiling points than iron, they cannot be liquefied at a high temperature of nearly 2700 degrees, so they are sucked into the slag pool by the suction device, leaving almost pure iron elements.

The liquid iron descends under the action of gravity and reaches the magnetic confinement device, where it stays for a short time. The very small amount of other metal elements inside are separated and fall into the slag pool below.

The further purified molten iron is introduced into the taphole, and the temperature is reduced to 1800 degrees Celsius, and the color is bright red.

At this time, the molten iron and slag collection group has started working, connecting each mold to the iron outlet and allowing it to cool inside the mold.

After observing the situation inside the reduction furnace, Wang Jiankun found that the furnace was already quite perfect. Almost all the iron powder that went in was reduced. The only thing was that the amount of hydrogen and carbon monoxide used could be reduced later because there was too much surplus. The remaining amount at the outlet exceeded the original expectation.

However, this requires subsequent continuous experiments, and it is also necessary to compare ores with different iron oxide contents, because the amount of reducing agent used is related to the composition of the ore.

Because a lot of raw materials were prepared, the first furnace was used to test the life of various high-temperature and high-pressure resistant equipment in the furnace. So the experiment continued and molten iron was continuously produced.

At this time, the molten iron that came out at the beginning had solidified and cooled down to several hundred degrees. Wang Jiankun paced to the iron block storage area and saw that several silver-white pure iron blocks had been stacked in the finished product area by the new human ironmaking workers participating in the experiment.

Wang Jiankun did not touch them with his hands, because although these silvery-white pure iron blocks were no longer steaming, their temperature was still over 200 degrees Celsius.

He used his super powers to examine them carefully and found that the other elements in the iron blocks were almost negligible. These were all extremely pure iron blocks.

This result shows that the flash iron reduction furnace designed by Tomoko is very excellent.

The experiment lasted for half an hour, and all the 400 tons of iron powder prepared were used up. A total of 152 tons of pure iron were produced. The iron element in the iron powder was almost completely collected to make pure iron.

According to existing data, such a reduction furnace can produce 38 tons of iron using iron powder with an iron content of 152% in half an hour. If it runs continuously for 24 hours, the daily iron production will reach 3648 tons, and 10 tons will be produced in a month.

This speed is a great improvement compared to traditional blast furnace ironmaking. Moreover, this type of furnace occupies a small area, requires very little reducing agent, and almost no slag-forming agent.

In addition, this flash iron reduction furnace can use iron ore with various iron contents, which makes it very suitable for use in northern Myanmar and Myanmar.

In the next few days, Wang Jiankun continued to prepare raw materials and test the amount of reducing agent required for iron ore powders with different iron contents.

By around May 5, the flash iron-making process had basically matured. Wang Jiankun completed the first phase of the experiment and began to report the results to his uncle, preparing to have Quan Jiezhen begin full preparations for the construction of this new ironworks.

(End of this chapter)