Some Feasibility Studies for Recycling of Steel Slag as a Useful Flux for Submerged Arc Welding

Protection of environment from industrialization and urbanization waste is the prime duty of engineers and researchers. Elimination of industrial waste completely is not possible because it is generally a byproduct of the process. It can be minimized by recycling or reusing. In this research, waste slag generated by steel plant is recycled as a useful flux for submerged arc welding. It is found that recycled slag is capable of producing acceptable weld bead geometry. The penetration achieved using recycled slag is 7.897 mm, which is more than the penetration obtained using fresh flux, i.e. 6.027mm. The reinforcement produced by recycled slag is 2.632mm, which is close to the reinforcement obtained using fresh flux. It is further observed that chemistry of weld metal deposited using recycled slag is also at par with that of weld metal produced using fresh original flux. The amount of carbon present in weld metal produced by recycled slag is 0.15%, which is comparable to the percentage of carbon present in weld metal produced using fresh flux. The microstructure and microhardness obtained using recycled slag are also comparable with the microstructure and microhardness obtained using fresh flux. This research established the feasibility of recycling slag as a flux required for submerged arc welding process.