THERMODYNAMICS OF THE PROCESSES OF INTERACTION OF LIQUID METAL COMPONENTS IN Fe – Mg – Al – La – O SYSTEM

Abstract

At the present time, rare-earth elements in metallurgy are used in  the form of mischmetal – a rare-earth elements natural mixture (with  atomic numbers from 57 to 71). It contains about 50  wt.  % of cerium.  The remaining elements are mainly lanthanum and niobium. The specific composition is determined by the ore deposit. Inconstant composition of the modifier containing rare-earth metals (REM) can significantly reduce its efficiency. Experimentally, for every branded steels  composition the ratio of various REMs can’t be selected because of the  high costs of obtaining technically pure rare-earth metals. The task of  determining the each rare earth element optimum concentrations and  complex ligature composition can be solved by thermodynamic modeling. In the framework of thermodynamic modeling, the interaction  between magnesium, aluminum and lanthanum with oxygen in liquid  iron is presented. And the thermodynamic model of steel deoxidation  by these active metals composition is considered. On the basis of available literature data on the phase diagrams of the systems MgO – Al2O3 ,  MgO – La2O3 and La2O3 – Al2O3 , the coordinates of the invariant equilibria points in the system MgO – La2O3 – Al2O3 were determined. The  phase diagram of the system MgO – La2O3 – Al2O3 was constructed. It  made possible to establish all phase equilibria realized in the process  of deoxidation of steel with magnesium, lanthanum and aluminum and  to describe these phase equilibria by chemical reactions equations. The  activity of the components in liquid oxide melts was determined using  the theory of subregular ionic solutions, which takes into account the  dependence of the coordination number of cations on the composition  of the oxide melt. The activity of components in metal melts conjugated with oxide systems were determined by Wagner’s theory using the  parameters of the first order interaction. Equilibrium constants values  for the steel deoxidation reactions are installed indirectly by thermodynamic calculations. On the basis of the obtained data the components  solubility surface in the metal melts of Fe – Mg – Al – La – O system  was constructed, which allowed to determine the liquid metal composition regions associated with the corresponding oxide phase.