Effect of CaF2 Addition on the Silicothermic Reduction of MnO in Ferromanganese Slag

The effect of temperature and CaF2 (fluorspar) addition on the silicothermic reduction behavior of MnO in the CaO-40 pct MnO-SiO2 (C/S = 1.0) system, which is used to simulate high carbon ferromanganese (HCFeMn) slag, was investigated at 1773 K (1500 A degrees C). The production of SiO2 was stoichiometrically balanced with the consumption of MnO in the slag phase in the CaF2-containing systems based on the reaction "[Si] + 2(MnO) = (SiO2) + 2[Mn]," whereas the SiO2 production was lower than the MnO consumption in the CaO-MnO-SiO2 ternary system, which may have originated from the production of SiO gas in the latter. From the temperature dependence of the mass transfer coefficient of SiO2, the activation energy of the silicothermic reduction process was determined to be about 217.9 kJ/mol, which was very close to the activation energy reported in the literature for mass transfer in the slag phase. The mass transfer coefficient of SiO2 exhibited a maximum value at 5 mass pct CaF2, which originated from an increase in the apparent viscosity of the slag due to the precipitation of solid cuspidine at CaF2 content greater than 5 pct. Consequently, the addition of fluxing additive CaF2 should be carefully determined, because an excess of CaF2 results in the formation of cuspidine during silicothermic reactions.